The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft Part 36

_Lewis and Clarke's Trav._, pp. 557; _Franchere's Nar._, p. 269.

[412] _Kane's Wand._, pp. 310-11.

[413] The princ.i.p.al Okanagan amus.e.m.e.nt is a game called by the voyageurs 'jeu de main,' like our odd and even. _Wilkes' Nar._, in _U. S. Ex.

Ex._, p. 463. It sometimes takes a week to decide the game. The loser never repines. _Ross' Adven._, pp. 308-11; _Stuart's Montana_, p. 71.

[414] Among the Wahowpums 'the spectators formed a circle round the dancers, who, with their robes drawn tightly round the shoulders, and divided into parties of five or six men, perform by crossing in a line from one side of the circle to the other. All the parties, performers as well as spectators, sing, and after proceeding in this way for some time, the spectators join, and the whole concludes by a promiscuous dance and song.' The Walla Wallas 'were formed into a solid column, round a kind of hollow square, stood on the same place, and merely jumped up at intervals, to keep time to the music.' _Lewis and Clarke's Trav._, pp. 526, 531. Nez Perces dance round a pole on Sundays, and the chiefs exhort during the pauses. _Irving's Bonneville's Adven._, pp.

101-2, 245. In singing 'they use _hi_, _ah_, in constant repet.i.tion, ...

and instead of several parts harmonizing, they only take eighths one above another, never exceeding three.' _Parker's Explor. Tour_, pp.

242-3. 'The song was a simple expression of a few sounds, no intelligible words being uttered. It resembled the words _ho-ha-ho-ha-ho-ha-ha-ha_, commencing in a low tone, and gradually swelling to a full, round, and beautifully modulated chorus.'

_Townsend's Nar._, p. 106. Chualpay scalp-dance. _Kane's Wand._, p. 315.

Religious songs. _Dunn's Oregon_, pp. 338-40; _Palmer's Jour._, p. 124.

[415] De Smet thinks inhaling tobacco smoke may prevent its injurious effects. _Voy._, p. 207. In all religious ceremonies the pipe of peace is smoked. _Ross' Adven._, pp. 288-9. _Parker's Explor. Tour_, p. 286; _Hines' Voy._, p. 184. 'The medicine-pipe is a sacred pledge of friends.h.i.+p among all the north-western tribes.' _Stevens_, in _Ind. Aff.

Rept._, 1854, p. 220.

[416] In moving, the girls and small boys ride three or four on a horse with their mothers, while the men drive the herds of horses that run loose ahead. _Lord's Nat._, vol. i., pp. 71-3, 306. Horses left for months without a guard, and rarely stray far. They call this 'caging'

them. _De Smet_, _Voy._, pp. 187, 47, 56. 'Babies of fifteen months old, packed in a sitting posture, rode along without fear, grasping the reins with their tiny hands.' _Stevens_, in _Pac. R. R. Rept._, vol. xii., pt.

ii., p. 130, with plate; _Gibbs_, in _Pac. R. R. Rept._, vol. i., pp.

404-5; _Palliser's Rept._, p. 73; _Farnham's Trav._, pp. 81-; _Domenech's Deserts_, vol. ii., p. 64; _Irving's Astoria_, p. 365; _Franchere's Nar._, pp. 269-71; _c.o.x's Adven._, vol. ii., pp. 110-11.

[417] 'L'aigle ... est le grand oiseau de medecine.' _De Smet_, _Voy._, pp. 46, 205; _Wilkes' Nar._, in _U. S. Ex. Ex._, vol. iv., pp. 494-5; _Stevens_, in _Ind. Aff. Rept._, 1854, p. 212, and in _De Smet's West.

Miss._, pp. 285-6; _Suckley_, in _Pac. R. R. Rept._, vol. i., p. 297; _Hale's Ethnog._, in _U. S. Ex. Ex._, vol. vi., p. 208-9; _Ross' Fur Hunters_, vol. i., p. 64, vol. ii., p. 19; _Kane's Wand._, pp. 267, 280-1, 318.

[418] _Lewis and Clarke's Trav._, pp. 343-4; _Parker's Explor. Tour_, pp. 241-2; _Ross' Adven._, pp. 311-12.

[419] The Walla Wallas receive bad news with a howl. The Spokanes 'cache' their salmon. They are willing to change names with any one they esteem. 'Suicide prevails more among the Indians of the Columbia River than in any other portion of the continent which I have visited.'

