50 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 
the necessity of rescuing the linguistic and sociological data 
of those Indian stocks that are rapidly disappearing. It 
would be culpable if any of these languages should vanish 
completely without some record. Interest in the aborigines 
of this continent has greatly increased in the last years, 
especially on account of the stimulus of the movement called 
““see America first.”’ 
In addition to his purely administrative duties, con- 
siderable time has been devoted by the chief to researches 
in the field. This work was archeological in nature and a 
continuation of that of previous years, and was carried on 
in cooperation with the National Park Service of the 
Department of the Interior. 
Two months were spent in the neighborhood of Far View 
House, the first pueblo discovered on the Mesa Verde 
National Park, six years ago. In the course of the work 
this fine ruin was thoroughly repaired and put in such con- 
dition that it will now resist the wear of the elements for 
several years. Ruins once repaired must be watched with 
care. On an average between 3,000 and 4,000 visitors, 
mainly tourists, visit the Mesa Verde National Park and 
examine the excavated ruins. Fifteen thousand visitors 
have already passed through Spruce-tree House and Cliff 
Palace, and the wear on the soft rock of which the ruins 
are made is beginning to show. Unless constant vigilance 
is exercised the walls will fall within a short time. Any 
deterioration ought to be repaired annually. Tourists are 
not now permitted to visit any of the ruins on this park 
without a guide, a regulation that has been strictly enforced 
during the past year. 
Field work in May and June was devoted to excavating 
a ruin called Pipe Shrine House, situated to the south of 
Far View House. This was apparently a communal build- 
ing, or one not inhabited, which was used by the people of 
the pueblo for sacred ceremonies. It would appear that 
Pipe Shrine House, so called, bears the same relationship 
to Far View House that the Lower House of the Yucca 
National Monument does to the Upper. The great kiva 
at Aztec, in New Mexico, lately excavated, bears a some- 
