HARRINGTON ] HISTORY OF BURTON MOUND 59 
year around it is green, because in every part of it are welling up beautiful 
little springs. On the highest part of the hill is an adobe house, which was 
when new one of the best houses in the country, though now it is somewhat 
out of repair. There lives a man by the name of Nidever, an otter hunter, 
in these parts long before the Americans came here. 
In a letter dated August 16, 1923, Miss Stella G. Hinchman states: 
With regard to the “Mound”: In December, 1851, my father purchased the 
property you speak of as “ Burton’s Mound.” .. . 
In August, 1856, my father erected a store building at the foot of the mound on 
the beach, and formed a copartnership with Lewis T. Burton and Harvey B. 
Blake, who had previously been in business and were agents for the steamship 
line and the express company. This firm was dissolved January, 1860... . 
The beach at the foot of the mound was the favorite bathing spot for the 
women and girls of the vicinity, and a right to the undivided and sole use of 
this part of the beach by the women during their bathing hours had been 
established by long usage and become an unwritten law... . 
Now, as to the name “La Playa” being applied to the ‘ Mound,” which 
you question. The women when they came to bathe naturally spoke of going 
to la playa, the beach. However, if the townspeople went to the beach store 
they spoke of going to La Playa. I remember that during several visits that 
I made to Santa Barbara I was repeatedly asked if I was born at La Playa. 
If asked where the Hinchmans lived or they answered any question connected 
with the mound, they called it La Playa. My father in his correspondence 
ealled it “Casa del Mar,” but the name did not stick. 
Concerning the sulphur springs, my brother says that in 1868 he, while on a 
visit to Don Lewis Burton, was taken by my father to the north of the house 
and was shown the sulphur springs. My father took a pole and prodded the 
mud at the bottom of the spring, releasing the gases, which arose in enormous 
bubbles through the water and which he ignited with a lighted piece of news- 
paper. The springs at that time were not in use and there was no talk of 
exploiting them. 
The Indian relics are frequently alluded to in the letters, and in 1854 the 
intention is expressed of sending them to Dover if a favorable opportunity 
presented itself. This, however, was never done. My mother remembers the 
giving of a large quantity of these relics to a representative of the Smithsonian 
about this time, and thinks his name sounded like Zieglau. She rather regret- 
fully says that it was a besetting weakness of my father’s to present almost 
anything he possessed to any one who expressed a desire for it, or even 
admired it. 
Relative to Indian affairs, my mother—who lives with me, is in her 95th 
year, who although not active has a very clear memory—relates the following 
story that was current in her younger days. Nidever in one of his otter- 
hunting expeditions, found on the island of Anacapa, one of the Santa Barbara 
Channel islands, a lone Indian maiden, who, together with her belongings, he 
brought to his home on the mainland. Nobody in Santa Barbara could under- 
stand her language. Native Indians from adjacent pueblos were brought and 
they also failed to understand her dialect, and no clew was ever obtained as 
to her identity. The maid pined away and finally died, it was thought, of 
homesickness. When found she was oddly clad, among other articles of attire 
Was a cape composed of bird skins, mainly the breasts of wild fowl with the 
down on. Tradition has it that after death her belongings were sent to a 
museum at Francisco. She also recalls a legend of the native Indians, to the 
effect that at a remote period the Santa Barbara Islands formed a part of the 
