SCHUMACHER ON KJOKKENMODDINGS OF OREGON. 35 



the bluff, we find iudications of several house-sites, aud much decayed 

 shells and animal bones, mixed with sandy soil, producing that peculiar 

 ash-like appearance. Neither at this place nor at the shell-mound did 

 we discover any skeletons ; and only a small addition to our collection 

 was obtained in surface findings. In the right bank of the Pistol Eiver, 

 on the elevated bluff running parallel with the ocean beach, several 

 small shell-mounds were met with ; as also on the bare dunes across the 

 river, &e. ; but of these I have spoken in the Smithsonian Eeport of 1873. 

 At Pistol Eiver, we were detained for several days by heavy rain, 

 during which time I made a trip ten miles (by the trail) down the coast, 

 to a place known as Hustenate, where the old ranclieria of the Khiist-e- 

 nete is located (Map 5) [Plate 8]. Here the well-defined cemetery was 

 readily found. Mack's Arch is the northern boundary of the Khust-e- 

 nete, and Whale's Head, a prominent landmark on the ocean shore, 

 about eight miles southward, is the southern boundary, whence the ter- 

 ritory formerly occupied by the Chetkos extends southward. The next 

 day we moved a light camp to Hustenate over a very rough trail, and 

 reached that place in a heavy fall of rain of a winter storm just setting^ 

 in. During the night, our tent was blown down, and shelter had to be 

 sought for in a small shanty open to rain and wind. The location of the 

 ranclieria is sheltered toward the south by arise and outreaching bluffs, 

 while back of it, and to the northward, the ground rises rapidly, leaving 

 a steep opening, from which issues a creek of considerable volume, which 

 was much swollen by the rains at the time of our visit. The ground on 

 which the ranclieria is located has been disturbed by many slides, some of 

 which evidently occurred since the place was abandoned by the Indians. 

 Decayed shells and bones, mixed with sand brought up from the beach, a 

 mass of vegetable mold and rubbish , and all sizes of beach-stone, constitute 

 thecompostof the surface-layer to a depth of two to five feet, below which 

 dark humus is found, over a soft slaty formation of a grayish color, which is 

 coal-bearing. The house-sites are, as usual, irregularly located over a 

 space of a hundred yards in length and something less in width. Con- 

 sidering the condition of the ground upon which we find the aboriginal 

 settlements on the Oregonian coast visited by our expedition, the opin. 

 ion I have expressed in my previous report of such settlements on the 

 southern coast of California holds good for this locality also: that all 

 such stations had been established either on sandy ground, or that the 

 natureof the ground had been artificially changed by layers of sand carried 

 thitber when it was rocky or hard. Sandy soil was necessary to the rude 

 and imperfect tools for the erection of houses, which were partially dug in 

 the ground, and surrounded by e.mbankments. It was also a require- 

 ment for cleanliness, and healthful through its absorption of moisture 

 in rainy seasons. About fifteen feet from the creek as well as from the 

 shore, and but fifteen to twenty feet above the sea, are two rows of 

 graves, dug in dark, coarse soil, bare of shells and sand, each grave be- 

 ing distinct one from another. On digging, the graves were found to be 



3 BULL 