_Kane's Wand._, pp. 282-3, 307-10. 'Preserve particular order in their movements. The first chief leads the way, the next chiefs follow, then the common men, and after these the women and children.' They arrange themselves in similar order in coming forward to receive visitors. Do not usually know their own age. _Parker's Explor. Tour_, pp. 87, 133-4, 242. Distance is calculated by time; a day's ride is seventy miles on horseback, thirty-five miles on foot. _Ross' Adven._, p. 329. Natives can tell by examining arrows to what tribe they belong. _Ross' Fur Hunters_, vol. ii., p. 167. Kliketats and Yakimas often unwilling to tell their name. _Gibbs_, in _Pac. R. R. Rept._, vol. i., p. 405.

'D'apres toutes les observations que j'ai faites, leur journee equivaut a peu pres a cinquante ou soixante milles anglais lorsqu'ils voyagent seuls, et a quinze ou vingt milles seulement lorsqu'ils levent leur camps.' _De Smet_, _Voy._, p. 205. Among the Nez Perces everything was promulgated by criers. 'The office of crier is generally filled by some old man, who is good for little else. A village has generally several.'

_Irving's Bonneville's Adven._, p. 286. Habits of wors.h.i.+p of the Flatheads in the missions. _Dunn's Oregon_, pp. 315-6. 'A pack of p.r.i.c.k-eared curs, simply tamed prairie wolves, always in attendance.'

_Lord's Nat._, vol. i., pp. 71-3.

[420] The Nez Perces 'are generally healthy, the only disorders which we have had occasion to remark being of scrophulous kind.' With the Sokulks 'a bad soreness of the eyes is a very common disorder.' 'Bad teeth are very general.' The Chilluckittequaws' diseases are sore eyes, decayed teeth, and tumors. The Walla Wallas have ulcers and eruptions of the skin, and occasionally rheumatism. The Chopunnish had 'scrofula, rheumatism, and sore eyes,' and a few have entirely lost the use of their limbs. _Lewis and Clarke's Trav._, pp. 341, 352, 382, 531, 549.

The medicine-man uses a medicine-bag of relics in his incantations.

_Parker's Explor. Tour_, pp. 240-1. The Okanagan medicine-men are called _tlaquillaughs_, and 'are men generally past the meridian of life; in their habits grave and sedate.' 'They possess a good knowledge of herbs and roots, and their virtues.' I have often 'seen him throw out whole mouthfuls of blood, and yet not the least mark would appear on the skin.' 'I once saw an Indian who had been nearly devoured by a grizzly bear, and had his skull split open in several places, and several pieces of bone taken out just above the brain, and measuring three-fourths of an inch in length, cured so effectually by one of these jugglers, that in less than two months after he was riding on his horse again at the chase. I have also seen them cut open the belly with a knife, extract a large quant.i.ty of fat from the inside, sew up the part again, and the patient soon after perfectly recovered.' The most frequent diseases are 'indigestion, fluxes, asthmas, and consumptions.' Instances of longevity rare. _Ross' Adven._, pp. 302-8. A desperate case of consumption cured by killing a dog each day for thirty-two days, ripping it open and placing the patient's legs in the warm intestines, administering some barks meanwhile. The Flatheads subject to few diseases; splints used for fractures, bleeding with sharp flints for contusions, ice-cold baths for ordinary rheumatism, and vapor bath with cold plunge for chronic rheumatism. _c.o.x's Adven._, vol. ii., pp. 90-3, vol. i., pp. 248-51.

Among the Walla Wallas convalescents are directed to sing some hours each day. The Spokanes require all garments, etc., about the death-bed to be buried with the body, hence few comforts for the sick. _Wilkes'

Nar._, in _U. S. Ex. Ex._, vol. iv., pp. 426-7, 485. The Flatheads say their wounds cure themselves. _De Smet_, _Voy._, pp. 198-200. The Wascos cure rattlesnake bites by salt applied to the wound or by whisky taken internally. _Kane's Wand._, pp. 265, 273, 317-18. A female doctor's throat cut by the father of a patient she had failed to cure. _Hines'

Voy._, p. 190. The office of medicine-men among the Sahaptins is generally hereditary. Men often die from fear of a medicine-man's evil glance. Rival doctors work on the fears of patients to get each other killed. Murders of doctors somewhat rare among the Nez Perces. _Alvord_, in _Schoolcraft's Arch._, vol. v., pp. 652-3, 655. Small-pox seems to have come among the Yakimas and Kliketats before direct intercourse with whites. _Gibbs_, in _Pac. R. R. Rept._, vol. i., pp. 405, 408. A Nez Perce doctor killed by a brother of a man who had shot himself in mourning for his dead relative; the brother in turn killed, and several other lives lost. _Ross' Fur Hunters_, vol. i., p. 239.

