Physically speaking, the Seris are most remarkable.  They are of great stature, the men averaging nearly six feet in height, with splendid chests.  But the most noticeable point about them is their legs, which are very slender and sinewy, resembling the legs of the deer.  Since the first coming of the Spaniards they have been known to other tribes as the runners.  It is said that they can run from 150 to 200 miles per day, not pausing for rest.  The jack rabbit is considered a very fleet animal, yet these Indians are accustomed to catch jack rabbits by outrunning them.

For this purpose, three men or boys go together.  If the rabbit ran straight away from the pursuer it could not be taken, but its instinct is to make its flight by zigzags.  The hunters arrange themselves a short distance apart.  As quickly as one of them starts a rabbit, a second Indian runs as fast as he can along a line parallel with the course taken by the animal.  Presently the rabbit sees the second Indian, and dashes off at a tangent.  By this time the third hunter has come up and gives the quarry another turn.  After the third or fourth zigzag, the rabbit is surrounded, and the hunters quickly close in upon him and grab him.

It is an odd fact that this method of catching jack rabbits is precisely the same as that adopted by coyotes, which work similarily by threes.  By this strategy, these wild dogs capture the rabbits, though the latter are more fleet by far.  It is believed that no other human being approaches the Seris in celerity of movement.  A favorite sport of the boys is lassoing dogs.  Mongrel curs are the only animals domesticated by these wild people.  For amusement sake, the boys take their dogs to a clear place and drive them in all directions, then they capture the frightened animals by running and throwing the lassos, which are made of human hair.  They have no difficulty in overtaking the dogs.

One day, a party of boys returning with their dogs after a bout of this sport, passed near a bush in which there were three or four blackbirds; on spying the birds, they dashed toward the bush and tried to catch them with their hands; they did not succeed, though one of the birds only escaped with the loss of several feathers.  Some women of the tribe were watching, and they actually jeered at the boys for their failure.  The boys were so mortified that they did not go into camp, but went off and sat by themselves in the shade of a greasewood bush.  What white man or boy would think of catching blackbirds in such a way?  Yet non-success in an attempt of that kind was the exception and not the rule.  The Seris often take birds in this fashion.