272 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 



Stances a sort of rude box of large flat stone being made to do duty as a coffin. 

 It is in these more methodical lombs that the richest deposits of stone relics are 

 iound. In the majority of cases, however, the dead seem to have been thrown 

 promiscuously into the ground, though in one locality the singular circumstance 

 was observed that the bones of children were invariably accompanied by those of 

 an adult, a fact fruitful of speculation. One interesting fact connected with these 

 remains is the regularity and remarkable state af preservation of the teeth found, 

 and also the somewhat singular circumstance that these teeth are almost invaria- 

 bly worn smooth on their upper surface, thus proving that their possessors must 

 have been compelled to eat much more than the traditional " peck of dirt " in 

 order to have produced such a uniformity of surface. It was at this place that 

 sometime since a farmer plowed up a relic which to all appearances would seem 

 to have been intended as a tombstone, with an inscription upon it. This con- 

 sisted of a large flat bone of a whale. Portions of the surface had been hollowed 

 out and these excavations filled with asphaltum, with which the coast abounds. 

 In this asphaltum, when soft, the tiniest white shells had been imbedded in va- 

 rious patterns, and with such method as to warrant the supposition that some 

 meaning was sought to be conveyed. Unfortunately the bone was in such a state 

 of decay that it fell to pieces, and no effort was made to save more than one or 

 two of the larger fragments. 



Acting on the supposition that this was probably the headstone of some im- 

 portant personage, and that a rich deposit would reward the discoverer of his 

 resting-place, many excavations were made in the locality, but nothing of inter- 

 est was found, the bones having, in all probability, been shifted a considerable 

 distance from its original locality in the course of ages. Numerous parties have, 

 at different times, made the deposit at Point Rincon the scene of their researches, 

 and in nearly every instance have been well repaid. As a matter of course the 

 age of this deposit can only be conjectured, but every indication points to the 

 belief that the race who inhabited the coast antedate all other inhabitants of this 

 continent. One remarkable fact has been noticed, and that is the entire absence 

 of any metallic objects, or any signs of any having been used, showing these 

 aborigines to have been in ignorance of anything of the sort. 



At a point on the coast about thirty miles north of Point Rincon, and near 

 the little village of Goleta, is a place called More's Island. This is an elevated 

 plateau, surrounded by lowlands, and which, at no distant period, was an island. 

 Here it had been long known that there were traces of former inhabitants, but no 

 systematic search was ever made until the Wheeler expedition paid that place a 

 visit a few years since, when, in a short time, they exhumed and forwarded to 

 the Smithsonian Institution no less than ten tons of relics of all kinds. 



Crossing the Santa Ynez range at Santa Barbara, a region is reached where 

 no one would expect to find evidences of any former population, as the country 

 is as wild, unproductive and inhospitable as can well be imagined. Yet, in some 

 of the remote canons of the mountain range, and in places almost impossible of 

 access, extensive burial places and remains have been found and many valuable 



