“My first impression was that this peculiarly constructed way was a precaution against enemies, and that it was probably the only means of entrance to the interior of the house, but I am now inclined to think this is hardly probable, and conclude that this was rather designed to render a sacred chamber as free as possible from profane intrusion.” This illustrates the peculiar regard in which it was held. Even when sore pressed by their enemies, and obliged to flee to inaccessible heights, they still constructed their sacred place. Cliff-Town, Rio Mancos. These cliff-houses, of which we give illustrations, are quite common in the Mancos. Our frontispiece shows an interesting group, about ten miles from the foot of the cañon. These are situated only about forty feet above the bed of the creek, but still in a secure position. Here a bed of shale had been weathered out of the sandstone, leaving a sort of horizontal groove four feet high and from four to six feet deep. In this a row of minute houses had been built. They had been made to occupy the full height and depth of the crevice, so that when one reaches it at the only accessible point he is between two houses, and must pass through these to get at the others. Besides the cliff-houses, the explorers found that these people had made use of little cave-like openings in the cliffs, and, by walling up the openings, had converted them into houses. These were very common in the Mancos, and of all sizes. Some were evidently merely little hiding places, in which to store away provisions or other articles. In some places the cliffs were literally honey-combed with these little habitations. Sometimes the walls were quite well preserved and new-looking, while all about were others in all stages of decay. “In one place in particular a picturesque outstanding promontory has been full of dwellings. . . . As one from below views the ragged, window-pierced crags, he is unconsciously led to wonder if they are not the ruins of some ancient castle, behind whose mouldering walls are hidden the dread secrets of a long-forgotten people; but a nearer approach quickly dispels such fancies, for the windows prove to be only the doorways to shallow and irregular apartments hardly sufficiently commodious for a race of pigmies. Neither the outer openings nor the apertures that communicate between the caves are large enough to allow a person of large stature to pass, and one is led to suspect that these nests were not the dwellings proper of these people, but occasional resorts for women and children, and that the somewhat extensive ruins of the valley below were their ordinary dwelling places.”20 Caves used as Houses, Rio Mancos.