Page:The Pima Indians.pdf/104

] Yoke. With the introduction of cattle the Pimas obtained their first draft animal. They were used principally in plowing and were fitted with yokes (fig. 12) of cottonwood or willow which were attached to the horns of the animals as in southern Europe to the present day. The yokes themselves are the best evidence that the burden upon the animals was light, for these small sticks of brittle wood would snap at the first strain if on the shoulders of an ox team with a heavy load. There are a few yokes yet to be found, though they have not been used for several years. The specimens collected are fairly well made, straight, but with sections hollowed to fit the necks of the team.  

Mortar. Perhaps the mortar should be placed first in importance among the utensils of this class. There are two forms, one (fig. 13, a) with the hole sunk in the end of the log, and which may be either sharpened at the other end and set permanently in the ground or cut flat at the opposite end so that it will stand upright and may be moved about. The other style (fig. 13, b) lies horizontal, with the hole in the side of the log. This is always portable.

Two or three stone mortars, rounded and well shaped, were seen; they had been obtained from the ruins and were little used. At the Double buttes, near the center of the Gila River reservation, there are a few mortar cavities in the solid rock ledges. There is also one in a large bowlder which is regarded with superstitious reverence. Mortars in solid stone are not uncommon in Arizona. The writer saw a row of them at the end of a cliff ruin of eight or ten rooms in Aravaipa canyon. There are several in a rough hillock in Harshaw canyon, Patagonia mountains. The base of the conical hill at Tucson is well