SCHUMACHER ON KJOKKENMODDINGS OF CALIFORNIA. 53 



&c., while other places in the same buryiug-groimd compensated our 

 labor with the common mortar and pestle. 



The lower settlement does not indicate as long a period of habitation 

 nor as large a town as the upper one. The graves are located in a sticky, 

 dark ground, slightly mixed with gravel, and dilScult to dig up as com- 

 pared with the common soil of burying-places. The short time left us 

 before the departure of the steamer, after finishing work at the upper 

 cemetery, did not admit of an entire excavation; and, on the other 

 hand, the aspect was not inviting enough, and jDromised not sufficient 

 work to our enlarged party for a stay to await another steamer, even if 

 my proposed northern trip had left us any time to spare. We had here 

 five working-days for excavation and packing, .during which time an 

 addition of seventeen large cases was realized. 



On the 18th and 19th of July, our party moved back to Santa Barbara, 

 and I started on the following day to San Francisco. 



After a trip to Oregon, which I describe in another place, I returned 

 again to the southern coast of California, to make some further re- 

 searches. My starting-point for this trip was San Luis Obispo. I left 

 this place in the beginning of January, with two men and the smallest 

 camp-outfit possible, for the Eancho de los Alamos, on which several 

 graves had been reported by one of the owners of the land. Unfortu- 

 nately, It was not as represented. We also visited Alamo Pintado 

 (painted alder), now known as Ballard Stage Station, which is said to 

 have been once a great resort for the Indians in the early times of the 

 missions. We made inquiry of the people at the station, and found them 

 utterly ignorant of the existence of such a cave, which, as my informant 

 said, ought to be " within a hundred yards or so" from the station. The 

 geological stratification is not adapted to the formation of caves, and 

 gives no hint where to look for them. After a short, useless search, we 

 were compelled to return for quarters at Bell Station. We went back 

 to La Graciosa, a small settlement at the boundary-line of Los Alamos 

 grant, and about eleven miles from the ocean shores, near the Santa 

 Maria Eiver, and there hired a guide to bring us through the mountain- 

 pass to a place at the beach about 5 miles to the southward of Point 

 Sal. The existence of a shell-mound in that location was known to me, 

 I having observed it two years ago with the aid of a telescope from the 

 height of Point Sal, while engaged in the works of the United States 

 Coast Survey. This rancheria is called Os-hi (Map 13) [Plate 19] by the 

 old Spaniards. Its appearance is a grand sight to an eager collector, on 

 account of the great masses of kjokkenmoddings found here. Along 

 the shore are low dunes, and back of it a grassy flat, which extends 

 toward the steep foot-hills of the Coast Range, and affords ample room 

 for a settlement, which we still can trace in many house-sites. The sub- 

 soil of the flat is deep, and consists mostly of decayed shells of an ash- 

 like appearance, which are of a greater age than those on- the dunes. 

 The dunes, extending half a mile in length and about a hundred yards 