[421] The Sokulks wrap the dead in skins, bury them in graves, cover with earth, and mark the grave by little pickets of wood struck over and about it. On the Columbia below the Snake was a shed-tomb sixty by twelve feet, open at the ends, standing east and west. Recently dead bodies wrapped in leather and arranged on boards at the west end. About the centre a promiscuous heap of partially decayed corpses; and at eastern end a mat with twenty-one skulls arranged in a circle. Articles of property suspended on the inside and skeletons of horses scattered outside. About the Dalles eight vaults of boards eight feet square, and six feet high, and all the walls decorated with pictures and carvings.

The bodies were laid east and west. _Lewis and Clarke's Trav._, pp.

344-5, 359-60, 379-80, 557-8. Okanagans observe silence about the death-bed, but the moment the person dies the house is abandoned, and clamorous mourning is joined in by all the camp for some hours; then dead silence while the body is wrapped in a new garment, brought out, and the lodge torn down. Then alternate mourning and silence, and the deceased is buried in a sitting posture in a round hole. Widows must mourn two years, incessantly for some months, then only morning and evening. _Ross' Adven._, pp. 321-2. Frantic mourning, cutting the flesh, etc., by Nez Perces. _Ross' Fur Hunters_, vol. i., pp. 234-5, 238-9, vol. ii., p. 139. Destruction of horses and other property by Spokanes.

_c.o.x's Adven._, vol. i., pp. 200-1. A Shushwap widow instigates the murder of a victim as a sacrifice to her husband. The horses of a Walla Walla chief not used after his death. _Kane's Wand._, pp. 178-9, 264-5, 277, 289. Hundreds of Was...o...b..dies piled in a small house on an island, just below the Dalles. A Walla Walla chief caused himself to be buried alive in the grave of his last son. _Hines' Voy._, pp. 159, 184-8. Among the Yakimas and Kliketats the women do the mourning, living apart for a few days, and then bathing. Okanagan bodies strapped to a tree. Stone mounds over Spokane graves. _Gibbs and Stevens_, in _Pac. R. R. Rept._, vol. i., pp. 405, 413, vol. xii., pt. i., p. 150. Pend d'Oreilles buried old and young alive when unable to take care of them. _Ind. Aff. Rept._, 1854, pp. 211, 238. 'High conical stacks of drift-wood' over Walla Walla graves. _Townsend's Nar._, p. 157. Shushwaps often deposit dead in trees. If in the ground, always cover grave with stones. _Mayne's B.

C._, p. 304. Killing a slave by Wascos. _White's Ogn._, pp. 260-3.

Dances and prayers for three days at Nez Perce chief's burial. _Irving's Bonneville's Adven._, p. 283. Burying infant with parents by Flatheads.

_De Smet_, _Voy._, p. 173. Light wooden pilings about Shushwap graves.

_Milton and Cheadle's Northw. Pa.s.s._, p. 242; _Alvord_, in _Schoolcraft's Arch._, vol. v., p. 655; _Parker's Explor. Tour_, p. 104; _Palmer_, in _B. C. Papers_, pt. iii., p. 85; _Ga.s.s' Jour._, p. 219; _Ind. Life_, p. 55; _Tolmie_, in _Lord's Nat._, vol. ii., pp. 237-8, 260-1.

[422] Sokulks 'of a mild and peaceable disposition,' respectful to old age. Chilluckittequaws 'unusually hospitable and good humoured.'

Chopunnish 'the most amiable we have seen. Their character is placid and gentle, rarely moved into pa.s.sion.' 'They are indeed selfish and avaricious.' Will pilfer small articles. _Lewis and Clarke's Trav._, pp.

