260 THE MODOK. 
rior that amount of money, and he had grave doubts whether the currency 
would be of any use to him in the other world—sad commentary on our 
national currency !—and desired to have the coin instead. Procuring it 
from one of the soldiers, he cast it in, and seemed greatly relieved. All the 
dead man’s other effects, consisting of clothing, trinkets, and a half dollar, 
were interred with him, together with some root-flour as victual for the 
journey to the spirit-land. 
It does not come within the purpose of this report to narrate the Indian 
wars of California; only those incidents are selected which throw some light 
on aboriginal customs, habits, and ideas. It was asserted by some writers, 
and by the Hon. A. B. Meacham in his lecture, that the Modok were led 
into their last terrible outbreak by a belief that their dead were about to be 
restored to life and come to their assistance, and at the same time the Ameri- 
cans would be swallowed up in the earth. This curious expectation pre- 
vailed not only among them, but among the Yurok, Karok, Shastika, and 
in fact all over Northern California, as far down as Lower Russian River 
and American River, and perhaps farther. The Shastika said a crow had 
imparted to them the information that all their dead were hovering about 
the top of Mount Shasta, waiting a favorable moment to descend. The 
Karok prophets announced that the re-embodied dead of their tribe were 
already on the march from the east, myriads of pigmies, coming to over- 
throw the Americans. 
But I do not believe this prophecy had any active influence in driving 
the Modok into the rebellion. To their credit, a great majority of the In- 
dians refused credence to their soothsayers in this thing. To be sure, there 
was infinite talk about it, as there always is among savages about any mat- 
ter of superstition, but they took good care not to attempt any rash thing 
against the whites in the expectation that they would be sustained in it by 
the timely arrival of the revivified dead. The Modok simply drifted into 
the war through the force of cireumstances—a war which had been pre- 
pared and made inevitable by events long antedating its outbreak. 
There is no doubt, however, that their sorcerers exercised a baneful 
influence over them both before the war and after it was begun. For in- 
stance, when an attack was ordered to be made on the Lava Beds by 400 
