190 BUREAU OF AMEEICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 34 



defects of hearing are quite rare, even in the aged. In a few tribes 

 there are from one to several deaf and dumb. 



Dental caries is not rare, though muph less frequent than among 

 the whites. It is usually a premolar or a molar that is affected. 

 Occasionally the gum or alveoli become involved, resulting in sup- 

 puration. Necrosis of importance was not seen in the living or in 

 the bones examined. Defects of the palate in an Indian of full blood 

 have not been met with, and but one minor case of harelip came 

 to notice. 



Of contagious and infectious diseases not before specially men- 

 tioned, the most dangerous, and one by which none of the tribes 

 visited has been spared, is smallpox. Localized epidemics of measles 

 are quite common. The disease attacks both children and adoles- 

 cents, and occasionally, usually in the absence of proper treatment, is 

 attended with mortality much greater than is the same disease among 

 whites. Where early hospital treatment was afforded, the fatal or 

 even grave cases were rare. Scarlet fever, curiously, seems to be very 

 uncommon, if it occurs at all in these regions. The Avriter could 

 learn of no case of it either personally or from the resident physicians 

 or from the Indians. Wliooping cough, on the other hand, is not very 

 rare; it does not seem to be more severe or dangerous than it is 

 among the whites. Diphtheria of moderate severity existed in 1902 

 and at other seasons in the Albuquerque school; it also occurred 

 within recent years at Zufii. Influenza has been reported from a 

 number of localities among the Southwestern Indians. Pneumonia, 

 in isolated cases, has appeared in an epidemic form. Parotitis is 

 seldom heard of. Malaria, known as "fever," frios, or calentura, 

 occurs more or less, in various forms, among all the tribes. Usually 

 it is not fatal in the north and on the highlands, but assumes more 

 dangerous, including hemorrhagic and not infrequently fatal, forms 

 in the valleys and especially in the lower coast lands of northern 

 Mexico. Leprosy is not heard of, but there were observed a few 

 cases of a condition allied to elephantiasis. The pinto malady was 

 not met with, though among the Mexican Indians there were 

 allusions to its existence farther south (Guerrero, etc.) 



Malignant diseases, if they exist at all — that they do would be 

 difficult to doubt — must be extremely rare. The writer heard of 

 "tumors," and saw several cases of the fibroid variety, but has 

 never come across a clear case of an epithelioma or other cancer; 

 nor has he as yet encountered unequivocal signs of a malignant 

 growth on an Indian bone (see notes in Bibliography). 



Rheumatic affections are quite common, but are very seldom of a 

 serious nature. They seem to be restricted to the muscular variety, 

 lumbago, and the artlii-itis of senility. Of rachitis, or osteomalacia, 

 not a trace was encountered either in the living or in the bones, and 

 though goiter exists, there was found no case of cretinism. 



