FEWKES] NAVAHO NATIONAL MONUMENT, ARIZONA 5 
cylinders of clay shaped like a Vienna loaf of bread. These 
‘‘bricks”’ consist of a bundle of twigs enveloped in red clay, 
which forms a superficial covering, the ‘‘brick”’ being flattened on 
two faces. These unusual adobes were laid like bricks, and so tena- 
ciously were they held together by clay mortar that in one instance 
the corner of a room, on account of undermining, had fallen as a single 
mass. The use of straw-strengthened adobe blocks is unknown 
in the construction of other cliff-houses, although the author’s 
investigations at Cliff Palace in Mesa Verde National Park revealed 
the use of cubical clay blocks not having the central core of twigs or 
sticks, and true adobes are found in the Chelly canyon and at 
Awatobi. The ruins in West canyon can be visited from either 
Bekishibito or Shanto, the approach from both of these places being 
not difficult. There is good drinking water in West canyon, where 
may be found also small areas of pasturage owned by a few Navaho 
who inhabit this region. The trail by which one descends from the 
rim of West canyon to the valley is steep and difficult. 
One of the most interesting discoveries in West canyon is the 
grove of peach trees in the valley a short distance from the canyon 
wall. The existence of these trees indicates Spanish influence. Peach 
trees were introduced into the Hopi country and the Canyon de 
Chelly in historic times either by Spanish priests or by refugees from 
the Rio Grande pueblos. They were observed in the Chelly canyon 
by Simpson in 1850. 
The geographical position of these ruins in relation to Navaho 
mountain” leads the writer to believe that they might have been 
built by. the Snake clans in their migration south and west from 
Tokénabi to Wuk6ki, but he has not yet been able to identify them 
by Hopi traditions. 
But little has appeared in print on the ruins near Marsh pass. 
In former times an old government road, now seldom used, ran 
through Marsh pass, and those who traveled over it had a good view 
of some of these ruins. Situated far from civilization, this region has 
attracted but slight attention, although it is one of the most impor- 
tant, archeologically speaking, in our Southwest. Much of this part 
of Arizona is covered with ruins, some of which, as ‘‘Tecolote,’’® are 
indicated on the United States Engineers’ map of 1877. In his 
excellent article on this region Dr. T. Mitchell Prudden gives us no 
description of the interesting cliff-dwellings in or near Marsh pass, 
though he writes of the ruins in the neighboring canyon: ‘‘There are 
numerous small valley sites, several cliff houses, and a few picto- 
a Hopi legends ascribe the former home of the Snake clan to the vicinity of this mountain. 
» The Mexican Spanish name for the ground-owl, from Nahuatl tecolotl. 
¢In Amcrican Anthropologist, N. S.,V, NO. 2, 1903. 
