Page:The Pima Indians.pdf/28

] The Pimas have a tradition relating the circumstances of the coming of the band of Sobaipuris, whom they call Rsaʼrsavinâ, Spotted, from the San Pedro. They are said to have drunk naʼvait or cactus liquor together with a village of Pimas of forgotten name, on the north side of the Gila, near the present Blackwater and the Picacho village of Akûtcĭny, before the time when the Apaches forced them to leave their homes on the San Pedro.

Since the settlement of the Gila and Salt river valleys by the whites and the establishment of peace with the Apaches, the Pimas have again manifested a disposition to extend their settlements, principally owing, however, to the scarcity of water on the Gila River reservation. The present villages are as follows:



The Pimas have long since grown accustomed to being interrogated concerning the builders of the great stone and adobe pueblos that now lie in ruins on the mesas of the Gila and Salt river valleys. However ready they may have been in the past to claim relationship