much, following the shape of the cave.  The materials used in the construction were stone and mud or, rather, reddish grit; and smaller stones had been put between larger ones in an irregular way.  The walls were only five or six inches thick and were plastered with mud.  An upright pole supported the ceiling, which was rather pretty, consisting of reeds resting on the rafters, and covered on top with mud.  The ceiling of the second story had been made in the same way, but had fallen in.  A piece of thick board half covered the entrance.  In the first story I found an additional chamber, and in it a skeleton, of which I secured the skull and some typical bones.

Not far from this, and situated in very rough country, was another cave, that contained ten one-storied chambers of the same material and construction.  The cave was fifty feet long and at the mouth seven feet high.  The apertures of the chambers were fairly squared, and not of the shape of the conventional ear of corn.  One door was a foot and a half broad, and two feet and a half high.  I crawled through the chambers, which were miserably small.  The floor was plastered, and in some rooms I noticed circular holes sunk into the ground in the way that I had already observed in Zapuri.  There were also small square holes, the sides being six inches long in the front wall.

Twenty miles from here, just north of the pueblo of Cavorachic, was a third cave which contained thirteen houses in ruins, The material here, too, was the same as before, but the houses were built to the roof of the cave, and were rounded at the corners.  Peculiar round loop-holes were seen here, too.  Eight of them formed a horizontal line, and one extra hole was a little higher up.  A track could be made out at certain places along the river, but the country was very lonely.  In the course of several days only six Indian families were encountered, and two of those lived here only temporarily.  We also met five stray Indians that had come down from the highlands to fetch bamboo reeds for arrows, etc.  It was quite pleasant to meet somebody now and then, although, unfortunately, no one had anything to sell, except a few small fish, the people being themselves as hard up for food as we were.  We carried our little metate on which we ground corn for our meals, but we found it very difficult on this trip of four weeks’ duration to secure from day to day corn enough to satisfy our wants.  One item in our menu, new to me, but common throughout northern Mexico, was really excellent when we could procure the very simple material from which it was made, namely squash-seeds.  These were ground very fine and boiled in a saucepan.  This dish, which is of Tarahumare origin, is called pipian, and looks like curds.  Mixed with a little chile it is very palatable, and in this period of considerable privation it was the only food I really enjoyed.