HARRINGTON ] HISTORY OF BURTON MOUND 65 
the foothills in gold or in green, and the mission towers combine to form an 
almost unparalleled picture and one generally neglected by visitors. 
Some years ago this mound with its adjacent surrounding property was pur- 
chased by a number of the prominent citizens of Santa Barbara, organized and 
incorporated as the Seaside Hotel Association. It is held by this association for 
the purpose of using it as a grand sanitarium and seaside hotel site. 
The mound appears to have been a system of subterranean water courses. 
Springs flow in all directions, and the most remarkable feature about it is their 
variety. At one place there is a clear blue spring of sulphur water bubbling up 
and discharging into the grass beneath the olive groves. At another place an 
“iron spring,” the water of which is strongly impregnated and the surroundings 
eovered with iron rust. Near the summit a spring of pure water, which is used 
to irrigate an immense vegetable garden, from which Santa Barbara draws its 
principal supply of vegetables. The property is intersected or traversed by a 
stream of water from the source of which the city derives its water supply 
above the mission. The water of the sulphur spring is similar to that of the 
Montecito Hot Springs, except in its temperature. The following extracts from 
an article in the Daily Independent of October 19, 1888, give a vivid description 
of the traditions of the mound: 
“Wor many years the coast of California and Oregon has been explored for 
ethnological relics. It has been dug up by different experts seeking to obtain 
the various implements of household goods and gods buried with the dead, who 
knew the patient labor of the Indian during life passed with him to the grave. 
In other words, the result of his work did not, as with us, go to the living—that 
it was superstition, no one in these days doubts. And hence we find in the 
grave the cooking utensils, the arrows, fish hooks, the crude pan for baking 
purposes, the tasteful olla for boiling, the flint motar for grinding corn and 
beans or seed, and various other implements, the present generation can not 
understand for what purpose they were made. Even the everlasting pipe is 
found buried. 
“ But, speaking of the Burton Mound, its origin is unknown to men now living, 
but it is known to have been formed of the bones, the trinkets, the cooking 
utensils, and weapons of thousands of natives of this coast. It is in fact one 
grand catacomb or deposit of human bodies covered with immense quantities of 
sea shells. The interior of the mound has never been explored. No defiling spade 
or shovel has been permitted to unearth the immense quantities of Indian 
remains and relics therein deposited. Sometimes when a tree has died and it 
has been deemed desirable to remove the stump or roots, in digging it out, the 
earth was found full of Indian relics such as stone utensils, skulls, and in- 
geniously made articles of ornament. Many efforts have been made to obtain 
permission to explore the interior of this mound, but thanks to the vigilance 
and care of Capt. William E. Greenwell, a manager of the Sea Side Hotel 
Association, the valuable ethnological treasures of the mound remain intact. 
They are perhaps the most complete and valuable collection of aboriginal relics 
in the United States and will some day be regarded with more interest than at 
present. 
“There is a tradition extant which says that this mound was the regal resi- 
dence of the Grand Sachem or Inea of all the tribes of this southern coast. 
Around its base the supreme chief of all the southern tribes held regal court. 
Upon it the priests and medicine men of the tribes held their mystic conclaves, 
and no doubt enacted savage tragedies in centuries gone by. 
“Vancouver, the English explorer, in his three volumes published in 1798, 
speaks of this mound as the abode of the Great Chief, which undoubtedly it 
