4 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 60 



concerning them since the accounts of the early Spanish missionaries, who 

 visited the country, and described the " seven cities " which they found there. 

 .... The men wear loose cotton trousers, and frequently a kind of blouse for 

 an upper garment, over which they throw a blanket. The dress of the women 

 is invariably a loose black woolen gown with a gold-colored stripe around the 

 waist and bottom of the skirt. The stripe is of cotton which they grow in 

 small quantities. 1 



EVIDENCES OF FORMER CULTIVATION BY THE PIMA INDIANS 



The Spanish missionary, Padre Pedro Font, who accompanied 

 Padre Francisco Garces in his fifth journey from the San Xavier 

 Mission to the Pima Indians on the Gila Riv^r, kept an extended 

 diary of the journey. On November I, 1775, he wrote : 



I also saw how they wove cloaks of cotton, a product which they sew and 

 spin ; and the greater number of them know how to weave. 2 



Mr. John R. Bartlett, U. S. Commissioner of the United States and 

 Mexican Boundary Commission during- the years 1850 to 1853, also 

 records the Pimas on the Gila as raising cotton : 



Cotton is raised by them (the Pimas), which they spin and weave. Their 

 only manufactures consist of blankets of various textures and sizes ; a heavy 

 cloth of the same material used by the women to put around their loins; and 

 an article from 3 to 4 inches wide, used as a band for the head, or a girdle for 

 the waist. The blankets are woven with large threads, slightly twisted and 

 without any nap. They are made of white cotton, and are without ornament 



of colors or figures, save a narrow selvage of buff The weaving is 



generally done by the old men. 3 



Lieut. A. W. Whipple, U. S. A., also of the Mexican Boundary 

 Commission, in an official report of the survey of the Gila River, dated 

 January 10, 1852, describes finding an Indian garden in the Cascade 

 Grotto, where were melons, maize, beans, and to his great surprise, 

 a field of cotton. He also states that the banks of the Gila from the 

 Pima settlement to the junction of the Salt River, were fertile, pro- 

 ducing crops of cotton of the first quality. 4 



The suitability of this region for growing cotton and the familiarity 



1 Ives, Jos. C. : Report upon the Colorado River of the West, 1861, pp. 116, 

 127. 



2 26th Ann. Rep. Bur. Amer. Ethnol., 1908, p. 29. 



See also Coues, E. : On the Trail of a Spanish Pioneer, 1900, vol. 2, p. 386. 



3 Bartlett, John R. : Personal Narrative of Explorations and Incidents in 

 Texas, New Mexico, California, Sonora and Chihuahua, 1854, vol. 2, p. 224. 



* Bartlett, John R. : Personal Narrative of Explorations and Incidents in 

 Texas, New Mexico, California, Sonora and Chihuahua, 1854, vol. 2, pp. 598, 

 599- 



