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wmmm SS" mstm mmmmi iassi WM i i : v.: a . 1 im SSlill i§® mmi mi 111 mm Miimms »*«igsraH ?' liligll I m m '? I SsH 1|g||$lf$| K?*v :1- i 1 1 1 6 V, 14 T h e ^ / asterkey |v'- and show him our find. Had Man been there with the ele­phant? We wish we could be certain. There was a patch of charcoal near the mammoth’s head. Possibly some early hunter or traveler did sit in this little canyon and broil a choice bit of meat. Excavation told us a few facts: the mammoth lay on his side; the bones were more or less in disorder; many of the bones we found were broken or partial­ly missing. Had the big fellow come here to die? Did something frighten him and drive him into soft clay where he became mired and died? Did he die where we found him, or did a gliding mass of clay disarticulate his bones? These were some of the questions that came to mind that evening as we sat around the camp-fire; and as the quiet of the desert night was split by the tense roar of a formation of sabre jets, two widely separated periods of human history seemed to blend there by the fire. The sabre jets were roaring over Las Vegas now, and the lights of the casinos and exclusive hotels less than twenty miles away shimmered green and yellow through the fire; search-lights swept the sky. Behind us in the shadows lay the lake-deposi­ted clays that were grudgingly yielding bit by bit the evidence of Man and the animals that were his contempo­raries: camelops, Pleistocene horse, long-horned bison and the mammoth. Plastic bags and glass jars on our table held charcoal from fires those hunters had lit when there was no Las Vegas. Those hunters knew no casinos, no jeeps, no sabre jets. Their thoughts were of survival, and they listened in the night, not for jets or atom bombs, but for the running steps of camels or the lumbering tread of the mammoth. As we sat by our own fire and looked at the silent lights, in our thoughts, the bones and the fires that had been cold for more than 20,000 years seemed to live again. (Cover) RE-FORMED SPELLING — Mrs. Bernice Johnston, our Docent, who so capably takes care of the numerous schools visiting the Museum, receives many "fan letters,” some of which are precious. The latest gem is: "Dear Mrs. Johnston: I enjoyed the trip through the Museum. I liked the Buffalo and the Indian T.P. Yours truly Bruce Wicks” T he asterkey 1 17 ANCIENT LIFE AMONG THE SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA INDIANS ft By M. R. H ar r in g to n p a r t II W 7 e are awakened by the sound of breaking sticks outside; a dim light is coming through the smokehole; Grandma, our host and the children are still sleeping on their mats— only our hostess is missing. Her mat and robe are neatly rolled. The fire is out. Stepping outside, we find she has built a cooking fire under the arbor. As the guide says it’s the custom to bathe every day we go down to the river and find a number of men and boys already in the water. On the way home we pass the potter’s hut and see her outside, already at work (Fig. 2 ). "What’s the matter— isn’t she going to take her bath?” we ask. "Oh, yes, later on” the guide explains. "When the men have all had theirs the women and girls go down as they find the opportunity. It’s one of their rules— to bathe every day if they can find enough water!” Thinking this a good example to follow, we return to the hut just in time to watch seeds being toasted in a pottery bowl over some coals while our hostess stirs them with a stick. She has to repeat the process a number of times before she has enough to boil with meat broth for the family’s break­fast mush. When this is done she carries the pot into the hut and we follow. The mush is really delicious and we are offered some pieces of dried venison to chew on. "What kind of seeds were in that mush?” we ask. "It certainly was good.” "The seeds of chia, a kind of sage, they call it pashal ” the guide replies. "That’s one of the best, but they use many kinds of seeds.” "But howr can they gather small seeds? Surely they can’t pick them out one at a time. It would take forever.” For reply he calls the younger woman over and explains the situation. She gets a large deep bowl-shape basket and puts it in her carrying net; then she dons a basket cap, and slings the pack net with the basket on her back, the packstrap across her forehead over the cap; then she takes a shallow bowl basket in her left hand and a basketry fan in her right. Now she walks about pretending to beat seeds lilt m I B ifllli H