HOMINID^. 279 



Genus Homo Linn. (Man.) 

 Facial angle high; arms shorter than legs; nail flattened, 

 present on all the digits. 



Dental formula, I, 2—2; C, i— i ; P, 2—2; M, 3—3X2=32. 



Homo sapiens americanus Linn. 



AMERICAN INDIAN. 



Hair coarse, round in transverse section, straight, black, 

 long and abundant on the scalp but sparse elsewhere; skin dark, 

 often with a bronzy tinge; forehead retreating; nose prominent, 

 usually with a high bridge; eyes horizontal. 



When the first Europeans came to California the Indians 

 were numerous and distributed over all the State except the high- 

 er parts of the mountains and the waterless deserts. Excepting 

 the desert tribes the California Indians were a quiet peaceable peo- 

 ple. They had few vices but were very superstitious and some- 

 what revengeful. They were humble, contented and industrious 

 considering the ease with which their few natural wants could 

 be supplied. Unlike the Indians of eastern North America they 

 did not torture prisoners nor scalp slain enemies. The chiefs or 

 head men had very little real authority, the conduct of individuals 

 being guided mostly by old customs and superstitions. The tribes 

 were small and weak. In his report on the "Tribes of California" 

 ( 1877) Powers names over one hundred and fifty tribes, a few of 

 these being small sub-tribes, the remainder being independent and 

 speaking distinct dialects. He did not include the Mission In- 

 dians, nor the Indians of the Colorado valley. 



It has been found that one of the best clews to the relation- 

 ship between human races is their languages. This seems par- 

 ticularly true of American Indians. The polysynthetic feature of 

 speech runs through all the various American languages and 

 dialects. Their construction is radically unlike that of Eurasian 

 languages and seems to point to a separation fromi the people now 

 inhabiting Europe and Asia soon after the acquirement of lan- 

 ^age by the human races. 



