Field and Forest 



A MONTHLY JOURNAL 



DEVOTED TO THE NATURAL SCIENCES. 



Vol. III.— NOVEMBER, 1877.— No. 5. 



Cremation Among the Yuma Indians. 



The following interesting account of a cremation among the Yuma 

 Indians of California was recently furnished me by Dr. J. V. Lauder- 

 dale, U. S. Army. It will eventually be embodied in my monograph 

 on the " Disposal of the dead among North American Indians;" 'but 

 as this work will not be published for some time, I have deemed it ad- 

 visable, in view of the little knowledge we have upon the subject of 

 cremation, to anticipate its final publication. — H. C. Yarrow. 



" A Yuma Indian employed about Arizona City had met with a vio- 

 lent death in a brawl. After the coroner had held an inquest upon 

 the body, it was given to his friends to be disposed of as is their cus- 

 tom, in the following manner : Two men placed the body on a gov- 

 ernment blanket, and tied the end corners together. Then they thrust 

 a long pole through the loops thus formed, and bore the body upon 

 their shoulders to a spot a mile from the town, near the river, and 

 laid it upon the ground. On the road there, the two pall-bearers had 

 been joined by another Indian and two or three squaws. I observed 

 that one of the squaws carried in her arms the head of an ox, which 

 she had procured from the stall of the town butcher. 



The Indians set themselves to work at once to collect wood for the 

 cremation. They selected a spot where two green trees stood about 

 four or five feet apart. They then gathered all the dry cotton and 

 drift wood to be found in the vicinity, and placed it between the two 

 trees in a compact pile, till it was about four feet in height. They 



