Page:American Anthropologist NS vol. 1.djvu/141

 1 1 8 AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST [n. s., I, 1899

On reaching the mining region attention was turned first toward the nature, age, and relations of the gravel deposits, to the topographic character of the district, and to the profound changes brought about by the mining operations. Thanks to the thorough work done by our geologists, all of these matters were readily mastered, and nothing need be added to what has been said respecting them in preceding paragraphs.

In the second place, a study of the implements and utensils, ancient and modern, of the general region was made in order that comparisons might be instituted between them and the gravel finds. The results of this comparison have already been referred to, but further mention of the topic will later be made.

A third line of investigation related to the distribution of the aboriginal tribes and their relation to the mining areas and mines, and in this direction very significant observations were made. Indian village sites are scattered over the hills and tablelands, and ancient Indian sites were found everywhere. At Nevada City, Nevada county, a " Digger" Indian village was encountered on the margin of the tableland overlooking the great gravel mines a mile west of the city. Its people were engaged in gathering acorns and grinding them in mortars of various shapes; some of the mor- tars were worn in outcropping masses of granite, or in large, loose bowlders, while others consisted of flattish or globular masses of stone more or less modified in shape by artificial means; and it was realized that, as the hydraulic work progressed in the mine below, this site would be undermined and that one by one the utensils would drop in and become intermingled with the crum- bling gravels, possibly to be recovered later with every appearance of having been imbedded with these deposits when they were laid down unnumbered centuries before. One of the mortars re- ported by Whitney was obtained from a mine on the western slope of this same hill, and it is easy to see how it could have rolled in from an Indian camp-site above, either before or during the prosecution of mining operations. The conditions observed

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