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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



The existence of " Avild " Indians in this part of the world was known, 

 or at least believed in, in many quarters, in spite of definite informa- 

 tion. Thus Stephen Powers in his classical " Tribes of California " 



(U. S. Department of the Inter- 

 ior, Contributions to North Amer- 

 ican Ethnology, Vol. 3) says, with- 

 out giving names, that five of tliis 

 tribe, two men, two women, and a 

 boy, were seen in 1870. This group 

 gave from time to time further 

 proof of their existence by their 

 habit of secretly taking food from 

 distant and lonely mountain cabins. 

 It is a settled fact, that this fugi- 

 tive remnant of a tribe did fairly 

 well with their primitive mode of 

 life, except in the late winter and 

 early spring. By that time their 

 stores were usually exhausted and 

 the salmon had not yet begun to 

 run in the streams. Their fear of 

 the whites forbade any change of 

 home or habitation in search of 

 food. The only course possible, 

 aside from quiet starvation, was to 

 seek out some white man's cabin 

 somewhere in the hills, help them- 

 selves to food as quickly as possible, 

 and carry it back to their lurking 

 places. This they seem to have 

 done on several occasions almost 

 every year. To this we probably 

 owe the fact that the group man- 

 aged to remain alive. This rob- 

 bing of cabins could not, of course, 

 pass unnoticed. Surh cabins as 

 exist in these hills are mere tempo- 

 rary shelters, utilized by wandering 

 hunters and stockmen. Any pass- 

 er-by, according to the custom of the 

 country, is at liberty to invite him- 

 self into a cabin if he happens to 

 find one that is in use at all, and 

 is supposed to give himself full rights and privileges, including the 

 use of all solids and liquids. This is a sort of informal hospitality 

 which prevails universally. The Indians, when compelled to risk dis- 



IsHi, THE Last of the Yahi. 

 From a photograph taken after his cap- 

 ture at Oroville, California in 1911. He 

 is wearing a " slaughter-house apron " 

 put on him before he was taken to town. 

 His hair he had liurnecl off with a fire- 

 brand, as a sign of mourning, throwing 

 on water with his hands to keep from 

 burning his scalp. The remaining photo- 

 graphs in this article were taken re- 

 cently, after his appearance was much 

 changed. 



