In this instance the houses were situated sixty feet above the trail without any visible means of access. If ladders were used, they were made of timber taller than any of the trees now growing in the valley. Twelve miles below the Montezuma the party discovered really one of the most picturesque and wonderful of all the cliff-dwellings. On the opposite side of the river, where the bluff was two hundred feet high, near the top of the cliff, they observed a deeply receding cave with an opening nearly circular “two hundred feet in diameter, divided equally between the two kinds of rocks, reaching, within a few feet, the top of the bluff above and the level of the valley below. It runs back in a semicircular sweep to a depth of one hundred feet; the top is a perfect half dome, and the lower half only less so from the accumulation of débris and the thick brushy foliage, the cool dampness of its shadowed interior, where the sun never touches, favoring a luxuriant growth. A stratum of harder rock across the central line of the cave has left a bench running around its entire half circle, upon which is built the row of buildings which caught our attention half a mile away.” [Illustration: Row of 11 Rooms, one story in height, from 4 to 10 feet in width, by 130 feet. HORIZONTAL SECTION of the GREAT ECHO CAVE on the RIO SAN JUAN] “It will be seen that the houses occupy the left-hand or eastern half of the cave, for the reason, probably, that the ledge was wider on that side, and the wall back of it receded in such a manner as to give considerable additional room for the second floor, or for the upper part of the one-story rooms. It is about fifty feet from the outer edge in to the first building, a small structure sixteen feet long, three feet wide at the outer end, and four at the opposite end; the walls, standing only four feet on the highest remaining corner, were nearly all tumbled in. Then came an open space eleven feet wide and nine deep, that served probably as a sort of workshop. Four holes were drilled into the smooth rock floor, about six feet equidistantly apart, each from six to ten inches deep and five in diameter, as perfectly round as though drilled by machinery. We can reasonably assume that these people were familiar with the art of weaving, and that it was here they worked at the loom, the drilled holes supporting its posts. At _b_, in this open space, are a number of grooves worn into the rock in various places, caused by the artificers of the little town in shaping and polishing their stone implements. The main building comes next, occupying the widest portion of the ledge, which gives an average width of ten feet inside; it is forty-eight feet long outside, and twelve high, divided inside into three rooms, the first two thirteen and a half feet each in length, and the third sixteen feet, divided into two stories, the lower and upper five feet in height. The joist holes