REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 35 
an overhanging side of the cave, and were buried about 2 feet in the guano and 
soil; beneath these crania were human long-bones, crossed. Several fragments 
of a single skull or of several skulls were embedded in a hard stalagmitic 
formation over the deposit of long-bones. No Indian implements or pottery 
accompanied the bones, and no fossils were found in association with them. So 
far as recorded this is the first instance of the finding of skeletal remains of 
eave man in the Isle of Pines. Their general appearance and mode of burial 
were the same as in the case of those discovered by Drs. Montoné and Carlos 
de la Torre. 
Dr. Fewkes also examined, in the Isle of Pines, about 30 structures known 
as cacimbas, their Indian name, These are vase-shaped, subterranean recep- 
tacles, averaging 6 feet in depth and 4 feet in maximum diameter, generally 
constricted to about 2 feet at the neck, and with the opening level with the 
surface of the ground. Although these cacimbas are generally ascribed to the 
Indians, they are thought by some to be of Spanish origin, and are connected 
by others with buccaneers, pirates, and slavers. They are built of masonry or 
cut in the solid rock; the sides are often plastered and the bottoms commonly 
covered with a layer of tar. On the ground near the openings there is gener- 
ally a level, circular space, with raised periphery. The whole appearance sup- 
ports the theory that these structures were used in the manufacture of turpen- 
tine or tar, the circular area being the oven and the cacimba the receptacle for 
the product. 
Dr. Fewkes found that the Pineros, or natives of the island, employ many 
aboriginal terms for animals, plants, and places, and in some instances two 
Indian words are used for the same object. An acknowledged descendant of 
a Cuban Indian explained this linguistic duality by saying that the Indians 
of the eastern end of the Isle of Pines spoke a dialect different from those of 
the western end, and that when those from Camaguey, who were Tainan and 
of eastern Cuban origin, came to the Isle of Pines at the instance of the Spanish 
authorities they brought with them a nomenclature different from that then 
in use on that island. 7 
Several old Spanish structures of masonry, the dates of which are unknown, 
were also examined in the neighborhood of Santa Fé, Isle of Pines. The roof 
of a cave at Punta de Este, the southeastern angle of the island, bears ab- 
original pictographs of the sun and other objects, suggesting that it is com- 
parable with the cave in Haiti, in which, in Indian legend, the sun and the 
moon originated and from which the races of man emerged. 
Dr. Fewkes has now collected sufficient material in Cuba to indicate that its 
western end, including the Isle of Pines, was once inhabited by a cave-dwelling 
reople, low in culture and without agriculture. His observations support the 
belief that this people were in that condition when Columbus visited the Isle of 
Pines and that they were survivors of the Guanahatibibes, a cave-dwelling 
population formerly occupying the whole of Cuba and represented in Porto 
Rico and other islands of the West Indies. 
Dr. Fewkes also visited several of the coral keys southwest of Isle of Pines, 
but, finding no aboriginal traces, he crossed the channel to Cayman Grande, 
about 250 miles from Nueva Gerona. The Cayman group consists of coral 
islands built on a submarine continuation of the mountains of Santiago 
Province, Cuba. A cave with Indian bones and pottery, probably of Carib 
origin, was found near Boddentown on the eastern end of the island, and a 
few stone implements were obtained from natives, but as these specimens may 
have been brought from adjacent shores they afford little evidence of a former 
aboriginal population of Cayman Grande. The elevation of the Cayman 
Islands, computed from the annual accretion, would indicate that Cayman 
