HOLMES ANNIVERSARY VOLUME 



angular at the base, and always had a dome-shaped roof. It was 

 built as follows : First from four to eight posts were firmly planted in 

 the ground, extending up to a height of perhaps six feet. At a height 

 of about two feet from the ground horizontal stringers were bound 

 to the sides of these posts. Upon these the closely set poles which 

 formed the floor were supported. It was very necessary that this floor 

 be substantial, since it must support perhaps as much as a ton of 

 acorns. Upon this floor, and within a fairly light framework of poles 

 carefully bound together and to the heavy corner posts, the sides of 

 the cache were built up of light twigs and weeds, this being finally 

 lined with fine grass. Its interior when finished was not unlike that 

 of a bird's nest. The curving top only was finally covered with a 

 thatch of tule, and, when finished, the entire structure looked very 

 similar to a small, tule house set up on piles. The thatch overhung 

 slightly so that the water dripped from its edges directly to the 

 ground. The sides therefore needed no special covering, as they were 

 thick enough to prevent the driving rains from penetrating enough to 

 do damage. It was filled with acorns before the roof was put on, and 

 had no regular door; in fact, a door was unnecessary for the removal 

 of the acorns. The loosely constructed sides, being without wattling 

 or other form of weaving, were easily opened at any desired point by 

 simply pulling the twigs, weeds, and grass apart, since only a small 

 aperture allowed the acorns to run out into a basket set below. The 

 twigs, etc., were then pulled back into place and adjusted to close 

 the opening. A cache of the rectangular type is shown in plate IV, 

 fig. 2, and one of the square type in plate n, fig. i. The former was 

 ten feet high, with a floor eight by four and a half feet in dimensions, 

 at a height of thirty inches from the ground. The latter was of about 

 the same height, from three to four feet square, and about the same 

 height from the ground. These were photographed at the Lower Lake 

 village in 1902, and, so far as known, were the last caches built by 

 any of the Porno. 



In the other two environmental areas acorns and similar foods 

 were stored chiefly in openwork storage baskets, sometimes of several 

 bushels' capacity, and usually kept in the house. Two types of out- 

 door caches were built, however, particularly in a year of very abun- 

 dant harvests. The summit of a conical knoll with good, natural 

 drainage was first hollowed out to accommodate one of these storage 

 baskets. A few inches was allowed all around, and a wooden platform 

 was placed in the bottom of the pit to keep the dampness from it. 

 The top of the basket came just even with the top of the excavation, 

 and over this a very low, gently sloping, conical, slab roof was built. 



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