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268 



THE AUEIFEROUS GKAVELS OF THE SIERRA NEVADA. 



before these gentlemen for seeking to sift the evidence, and endeavoring to ascertain, by com- 

 parison and putting together of various circumstances, whether there were any Haws in their state- 

 ments, or whether any reason could be found for doubting the exactness of the information given 



by them. 



Mr. Mattison, on being questioned, stated that he took the skull from his shaft in February, 



1866, with some pieces of wood found near it, and, supposing that it might be something of inter- 

 est, carried it in a bag to the office of Wells, Fargo & Co.'s Express, at Angel's, and gave it to 

 Mr. Scribner, the agent, also well known to the writer as a man of intelligence and veracity. He 

 stated, on being questioned in regard to the appearance of the skull when it was brought to him, 

 that it was so imbedded in and encrusted with earthy and stony material that he did not recognize 

 what it was. Mr. Mattison had previously made a similar statement, saying that when he found 

 the object he thought it to be a piece of the root of a tree, only a portion of the frontal bone 

 bein^ visible. Mr. Scribncr's clerk cleaned off a portion of the encrusting material, discovered 

 that the article in question was a human skull, and, shortly after, gave it to Dr. Jones, who was 

 well known in that region as an enthusiastic collector of objects of natural history, and in his 

 possession it remained for some months before it was placed in the writer's hands. 



The skull is by no means a perfect one, as the whole of the parietal and nearly the whole of the 

 occipital, as well as a large part of the right half of the base, are missing. The line of fracture 

 through the base is from the right temporal fossa through the opening for the spinal cord, leaving 

 its fore part, and ending about an inch and a half behind the left ear. The frontal bone is nearly 

 entire. A fracture extends across the upper jaw, a short distance below the orbits, otherwise the 

 bones of the face are in most respects complete. This describes the appearance of the skull as it 

 now exists. When delivered into the writer's hands its base was imbedded in a conglomerate 

 mass of ferruginous earth, water-worn pebbles of much altered volcanic rock, calcareous tufa, and 

 fragments of bones. This mixed material covered the whole base of the skull and filled the left 

 temporal fossa, concealing the whole of the jaw. A thin calcareous incrustation appears to have 

 covered the whole skull when found ; portions of it had been scaled off, probably in cleaning away 



the other material attached to the base. 



Nothing was done to the skull to alter its condition in any way, after it came into the writer's 

 hands, until it had been examined by Dr. Wyman, when we together carefully chiselled off the 

 foreign matter adhering to its base, so as to fully expose the natural surface of the skull, leaving 



it in its present state as figured on Plate L. # 



On exposing the jaw, the skull was found to be that of a very old person ; as the teeth, with 

 the exception of a single root of a molar on the right side, have disappeared. All the alveoli in 

 front have been wholly, and those on the sides partly, absorbed ; in consequence of this, if any 

 peculiarity of the jaws existed, it is no longer to be recognized. 



In cutting away the mixed tufa and gravel which covered -the face and base, several fragments 

 of human bones were removed ; namely, one whole and one broken metatarsal ; the lower end of 

 a left fibula, and fragments of an ulna, as well as a piece of a sternum. These bones and frag- 

 ments of bone might have belonged to the same individual to whom the skull had appertained ; 

 but, besides these, there was a portion of a human tibia of too small size to be referred to the 

 same person. There were also some fragments of the bones of a small mammal. Under the 

 malar bone of the left side a small snail shell was lodged, partially concealed by one of the small 

 human bones which was wedged into the cavity. This shell was recognized by Dr. J. G. Cooper 

 as Helix mormonum,, a species now existing in. the Sierra Nevada. Cemented to the fore part of 

 the roof of the mouth was found a circular piece of shell four tenths of an inch in diameter, with 

 a hole drilled through the centre, which had probably served as an ornament. Several very 

 small pieces of charcoal were also found in the matter adhering to the base of the skull. 



On chemical examination of a portion of the skull by Mr. Sharpies, it was found that it had lost 



* The upper jaw is detached, and had to be temporarily attached by wax when the drawing was made. 



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