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University of California. 



[Vol. 3. 



place the sand contains great quantities of river cobbles, very- 

 many of which are broken. They are scattered about on the 

 plain over a space fully 200 yards long by 100 yards wide, 

 and patches of them occur on the higher terrace. Along the 

 bank where the river at flood times is eroding the sand into a 

 perpendicular bank from three to six feet high, it is seen that 

 in places the cobbles only extend to a depth of two feet, but in 

 others are thickly packed to a depth of five feet. By the removal 

 of the sand the cobbles accumulate at the foot of the bank, where 

 they form extensive beds. Tbey attract attention by reason of 

 the comparative uniformity in size (by far the larger number 

 being three or four inches in the longer diameter), and by the 

 large proportion that are broken. Many of them are reddened 

 by fire, and nearly all are supposed to have been used in cooking 

 acorns, by which they became brittle and were easily broken. 

 Along with these cobbles there are many angular fragments of 

 white quartz, and occasionally an obsidian flake, but implements 

 are not common, although I am told that mortars and pestles 

 have been found. The remarkable feature of the deposit is the 

 great quantity of these old cooking stones. It is no exaggeration 

 to assert that hundreds of thousands are now exposed to view at 

 the foot of the steep bank, and many times as many may remain 

 buried in the sand of the terrace. From inquiry among the 

 Indians I learn that each family used from five to ten stones 

 in a set. It is a question of how frequently they were broken 

 and how many families lived in tbis village, but it is beyond 

 doubt that this site was occupied for many centuries or else 

 the population was very great. Yet this village dated entirely 

 from a time subsequent to the abandonment of the forty-five- 

 foot terrace by the river, and was nearly unoccupied half a 

 century ago. 



I am strongly inclined to consider the uplift to which the 

 Modern canon is due as also the cause of the great extension of 

 the glaciers in the last, or Wisconsin stage, and on this suppo- 

 sition the age of the Modern canon may be placed at 5,000 years. 

 However, this figure will imply an unreasonably great age for 

 the upper terraces, and, in place of it, I will arbitrarily assume 

 2,000 years as the age of the Modern canon. It is not my inten- 



