XXX ANNUAL REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR 
at the present state of affairs exhibits the fact that these tribal 
communities will speedily be absorbed in the citizenship of 
the republic. No new method is to be adopted; the work is 
almost done; patient and persistent effort for a short future 
like that of the long past will accomplish all. It remains for 
us but to perfect the work wisely begun by the founders of 
the Government. 
The industries and social institutions of the pristine Indians 
have largely been destroyed, and they are groping their way 
to civilized life. To the full accomplishment of this, three 
things are necessary: 
Ist. The organization of the civilized family, with its rules 
of inheritance in lineal descent. 
2d. The civilized tenure of property in severalty must be 
substituted for communal property. 
3d. The English language must be acquired, that the 
thoughts and ways of civilization may be understood. 
To the history of Indian affairs much time has been given 
by the various members of the Bureau of Ethnology. One 
of the more important of these studies is that prosecuted by 
Mr. Royce in preparing a history of the cessions of lands by 
Indian tribes to the Government of the United States. A 
paper by him appended to this report illustrates the character 
of these investigations. 
EXPLORATIONS BY MR. JAMES STEVENSON. 
In the early exploration of the southwestern portion of the 
United States by Spanish travelers and conquerors, about sixty 
pueblos were discovered. These pueblos were communal vil- 
lages, with architecture in untooled stone. In the conquest 
about half of the pueblos were destroyed. Thirty-one now 
remain, and two of these are across the line, on Mexican terri- 
tory. The ruins of the pueblos yet remain, and some of them 
have been identified. 
The Navajos, composed of a group of tribes of the Atha- 
bascan family, and the Coaninis, who live on the south side of 
