Page:Our Neighbor-Mexico.djvu/403

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
"A HOLE IN THE WALL."
391

regular shape. They look like guardsmens' hats, and well become these watchers of the vale.

The next range is not less than ten miles long, and is more varied in outline, though below, at the city, it looks so like a mitre that it bears that name. Far up its side, close at the edge of that same stratified summit, a bit of a hole lets you into a marvelous cave. But how to get to the hole is the question. It looks impossible, but a gentleman riding with me says he has done it. A safe but very steep path leads up that sheer, swart, hot wall. It was built by an American, who fell a martyr to the revolution a year ago.

The last range is before us, and back of the city, which lies hidden at its base, a huge piece, seemingly cut out of its ridge, making

SADDLE MOUNTAIN.

it look like a Mexican saddle, and hence its name of Saddle Mountain. It is a quaint feature in the scene. More quaint, however, is a hole on the opposite side. Near to the top of that ridge you see a hole clean through the face of the rock, opening to the light opposite. It looks from the valley as of the size of a hat. It is really large enough to let a yoke of oxen and their cart go through, though I have never heard of that being attempted. Whoever should attempt it would "hitch his wagon to a star," as Emerson