338, 341, 351, 376, 556-8, 564. The Flatheads 'se distinguent par la civilite, l'honnetete, et la bonte.' _De Smet_, _Voy._, pp. 31-2, 38-40, 47-50, 166-74, 202-4. Flatheads 'the best Indians of the mountains and the plains,--honest, brave, and docile.' Kootenais 'men of great docility and artlessness of character.' _Stevens and Hoecken_, in _De Smet's West. Miss._, pp. 281, 284, 290, 300. Coeurs d'Alene selfish and poor-spirited. _De Smet_, _Miss. de l'Oregon_, p. 329. In the Walla Wallas 'an air of open unsuspecting confidence,' 'natural politeness,'

no obtrusive familiarity. Flatheads 'frank and hospitable.' Except cruelty to captives have 'fewer failings than any of the tribes I ever met.' Brave, quiet, and amenable to their chiefs. Spokanes 'quiet, honest, inoffensive,' but rather indolent. 'Thoughtless and improvident.' Okanagans 'Indolent rascals;' 'an honest and quiet tribe.'

Sanspoils dirty, slothful, dishonest, quarrelsome, etc. Coeurs d'Alene 'uniformly honest;' 'more savage than their neighbours.' Kootenais honest, brave, jealous, truthful. Kamloops 'thieving and quarrelling.'

_c.o.x's Adven._, vol. i., pp. 145, 148, 192, 199, 239-40, 262-3, 344, vol. ii., pp. 44, 87-8, 109, 145-60. Okanagans active and industrious, revengeful, generous and brave. _Ross' Adven._, pp. 142, 290-5, 327-9.

Skeen 'a hardy, brave people.' Cayuses far more vicious and ungovernable than the Walla Wallas. Nez Perces treacherous and villainous. _Kane's Wand._, pp. 263, 280, 290, 307-8, 315. Nez Perces 'a quiet, civil, people, but proud and haughty.' _Palmer's Jour._, pp. 128, 48, 53, 59, 61, 124-7. 'Kind to each other.' 'Cheerful and often gay, sociable, kind and affectionate, and anxious to receive instruction.' 'Lying scarcely known.' _Parker's Explor. Tour_, pp. 97, 105, 232, 239, 303-4, 311-12.

Of the Nicutemuchs 'the habitual vindictiveness of their character is fostered by the ceaseless feuds.' 'Nearly every family has a minor vendetta of its own.' 'The races that depend entirely or chiefly on fis.h.i.+ng, are immeasurably inferior to those tribes who, with nerves and sinews braced by exercise, and minds comparatively enn.o.bled by frequent excitement, live constantly amid war and the chase.' _Anderson_, in _Hist. Mag._, vol. vii., pp. 77-80. Inland tribes of British Columbia less industrious and less provident than the more sedentary coast Indians. _Mayne's B. C._, pp. 301, 297. Sahaptins 'cold, taciturn, high-tempered, warlike, fond of hunting.' Palouse, Yakimas, Kliketats, etc., of a 'less hardy and active temperament' than the Nez Perces.

_Hale's Ethnog._, in _U. S. Ex. Ex._, vol. vi., pp. 199, 210-13. Cayuses 'dreaded by their neighbors on account of their courage and warlike spirit.' Walla Wallas 'notorious as thieves since their first intercourse with whites.' 'Indolent, superst.i.tious, drunken and debauched.' Character of Flatheads, Pend d'Oreilles, Umatillas. _Ind.

Aff. Rept._, 1854, pp. 207-9, 211, 218, 223, 282, 1861, pp. 164-5.

Yakimas and Kliketats 'much superior to the river Indians.' _Stevens_, in _Pac. R. R. Rept._, vol. i., pp. 405, 298, 403, 416, vol. xii., pt.

i., p. 139. Wascos 'exceedingly vicious.' _Hines' Voy._, pp. 159, 169.

The Nez Perces 'are, certainly, more like a nation of saints than a horde of savages.' Skyuses, Walla Wallas. _Irving's Bonneville's Adven._, pp. 101, 287, 289-90, 300. Tushepaws; _Irving's Astoria_, p.

316. Thompson River Indians rather a superior and clever race. _Victoria Colonist_, Oct., 1860. 'Indians from the Rocky mountains to the falls of Columbia, are an honest, ingenuous, and well disposed people,' but rascals below the falls. _Ga.s.s' Jour._, p. 304. Flathead 'fierceness and barbarity in war could not be exceeded.' _Nicolay's Ogn. Ter._, p. 153.

Flatheads, Walla Wallas and Nez Perces; _Gray's Hist. Ogn._, pp. 171, 219. Kootenais; _Palliser's Explor._, pp. 44, 73. Salish, Walla Wallas; _Domenech's Deserts_, vol. i., p. 88, vol. ii., p. 64. Walla Wallas, Cayuses, and Nez Perces; _White's Oregon_, p. 174. Walla Wallas, Kootenais; _Lord's Nat._, vol. ii., pp. 85, 178. Flatheads, Nez Perces; _Dunn's Oregon_, pp. 311, 315, 326-8. Nez Perces; _Catlin's N. Am.

