HABITAT OF THE COAHUILLAS 25 



A year later Mr. Stanley, having made a visit to the desert villages 

 of the Coahuillas, wrote : 



At Agua Caliente (a Coahuilla rancheria in Palm Valley, east of San Ber- 

 nadino) I found the principal chief of the Chemehuevis, a tribe that has been 

 living on the west side of the Colorado river above La Paz. These Indians, 

 having engaged in a war with the Mojaves, were beaten, and after the loss of 

 many of their number were obliged to flee for protection to the Coahuillas of 

 Cabeson valley, and were living on the mescal plant and such other food as 

 they could pick up. 



The route traveled between these two tribes is an almost direct trail 

 running eastward from the Cabeson valley to the Colorado. In places 

 this path has been worn deep in the ridges of rock over which it passes. 

 The Indians take about two days to make the trip. 



CHAPTER II. 



THE HABITAT OF THE COAHUILLAS. 



10. The eastern half of southern California is everywhere a desert, 

 separated from the coast by the lofty elevations of the Sierras and the 

 Coast Range. Northward in Inyo county is the sterile and dangerous 

 depression famous as Death Valley. Southward, stretching from the 

 Colorado to the Sierras, is the Mojave, the most elevated and least 

 barren of these plains. Although its appearance is desolate, owing to 

 the volcanic character of its rocks and its drifting beds of sand, the 

 southern portion, now traversed by the Santa Fe Railway route, bears 

 a valuable growth of bushes, contains many water holes, and has 

 always proved a safe and direct route of travel. It was crossed by the 

 old Mormon road from Salt Lake City to San Bernadino, as well as 

 the overland trail from Santa Fe, both roads meeting near the western 

 side of the desert on the Mojave river. The San Bernadino range 

 and a low spur running southeastward to the Colorado river, where it 

 is known as the Chocolate mountains, separate the Mojave from the 

 Colorado desert. This great depressed area occupies almost the whole 

 southern part of the state and the northeastern part of Lower Cali- 

 fornia, clear to the Gulf. The northwestern portion, enclosed by the 

 San Bernadino range and the San Jacinto mountains, is the Coahuilla 

 or Cabeson valley, the present home of the desert Coahuilla Indians. 

 This valley is reached from the coast by the San Gorgonio pass. From 

 Colton eastward, there is a long and continuous ascent for thirty miles, 



