Snakes and lizards are also cooked and eaten by the Panamints, and their vegetable diet consists chiefly of leaves and buds of cactus plants and other wild herbs. They are not agriculturists and are but indifferent hunters. They seem contented with their lot and evince no desire to leave the desert for a more habitable region.
The Seri Indians are found at the extreme southern portion of the desert. At one time there were considerable numbers of them in the Colorado Desert, but in 1779 the Mexican Government, then in possession of the territory, removed them to the island of Tiburon, where the greater number now live. A few families are to be found, however, in the vicinity of the "Volcanoes" in the Colorado Desert.
The Seri Indians are unreasoning, treacherous, and indolent. The women of the tribe command great respect from the men, and the family relationship is always traced through the mother. In the language or dialect of the tribe there is no equivalent to the word "father," although there is for "mother." Little attention is paid to the death of a male member of the tribe, but when a woman dies the funeral ceremonies are elaborate.
The Cocopahs are another banished tribe, now occupying the desert region south of the boundary line between the United States and Mexico.
Not many years ago their chief village was a few miles from Yuma, which town was their trading-post. Smallpox broke out in the Indian village, but the Indians continued to visit Yuma and soon carried the disease thither. When the authorities learned the source of the infection they forbade the Indians to come to the town, and to insure obedience to the command, a mounted guard was placed about the Indian village. Two Indians one day eluded the guards and walked into Yuma. Then the edict of banishment went forth. The Indians were driven from their homes and across the border into Mexico, and the village and all effects left behind became food for the flames.
A CHEMEHUEVI DWELLING
From photograph by C. C. Pierce & Co.