GATHERING, PREPARATION, AND STORING OF FOODS 53 



characteristic storehouse of these Indians, and is by no means con- 

 fined to them. The Cocopahs make them in great numbers, filling 

 them each summer with dried mesquite pods and placing them out of 

 reach on the roofs of their houses. Very similar ones are made by 

 the Mojaves. 1 Seeds are often stored in old ollas and set away in the 

 corners of the house ; many kinds of dried fruit are kept in baskets ; 

 often herbs as well as small quantities of dried food are wrapped in 

 pieces of cloth and tucked away in the thatching or sides of the dwel- 

 ling. This is the regular manner of keeping dried meats or "jerky," 

 strips of which are also hung up uncovered. Hoarding of foods is, 

 however, unfortunately, not a strong instinct with the Indian. For 

 the Coahuillas, as we shall see later, there was not great need of keep- 

 ing a large supply of food ahead for any part of the year. 



38. For preparing the foods for eating, the two most important 

 implements are the primitive mills, the metate and the mortar. The 

 latter is used mainly for crushing seeds, the former for grains. The 

 Coahuilla mortar is a large, nearly round, stone. It is roughly shaped 

 from a hard boulder with a slightly flattened surface for the bottom. 

 In the top is cut a narrow, shallow cavity, perhaps not over three 

 inches in depth. About this hole is fastened with gum a shallow, 

 flaring basket without a bottom, so that the smaller opening just fits 

 over the hole in the rock. This basket-work, thus rising from the 

 edge of the mortar cavity, keeps the grain and meal from falling to 

 the ground, and makes unnecessary any further excavation of the 

 rock. The pestle is a thick, heavy stone, perhaps ten inches long, each 

 end being bluntly rounded. In using a mortar the woman sits with a 

 leg on each side of it, takes the pestle in both hands and drops it 

 heavily into the mortar. About a full double handful of grain or 

 seed is crushed at once. To reduce this very fine a few spoonfuls of 

 iron pyrites are tossed into the mortar to assist the milling. This is a 

 practice of which I have seen no notice among other Indians. The 

 pyrites is sifted from the meal when the necessary fineness has been 

 attained. The Coahuilla word for the mortar is kd-wa-val and for 

 the pestle pd-u-ul. The wooden mortars for the mesquite beans have 

 been already noticed. 



The Coahuilla metate, called mdl-al or ik-ni-vel, is not a particu- 

 larly well-shaped article. It usually measures about thirty inches in 

 length by twenty in width ; the upper end is fully twice the height of 



i " Near the houses were a great number of cylindrical structures with conical roofs, quite skillfully 

 made of osier twigs. They were the granaries referred to above, for their surplus stores of corn and the 

 mesquite fruit." {Pacific Railroad Survey, " Itinerary," p. 115.) 