Ind._, vol. ii., p. 109; _Franchere's Nar._, p. 268. Kayuses, Walla Wallas; _Townsend's Nar._, p. 156. Sahaptins; _Wilkes' Hist. Ogn._, p.

106. Nez Perces; _Hastings' Emigrants' Guide_, p. 59. Flatheads; _Ind.

Life_, pp. ix., x., 25. At Dalles; _Wilkes' Nar._, in _U. S. Ex. Ex._, vol. iv., p. 412. Shushwaps; _Grant's Ocean to Ocean_, pp. 288-304, 313.

At Dalles; _Hunt_, in _Nouvelles Annales des Voy._, 1821, tom. x., p.

82; _Stuart_, in _Id._, 1821, tom. xii., p. 43. Pend d'Oreilles; _Joset_, in _Id._, 1849, tom. cxxiii., pp. 334-40.

[Ill.u.s.tration: NATIVE RACES of the PACIFIC STATES CALIFORNIAN GROUP]

CHAPTER IV.

CALIFORNIANS.

GROUPAL DIVISIONS; NORTHERN, CENTRAL, AND SOUTHERN CALIFORNIANS, AND SHOSHONES--COUNTRY OF THE CALIFORNIANS-- THE KLAMATHS, MODOCS, SHASTAS, PITT RIVER INDIANS, EUROCS, CAHROCS, HOOPAHS, WEEYOTS, TOLEWAS, AND ROGUE RIVER INDIANS AND THEIR CUSTOMS--THE TEHAMAS, POMOS, UKIAHS, GUALALAS, SONOMAS, PETALUMAS, NAPAS, SUSCOLS, SUISUNES, TAMALES, KARQUINES, OHLONES, TULOMOS, THAMIENS, OLCHONES, RUMSENS, ESCELENS, AND OTHERS OF CENTRAL CALIFORNIA--THE CAHUILLAS, DIEGUEnOS, ISLANDERS, AND MISSION RANCHERIAS OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA--THE SNAKES OR SHOSHONES PROPER, UTAHS, BANNOCKS, WASHOES AND OTHER SHOSHONE NATIONS.

Of the seven groups into which this work separates the nations of western North America, the CALIFORNIANS const.i.tute the third, and cover the territory between lat.i.tude 43 and 32 30', extending back irregularly into the Rocky Mountains. There being few distinctly marked families in this group, I cannot do better in subdividing it for the purpose of description than make of the Californians proper three geographical divisions, namely, the _Northern Californians_, the _Central Californians_, and the _Southern Californians_. The _Shoshones_, or fourth division of this group, who spread out over south-eastern Oregon, southern Idaho, and the whole of Nevada and Utah, present more distinctly marked family characteristics, and will therefore be treated as a family.

[Sidenote: HOME OF THE CALIFORNIANS.]

The same chain of mountains, which, as the Cascade Range, divides the land of the Columbians, holds its course steadily southward, and entering the territory of the Californian group forms, under the name of the Sierra Nevada, the part.i.tion between the Californians proper and the Shoshones of Idaho and Nevada. The influence of this range upon the climate is also here manifest, only intenser in degree than farther north. The lands of the Northern Californians are well watered and wooded, those of the central division have an abundance of water for six months in the year, namely, from November to May, and the soil is fertile, yielding abundantly under cultivation. Sycamore, oak, cotton-wood, willow, and white alder, fringe the banks of the rivers; laurel, buckeye, manzanita, and innumerable berry-bearing bushes, clothe the lesser hills; thousands of acres are annually covered with wild oats; the moist bottoms yield heavy crops of gra.s.s; and in summer the valleys are gorgeous with wild-flowers of every hue. Before the blighting touch of the white man was laid upon the land, the rivers swarmed with salmon and trout; deer, antelope, and mountain sheep roamed over the foot-hills, bear and other carnivora occupied the forests, and numberless wild fowl covered the lakes. Decreasing in moisture toward the tropics, the climate of the Southern Californians is warm and dry, while the Shoshones, a large part of whose territory falls in the Great Basin, are cursed with a yet greater dryness.

