File:The American Museum journal (c1900-(1918)) (17975984209).jpg

Title: The American Museum journal
Identifier: americanmuseumjo18amer (find matches)
Year: c1900-(1918) (c190s)
Authors: American Museum of Natural History
Subjects: Natural history
Publisher: New York : American Museum of Natural History
Contributing Library: American Museum of Natural History Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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THE HAVASUPAl OF CATARACT CANON G39 hand and drops away on the otluM- side with nauseating precipitancy to tlie rocky floor below. Now we entered a cleft deeper than usual and arrived at the liead of a great fall of rock, down which the rough trail zigzagged in be- wildering fashion to negotiate the last drop of five hundred feet to the canon bed. Following the example of my In- dian companions, I dismounted and led my horse—not in the least envious of one foolhardy Indian boy who rode aliead. jumping his liorse like a moun- tain sheep from rock to rock. Arriving at last on the comparatively level floor of the caiion, we mounted onr horses again and rode rapidly forward along the arid bed of Cataract Creek. Still descending, through cactus thickets and over great rocks, we came finally upon the Havasupai oasis, fully twelve miles from our ini- tial plunge over the rim. Here Cataract Creek bursts forth in full volume to dash away along its rocky bed for about two miles be- fore it tumbles in a series of cascades down another thousand feet or so to join the Colorado Eiver. Over the dense thicket of willows and Cottonwood trees that fills the caiion from wall to wall drifts the blue smoke from camp fires, in ethereal strata. Set among the trees and difficult to delineate in the dusk are the brush-covered houses: some of these are rectangular with dirt-strewn roofs and brush walls; others are shaped like our own wall tents, but so low and so covered with dirt as to seem mere sand mounds; still others are rough log cabins such as the Xavaho build : but the greatest num- ber perhaps are dome-siiaped, brush- thatched structures like huge beehives. Around them stretch fields of corn, beans, and squash, dotted with peach and fig trees, irrigated by ditches lead- ing from the little dams which divert the current of Cataract Creek. The life of these Indians of the canon depths was most interesting to study and to enter into. With dawn the camps are awake, and after a hasty meal, men, women, and children are off to the fields. The early morning hours witness an almost feverish activity- planting, hoeing, reaping, or the more strenuous household duties and native crafts, such as scraping and tanning the rapidly drying deer hides; for with
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Tlie Havasupai still make fire on occasion with two dry sticks, one of which, the "drill," is held with its point against the other and then steadily twirled between the palms until a glowing heap of wood dust collects on the hearth. When this pliotograph was taken to illustrate the method, a brisk fire was made in less than a minute. When traveling, the Hava- supai carry short fire sticks, tlie drill being set in an arrow shaft for use

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