XVIII ANNUAL REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR 



FIELD-WORK. 

 WORK OF MR. CUSHI2s T G. 



In the early summer of 1881, Mr. Frank Hamilton Cushing 

 carried on, under increasing- facilities, investigations into the 

 home life of the Zufiis, mentioned in the second annual report 

 of this Bureau, and prepared to visit the little-known, isolated, 

 and semi-hostile tribe heretofore vaguely mentioned as the Coco- 

 ninos. He was anxious to investigate the relationship mutually 

 claimed between these Indians and the Zufiis, and thus, if pos- 

 sible, to supplement his researches among the latter. He was 

 furnished by Dr. Washington Matthews, U. S. A., surgeon 

 at Fort Wingate, New Mexico, with means, which had failed 

 to reach him in time, and by General L. P. Bradley, U. S. A., 

 commanding that post, with two pack mules and appurtenances. 

 He secured the services as guide of a Zuui Indian named 

 Tsai-iu-tsaih-ti-wa, who bad before visited the country of the 

 Coconinos, and was accompanied by Tits-ke-mat-se, a Chey- 

 enne Indian, who had been sent by Professor Baird, secretary 

 of the Smithsonian Institution, as an assistant. The party 

 proceeded at once across the country to Mold. At the pueblo 

 of Te-wa Mr. Cushing also secured an interpreter and addi- 

 tional guide, a native trader named Pu-la-ka-kai, who was 

 familiar with the Zufii language. After a journey of about one 

 hundred miles the great Canon of Cataract Creek was reached, 

 and proceeding twenty miles down the trail leading through that 

 cafion, the party arrived at the village of the Coconinos, less than 

 seven miles due south from the Grand Canon of the Colorado, 

 and more than three thousand feet below the level of the sur- 

 rounding plains. Here were found about thirty huts, occupied 

 by two hundred and thirty-five Indians — men, women, and 

 children. This is probably the village from which smoke was 

 seen by the daring surgeon of the Ives Expedition, who nearly 

 lost his life in an endeavor to penetrate the canon. Aside from 

 mention given by the latter in his report, the exact site of the 

 habitations of the Coconinos had never been officially stated. 



