[ WORK OF DR. H. C. YARROW.]
During the summer and fall of 1885, Dr. H. C. Yarrow, acting assistant surgeon U.S. Army, examined points in Arizona and Utah. In the vicinity of Springerville, Apache County, Arizona, in company with Mr. E. W. Nelson, he visited a number of ancient pueblos and discovered that the people formerly occupying the towns had followed the custom of burying their dead immediately outside the walls of their habitations, marking the places of sepulcher with circles of stones. The graves were four or five feet in depth, and various household utensils had been deposited with the dead. Mr. Nelson, who had made a careful search for these cemeteries, informed him of the locality of hundreds. Unfortunately for anthropometric science, most of the bones are too much decayed to be of practical value. The places of burial selected at these pueblos are similar to the burial places discovered in 1874 near the large ruined pueblo of Abiquiu, in the valley of the Chama, New Mexico.
Dr. Yarrow also visited the Moki pueblos in Arizona, and obtained from one of the principal men a clear and succinct account of their burial customs. While there he witnessed the famous snake dance, which occurs every two years, and is supposed to have the effect of producing rain. From his knowledge of the reptilian fauna of the country he was able to identify the species of serpents used in the dance, and from personal examination satisfied himself that the fangs had not been extracted from the poisonous varieties. He thinks, however, that the reptiles are somewhat tamed by handling during the four days that they are kept in the estufas and possibly are made to eject the greater part of the venom contained in the sacs at the roots of the teeth, by being teased and forced to strike at different objects held near them. He does not think that a vegetable decoction in which they are washed has a stupefying effect, as has been supposed by some. He also obtained from a Moki high priest a full account of the ceremonies attending the dance. Through the assistance of Mr. Thomas V. Keam, of Keam Canyon, Arizona, and Mr. A. M. Stephen, he was able to procure from a noted Navajo wise man an exact account of the burial customs of his people, as well as valuable information regarding their medical practices, especially such as relate to obstetrics.
From Arizona Dr. Yarrow proceeded to Utah, and made an examination of an old rock cemetery near Farmington, finding it similar to the one he discovered in 1872 near the town of Fillmore. The bodies had been carried far up the side of the mountain; cavities had been prepared in a rock slide, and the bodies placed therein. Branches of cottonwood were then laid over and large boulders piled on top. In several of these graves the skeletons were in a fair state of preservation, and were removed, as well as the articles found with them.
Through the kindness of Mr. William Young, of Grantsville, a skeleton of a Gosiute, in excellent preservation, was obtained, and has been presented to the Army Medical Museum. It may be stated that the examination of the rock cemetery at Farmington showed that the inhabitants of the eastern slope of the Wahsatch Range, in Great Salt Lake Valley, followed the mode of rock sepulture from this, the most northern point visited, to below Parowan, a distance of at least two hundred miles southward, and it seems that these people occupied the valley long subsequent to those living near the water courses who constructed the small mounds on top of which were the rude adobe dwellings, and in some instances used these huts for burial purposes.
[ WORK OF MR. J. C. PILLING.]
In the spring of 1886 Mr. James C. Pilling made a trip to Europe in the interest of his work on the Bibliography of the Languages of the North American Indians, and spent many days in the library of the British Museum, the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris, and several extensive private libraries in England and France. The results of this trip are highly satisfactory and valuable.
[ WORK OF MR. JEREMIAH CURTIN.]
Mr. Jeremiah Curtin continued to collect vocabularies and myths in California. The whole number of myths obtained in California and Oregon was over three hundred. The number of vocabularies was eight, being the Yana, Atsugëi (Hat Creek), Wasco, Miléblama (Warm Springs), Pai Ute, Shasta, Maidu, and Wintu. Texts were also obtained in Yana, Wasco, Warm Spring, and Shasta.