20r;* THE SERI INDIANS ieth.annMT 



kuives in severing the tough iuteguineuts and tendons of horses and 

 kiue, although the tendency lias not yet resulted (as elsewhere noted, 

 ante, pp. 153-15tt) in the development of a knife-sense; and altliongh 

 boys on the frontier play at roping dogs, no effort to use the riata or 

 any form of rope is made in the actual chase. As naively explained 

 by Mashem amid api)roving grunts from his clan-mates, they have no 

 time for ropes or knives when hungiy. 



A quantitatively unimportant yet by no means negligible fraction 

 of the nornml diet of Seriland is vegetal; and while the sources of 

 vegetal food are many and diverse, the chief constituent is a single 

 Ijroduct characteristic of American deserts, viz, the tuna, or prickly 

 pear. 



All of the cacti of the region yield tunas in considerable quantity. 

 Tlie pitahaya is perhaps the most abundant producer, and its name is 

 often given to the fruit; the huge saguaro affords an enormous annual 

 yield, aiul the still more gigantic saguesa is even more i)rolific, espe- 

 cially in its immense forests along the eastern base of Sierra Seri; the 

 cina adds materially to the aggregate i^roduct, while the nopal, or 

 common prickly pear, contributes a quota acquiring importance from 

 the facility with which it may be harvested. The fruits of all these 

 cacti are sometimes classed as sweet tunas, in contradistinction from 

 the sour tunas yielded in great abundance by the choUa and consumed 

 with avidity by stock, though seldom eaten by men. The edible tunas 

 average about the size of lemons, and resemble figs save that their skin 

 is beset with i)rickles. The portion eaten is a luscious pulp, tilled with 

 minute seeds like those of the fig save that they are too hard for mas- 

 tication or digestion, its flavor ranging from the sickly sweet of the 

 overcultivated fig to a pleasant acidity. While occasional tunas may 

 be found at any time during the year, the normal harvest occurs about 

 midsummer, or shortly before the July-August humid season, and lasts 

 ibr several weeks. During the height of the season the clans with- 

 draw from the coast and give undivided attention to the collection and 

 consumption of the fruits, gorging them in such quantities that, accord- 

 ing to the -testimony of the vaqueros, they are fattened beyond recog- 

 nition. Commonly the tunas are eaten just as they are gathered, and the 

 families and larger bands move about from pitahaya to pitahaya and 

 from valley to valley in a slovenly chase of this natural harvest, until 

 waning supply and cloying appetite drive them back to the severer chase 

 of turtle and pelican. The fruit is not cooked, and never preserved save 

 in the noisome way of nature, and is rarely transported in quantitits 

 or over distances of industrial importance; yet the product may have 

 some connection with the basketry of the tribe. The devices for col- 

 lecting the fruits, especially from the lofty saguaro and saguesa, are 

 mere improvisations of harpoon shafts, paloblanco brnuches, or chance 

 cane-stalks carried primarily for arrow-making or balsa construction. 