The region known as the Great Basin, lying between the eastern base of the Sierra Nevada and the Wahsatch Mountains, and stretching north and south from lat.i.tude 33 to 42, presents a very different picture from the land of the Californians. This district is triangular in shape, the apex pointing toward the south, or southwest; from this apex, which, round the head of the Gulf of California, is at tide level, the ground gradually rises until, in central Nevada, it reaches an alt.i.tude of about five thousand feet, and this, with the exception of a few local depressions, is about the level of the whole of the broad part of the basin. The entire surface of this plateau is alkaline. Being in parts almost dest.i.tute of water, there is comparatively little timber; sage-brush and greasewood being the chief signs of vegetation, except at rare intervals where some small stream struggling against almost universal aridity, supports on its banks a little scanty herbage and a few forlorn-looking cotton-wood trees. The northern part of this region, as is the case with the lands of the Californians proper, is somewhat less dest.i.tute of vegetable and animal life than the southern portion which is indeed a desert occupied chiefly by rabbits, prairie-dogs, sage-hens, and reptiles. The desert of the Colorado, once perhaps a fertile bottom, extending northward from the San Bernardino Mountains one hundred and eighty miles, and spreading over an area of about nine thousand square miles, is a silent unbroken sea of sand, upon whose ashy surface glares the mid-day sun and where at night the stars draw near through the thin air and brilliantly illumine the eternal solitude. Here the gigantic cereus, emblem of barrenness, rears its contorted form, casting weird shadows upon the moonlit level. In such a country, where in winter the keen dust-bearing blast rushes over the unbroken desolate plains, and in summer the very earth cracks open with intense heat, what can we expect of man but that he should be distinguished for the depths of his low attainment.

But although the poverty and barrenness of his country account satisfactorily for the low type of the inhabitant of the Great Basin, yet no such excuse is offered for the degradation of the native of fertile California. On every side, if we except the Shoshone, in regions possessing far fewer advantages than California, we find a higher type of man. Among the Tuscaroras, Cherokees, and Iroquois of the Atlantic slope, barbarism a.s.sumes its grandest proportions; proceeding west it bursts its fetters in the incipient civilization of the Gila; but if we continue the line to the sh.o.r.es of the Pacific we find this intellectual dawn checked, and man sunk almost to the utter darkness of the brute.

Coming southward from the frozen land of the Eskimo, or northward from tropical Darien we pa.s.s through nations possessing the necessaries and even the comforts of life. Some of them raise and grind wheat and corn, many of them make pottery and other utensils, at the north they venture out to sea in good boats and make Behemoth their spoil. The Californians on the other hand, comparatively speaking, wear no clothes, they build no houses, do not cultivate the soil, they have no boats, nor do they hunt to any considerable extent; they have no morals nor any religion worth calling such. The missionary Fathers found a virgin field whereon neither G.o.d nor devil was wors.h.i.+ped. We must look, then, to other causes for a solution of the question why a n.o.bler race is not found in California; such for instance as revolutions and migrations of nations, or upheavals and convulsions of nature, causes arising before the commencement of the short period within which we are accustomed to reckon time.

[Sidenote: TRIBAL DIVERSITY.]

There is, perhaps, a greater diversity of tribal names among the Californians than elsewhere in America; the whole system of nomenclature is so complicated and contradictory that it is impossible to reduce it to perfect order. There are tribes that call themselves by one name, but whose neighbors call them by another; tribes that are known by three or four names, and tribes that have no name except that of their village or chief.[423] Tribal names are frequently given by one writer which are never mentioned by any other;[424] nevertheless there are tribes on whose names authorities agree, and though the spelling differs, the sound expressed in these instances is about the same. Less trouble is experienced in distinguis.h.i.+ng the tribes of the northern division, which is composed of people who resemble their neighbors more than is the case in central California, where the meaningless term 'Indians,' is almost universally applied in speaking of them.[425]

Another fruitful source of confusion is the indefinite nickname 'Digger'

which is applied indiscriminately to all the tribes of northern and middle California, and to those of Nevada, Utah, and the southern part of Oregon. These tribes are popularly known as the Californian Diggers, Washoe Diggers, Shoshone Diggers of Utah, etc., the signification of the term pointing to the digging of roots, and in some parts, possibly, to burrowing in the ground. The name is seemingly opprobrious, and is certainly no more applicable to this people than to many others. By this territorial division I hope to avoid, as far as possible, the two causes of bewilderment before alluded to; neither treating the inhabitants of an immense country as one tribe, nor attempting to ascribe distinct names and idiosyncrasies to hundreds of small, insignificant bands, roaming over a comparatively narrow area of country and to all of which one description will apply.