THE HUMAN BEAST OF BURDEN. 



267 



the Great Interior Basin the Shoshonian stock have carried it much 

 furfuer southward, and even to the Pacific Ocean in southru California. 

 The Shoshonian stock, especially the central tribes in Utah, are agri- 

 culturists in a crude fashion. The women gather the seeds of fifty or 

 more plants, fan out the chaff in a basketry tray, elsewhere described 

 grind the seeds on a flat slab with a muller, and of the meal make 

 cakes or mush. The gathering-basket in which this harvest is collected 

 and transported is shown in the accompanying figures (12, 13). This 









Fig. 12. 



Harvesting-basket, used by alt, tribes in 

 Colorado, Utah, and Nevada. 



(Cat. No. 14GG4, U. S. N. M.) 



t ' ' 



Fig. 13. 



Ute Type oe Harvesting-basket and Fan, 

 used by all other tribes; also in the 

 gbeat interior basin. 



(Cat No. 42155, V. S. N. M. Collected by James Stevenson.) 



conical receptacle is held with the point on the ground and the rim close 

 to the plants. The female harvester holds the gathering-basket with 

 her left hand, and by means of a coarse fan held in the right hand 

 beats the seed into the receptacle. The carrying- strap of soft buckskin 

 is passed across the forehead to hold the basket high on the back. 

 Thus burdened the Ute pack- worn an trudges home to change her craft 

 from the burden-bearer to the miller and the baker. The carrying-bas- 

 ket of the Utes is made in twined weaving. The pattern is varied 

 according to the number of warp-sticks included within each turn. 

 The simplest incloses each rod separately ; another style takes in two, 

 and the twines are always between the same pairs of warp twigs. A 

 third style imitates diagonal or twill by including a different set of rods 

 on each round. This has been described in another place. (Suiithson. 

 Rep. 1884, Pt. II.) 



