THE NAUTILUS. 



VOL. XIV. FEBRUARY, 19O1. No. 1(1. 



A CONTRIBUTION TO WEST COAST CONCHOLOGY. 



BY HENRY HEMPHILL. 



Between San Diego and Point Conception, a distance of about tun 

 hundred miles, there lies off the coast of Southern California (imt 

 Lower California) a number of islands generally called the Santa 

 Barbara group. In all, there are eight of these islands, varying in 

 length from one to thirty miles and from one to six or eight miles in 

 width, the nearest being about twenty-five, and the most distant 

 about seventy-five miles from the mainland. 



All of them bear the name of some saint whom tradition, supersti- 

 tion and religion have invested with supernatural power for good or 

 evil toward men. Beginning with the most northerly island of tl e 

 group and ending with the most southerly one, their names run as 

 follows: San Miguel, Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz, Anacapa, San 

 Nicolas, Santa Barbara, Santa Catalina, and San Clemente. 



Here is an array of saintly names that should satisfy the most de- 

 vout, and, if there is any virtue in a name, it should bring peac'- 

 hope and quiet rest (o those whose lot might be cast upon these rock- 

 ribbed and storm-beaten islands. But this does not seem to ha\e 

 been the case, for when they were first discovered by the old Spani>'n 

 or Portuguese navigators, colonies of peaceful and, perhaps, happy 

 Indians inhabited them, whose time and occupation in life was prin- 

 cipally devoted to securing something to eat and very little to wear. 

 Soon after the advent of the white man the^e poor creatures began to 

 disappear, decreased in numbers, and finally became extinct. There 

 still remain evidences of their home life, the shell heaps on their old 



