RELICS OF A RACE OF MOUND-BUILDERS IN CALIFORNIA. 271 



One locality in particular on the Mojave desert deserves especial mention. 

 In an utterly dry and desolate section, far from any apparent inducements for 

 the settlement of even the wandering desert Indians, are twelve mounds or cairns 

 of loose rock, piled up to an elevation of some five or six feet. The rocks of 

 which these mounds are composed must have been carried for a great distance, 

 as none like them are to be found in that neighborhood, and a vast amount of 

 time and labor must have been consumed in the apparently useless task. What 

 these monuments represent, or what may be concealed beneath them, is entirely a 

 matter of conjecture, and no doubt a thorough prospecting of them would amply 

 repay any curious scientist. Their remoteness of location has, so far, prevented 

 any one from making any thorough examination of these interesting relics of the 

 past. The Indians of that desert claim to have no knowledge of the purpose or 

 origin of these cairns, but say they have always been there, and that their fore- 

 fathers knew as little about them as they themselves. 



The researches so far made into the remains of this prehistoric people have 

 been almost entirely confined to the southern seacoast and the islands off" the 

 shore. Of these islands, San Nicolas, Santa Cruz and San Miguel have proved 

 especially rich in relics. Many tons of stone implements, knives, lances, arrow- 

 heads, bowls, mortars, etc., have been excavated and sent to museums in various- 

 portions of the world. All these islands — Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, San Miguel,. 

 San Nicholas and Anacapa — bear traces of having at some distant day been 

 densely populated, though what manner of men they were and what their history 

 is entirely a matter of conjecture, since, as far as known, no traces of any at- 

 tempt at carving or writing by means of hieroglyphics have ever been discovered. 



At Point Duma, in the extreme south western part of Ventura County, the 

 traces of a large settlement are to be seen. Here the debris from the ancient 

 dwellings has formed a large and deep deposit, covering a great extent of ground. 

 The burial places of the former inhabitants have been discovered, and in many 

 places excavated, and large quantities of the stone implements therein found have 

 been taken away by enthusiastic and professional relic hunters. Coming further 

 up the coast, at Point Rincon, nearly on the boundary line between Ventura and 

 Santa Barbara Counties, are to be found perhaps the most extensive evidences of 

 a former settlement that exist anywhere in this State. Here, for a space of up- 

 ward of two hundred acres, the entire surface of the ground is covered with a. 

 deposit of refuse left by the former inhabitants, varying in depth from two to 

 fifteen feet. This debris is composed of powdered shells, bones of all sorts of 

 animals, mostly in a calcined condition, the remains of former fire-places, and by- 

 no means the least, vast quantities of human remains. In the entire section it i& 

 almost impossible to dig to any depth without striking human remains in more or 

 less quantity, and all bearing evidence of having been interred for an incalculable 

 period, many of the bones crumbling to pieces on being touched, while others are 

 in a fair state of preservation. 



The locality of some of the graves is marked by rocks or whalebones, and 

 some sort of care was evidently taken in the burial of the occupants, in some in- 



