In the summer months, the Digger’s costume is extremely simple,—after the fashion of that worn by our common parents, Adam and Eve. In winter, however, the climate of his desert home is rigorous in the extreme,—the mountains over his head, and the plains under his feet, being often covered with snow. At this season he requires a garment to shelter his body from the piercing blast; and this he obtains by stitching together a few skins of the sage-hare, so as to form a kind of shirt or body-coat. He is not always rich enough to have even a good coat of this simple material; and its scanty skirt too often exposes his wrinkled limbs to the biting frost.
Between the Digger and his wife, or “squaw,” there is not much difference either in costume or character. The latter may be distinguished, by being of less stature, rather than by any feminine graces in her physical or intellectual conformation. She might be recognized, too, by watching the employment of the family; for it is she who does nearly all the work, stitches the rabbit-skin shirt, digs the “yampa” and “kamas” roots, gathers the “mezquite” pods, and gets together the larder of “prairie-crickets.” Though lowest of all American Indians in the scale of civilization, the Digger resembles them all in this,—he regards himself as lord and master, and the woman as his slave.
As already observed, there is no such thing as a tribe of Diggers,—nothing of the nature of a political organization; and the chief of their miserable little community—for sometimes there is a head man—is only he who is most regarded for his strength. Indeed, the nature of their country would not admit of a large number of them living together. The little valleys or “oases”—that occur at intervals along the banks of some lone desert stream,—would not, any one of them, furnish subsistence to more than a few individuals,—especially to savages ignorant of agriculture,—that is, not knowing how to plant or sow. The Diggers, however, if they know not how to sow, may be said to understand something about how to reap, since root-digging is one of their most essential employments,—that occupation from which they have obtained their distinctive appellation, in the language of the trappers.
Not being agriculturists, you will naturally conclude that they are either a pastoral people, or else a nation of hunters. But in truth they are neither one nor the other. They have no domestic animal,—many of them not even the universal dog; and as to hunting, there is no large game in their country. The buffalo does not range so far west; and if he did, it is not likely they could either kill or capture so formidable a creature; while the prong-horned antelope, which does inhabit their plains, is altogether too swift a creature, to be taken by any wiles a Digger might invent. The “big-horn,” and the black and white-tailed species of deer, are also too shy and too fleet for their puny weapons; and as to the grizzly bear, the very sight of one is enough to give a Digger Indian the “chills.”
If, then, they do not cultivate the ground, nor rear some kind of animals, nor yet live by the chase, how do these people manage to obtain subsistence? The answer to this question appears a dilemma,—since it has been already stated, that their country produces little else than the wild and worthless sage-plant.
Were we speaking of an Indian of tropical America, or a native of the lovely islands of the great South Sea, there would be no difficulty whatever in accounting for his subsistence,—even though he neither planted nor sowed, tended cattle, nor yet followed the chase. In these regions of luxuriant vegetation, nature has been bountiful to her children; and, it may be almost literally alleged that the loaf of bread grows spontaneously on the tree. But the very reverse is the case in the country of the Digger Indian. Even the hand of cultivation could scarce wring a crop from the sterile soil; and Nature has provided hardly one article that deserves the name of food.
Perhaps you may fancy that the Digger is a fisherman; and obtains his living from the stream, by the side of which he makes his dwelling. Not even this is permitted to him. It is true that his supposed kindred, the Shoshonees, occasionally follow the occupation of fishermen upon the banks of the Great Snake River,—which at certain seasons of the year swarms with the finest salmon; but the poor Digger has no share in the finny spoil. The streams, that traverse his desert home, empty their waters into the briny bosom of the Great Salt Lake,—a true Dead Sea, where neither salmon, nor any other fish could live for an instant.
How then does the Digger obtain his food? Is he a manufacturer,—and perforce a merchant,—who exchanges with some other tribe his manufactured goods for provisions and “raw material?” Nothing of the sort. Least of all is he a manufacturer. The hare-skin shirt is his highest effort in the line of textile fabrics; and his poor weak bow, and flint-tipped arrows, are the only tools he is capable of making. Sometimes he is even without these weapons; and may be seen with another,—a long stick, with a hook at one end,—the hook itself being the stump of a lopped branch, with its natural inclination to that which forms the stick. The object and purpose of this simple weapon we shall presently describe.
The Digger’s wife may be seen with a weapon equally simple in its construction. This is also a stick—but a much shorter one—pointed at one end, and bearing some resemblance to a gardener’s “dibble.” Sometimes it is tipped with horn,—when this can be procured,—but otherwise the hard point is produced by calcining it in the fire. This tool is essentially an implement of husbandry,—as will presently appear.
Let us now clear up the mystery, and explain how the Digger maintains himself. There is not much mystery after all. Although, as already stated, his country produces nothing that could fairly be termed food, yet there are a few articles within his reach upon which a human being might subsist,—that is, might just keep body and soul together. One of these articles is the bean, or legume of the “mezquite” tree, of which there are many kinds throughout the desert region. They are known to Spanish Americans as algarobia trees; and, in the southern parts of the desert, grow to a considerable size,—often attaining the dimension of twenty to twenty-five feet in height.