Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 July 1885 — A Sand-Storm in New Mexico. [ARTICLE]

A Sand-Storm in New Mexico.

The air was still as death, and there was not a puff of wind nor a rag ot cloud in the whole horizon. I observed, however, that the sky had undergone a curious ehange. There was no diminution of the blazing sunlight, but tbe deep blue had been superseded by a strange white glare that was nearly blinding, and the heat had iacf|sSqa rather than diminished. We saddled hastily, and were soon threading' onr way through the broiling labyrinth of sand-hills and out On the broad mesa again. We had not gone more than a mile or two in the direction of Espanola when Joe, who had been glancing about in all directions, suddenly remarked, “There she comes!” and jumping off his burro, commenced tying him up behind an adjacent heap of large bowlders. We stared in the direction he pointed, but could discover nothing save the white sky, the hills, and the sandy plains. As we looked, however, we gradually became aware that far down the valley two or three of the hills had entirely disappeared, and, stranger still, that more of them were being eaten up under our very eyes! A little brownish-black cloud, no bigger than one’s hand, was the monster that was thus devouring the landscape. We hastily secured the animals in the shelter of the rocks, and came back to look. The cloud had already spread quite across the plain and valley, and was approaching with frightful rapidity. It was not more than five miles away. It swept along toward us, with constantly accelerating speed, a bellying, portentous black wall of dust, that sent long waving fingers up to the zenith. Mile after mile of mesa, and hill alter hill, disappeared in its vast maw, until there was only one rise left. This was swallowed up, tfftd then, almost before wo coulel seek shelter, the storm was upon us with a shriek and a blast like the breath from a cannon.

In an instant everything was obscured. I peered through my halfclosed Jids, and could not see a sage,bush which I had noticed the moment before only a few feet distant. The air was full of the dull roar of the battling winds. We could barely hear the sound of our voices when we shouted. Everything had been wiped away from the face of the earth, and a blur of gray dust was all that remained. could barely distinguish those nearest me through this strange mist. The worst of it lasted for about half an hour, I should think, but the air was still full of dust when we arrived home about two hours later. Such is a New Mexican sand-storm. We found, all our household goods covered with a mat of from half an inch to an inch of impalpable powder, which had sifted in through every crack and cranny. Nothing had escaped.— liirge Harrison, in Harper’s Mugasins. —