Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 37.djvu/482

466 But, before turning to the subject proper, let us glance at the California Indian as he was found by the missionaries. And first as to his physical appearance.

Vancouver visited San Francisco in 1792, and thus alludes to the natives: "If we except the inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego,



and those of Van Diemen's land, they are certainly a race of the most miserable beings, possessing the faculty of human reason, I ever saw. Their persons, generally speaking, were under the middle size, and very ill made; their faces ugly, presenting a