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Show 50 THE SHORTEST ROUTE TO CALIFORNIA. they are obliged to live entirely on rabbits, rats, lizards, snakes, insects, rushes, roots, grass- seed, etc. They are more filthy than beasts, and live in habita-tions which, summer and winter, are nothing more than circular inclosures, about four feet high, without roof, made of the artemisia or sage bush, or branches of the cedar, thrown around on the circumference of a circle, and which serve only to break off the wind. As the temperature in the winter must at times be as low as zero, and there must fall a good deal of snow, it will readily be perceived that they must suffer considerably. Anything like a covered lodge, or wick- e- up of any sort, to protect them from the rain, cold, or snow, Captain Simpson did not see among them. Their dress, summer and winter, is a rabbit- skin tunic or cape, which comes down to just below the knee; and seldom have they leggins or moc-casins. The children at the breast were perfectly naked, and this at a time when overcoats were re-quired by Captain Simpson's party. The women frequently appeared naked down to the waist, and seemed unconscious of any immodesty in thus ex-posing themselves. The fear of capture causes these people to live some distance from the water, which they bring in a sort of jug made of willow tightly platted together and smeared with fir- gum. They also make their bowls and seed and root baskets in the same way; a species of manufacture quite common among all the Indian tribes, and which Captain Simpson saw in his Explorations of 1849, in the greatest perfection, among the Navajos and Pueblo Indians of New Mexico. |