journey to the coast. This spot, familiar to deer, coyote, and Pomo, is sequestered high up on the western declivity of the Coast range, and is marked by a spring which gives life and beauty to a grove of laurels and buckeyes.

Here a fire is built, and around its encouraging light supper is quickly eaten. Then, in a great ring, regardless of sex, with their blankets for mattress and the heavens for a canopy, packed in touch for additional warmth, they lie like the spokes of some great wheel, converging toward the blazing hub, around which circle the wedged-in feet. No sentinel is thrown out during the night, for their most dreaded enemy is invisible and inhuman, lurking without to seize his victim only when alone and in the gloom.

Sunrise finds the party well on its way beyond the summits, with the blue mists of the ocean in plain view. All cut-offs are taken, and by four or five o'clock the bay is reached. In a ravine sheltered from the winds are found willow shahs, woven by previous visitors, and with slight repairs, these are at once occupied.

The Pacific coast north of San Francisco is noted for rough weather and a dangerous shore, broken in but few places sufficiently to form harbors. The southern side of that long promontory which projects just north of Bodega bay, and guards its entrance, has for countless years been the favorite, in fact about the only, fish camp for Indians in all that region. They come at regular intervals, ranging the beach in search of mollusks and other ma

A day or two is taken to rest, cure the fish, and cleanse the shells, before starting homeward. Finally the plunder is divided in the big baskets according to the bearer's strength. Clam shells are heavy, a bushel weighing about 130 pounds, yet the Pomosnot only average this amount per pack, but also carry strings of dried fish, kelp, and lighter articles, over precipitous trails, making only four camps on the road.

It may be evening of the fifth day when they come in sight of their rancheria, lying far beneath in the valley's shadow. Their dangers are past, and the toil is almost over, when some majélla, in accompaniment to her

the line for a mile, perhaps, before reaching home.

The Pomo can be termed a bimetallist; for though no metal is used in his coinage, yet he aptly calls his white ká yah "Injun silver," and for gold he mints out cylinders from a handsome mottled stone, called poh.

Ká yah (water bone) comes from the two well known clam shells, Saridormis gracilis and Cardium corbis. They are first broken in the hand with a stone into roughly rounded disks, and later by means of a quartz implement having sharp edges, the angles are deftly chipped off.

When he approves of the size and qual

ity of the little pile gleaming in front of him like tiny biscuits of pearl, the old coiner arises and after much fumbling around in the gloom of his shah brings forth his ka win, or boring machine. The principle of this tool is familiar to certain classes of artisans the world over, and dates back to the earliest history of China. It is an upright shaft alternately revolving right and left as the torsion or relaxation of a string attached to its top is felt. Wood and buckskin are the only materials in its construction, except the boring point, which now is the sharpened triangular end of a small file.

He kneels with flexed feet as a cushion in a position seemingly unendurable, and under a fervid sun the whirr, whirr, is kept up as long as daylight itself. The drill being conical he bores from each side, to preserve an even caliber, and completes the operation by a few deft turns of a reamer held in the fingers. As the shell varies in thickness, so we find ka yah varied in diameter, ranging from the size of a large porcelain button down to a disk so minute and fragile that it is a marvel it was perforated without fracture. In fact the hole oft-times looks larger than the coin.

Next comes the polishing. Pieces of uniform size are strung on willow shoots or a wire about a foot long, and some half dozen of these at a time are rolled side by side under the hands, back and forth, on top of

a sandstone slab, with water, till the rough edges are scoured off and the pieces become round and polished. This is essentially a man's work, requiring strength, dexterity, judgment, and endurance. The lime and water produce a corroding fluid which wrinkles and seams a coiner's hands so that they show their owner's profession at a glance.

The ka yah, now finished, is sorted into strings according to diameter and hidden in some secret recess. The hinges of the clamshell are much thicker than its body, and furnish long cylinders much more valuable than the flat pieces, ranking next to poh.

"Injun gold," or poh, comes from a stone, a species of magnesite, found under the alluvium bordering Clear lake, California, and occurs in lumps oval from attrition, and about eight inches in length. When newly mined by the Indian, its surface is crumbly and degenerate, but fracture reveals a grain milky white and of a hardness sufficient to turn tool steel.

The mass must now be baked. A pit about the size of a wash basin is dug, in and over which a fire is kept burning till the

COUNTERFEITS

66

Photo by Carpenter

KA YAH NECKLACE AND BELT

ashes fill it. Then the stone is dropped in and covered with ashes and the fire replenished. It takes about four hours to cook" the kabéy, after which it is removed while in a certain red heat, and plunged into a basket of boiling water. A mild explosion accompanies the plunge, rending the stone into some dozen jagged fragments, and oft-times when unskilfully done instant disintegration follows and somebody gets hurt.

Old blind Charyém was once a famous "cooker," and even at the present day,

years after the flying fragments destroyed his sight, nothing touches his pride quicker than to be led up to the oven and consulted about the process.

As iron enters somewhat into this mineral's composition, a vivid red exhibits its oxide after excessive heat and moisture. One can hardly believe it the same as the white stone of a few hours ago; for it is now as fragile as glass and mottled throughout with every shade from burnt sienna to translucent porcelain. Each fragment is surveyed with critical eyes to determine the largest perfect cylinder to be obtained from it.

Next comes the most careful of all the coiner's work, shaping the poh, which is accompanied by chipping off minute particles till the shape is approximated. In bygone days the piece was held in the hand and gently struck with the edge of a quartz hammer, but the Indian has discovered in sheep shears a more expeditious tool. A single unskilful blow breaks and ruins the poh, already perhaps having two weeks labor upon it.

Before the grindstone became known slabs of a silicious stone found in the neighborhood were used for scouring the piece down with water. The grindstone has halved this work.

A computation has been made of time spent in actual labor upon a certain piece of rough poh, and it took nearly ten hours of skilled white labor with the best of modern tools (diamond point excepted) to bring it into shape. To this must be added two hours for lathe boring and polishing, thus consuming a full day.

Considering the fact that the Indians were ignorant of the mechanical value of precious stones, (the sapphire was well known,) it is a difficult matter to determine just what they formerly used to bore poh. Traditions mention three substances, quartz, obsidian, and flint, none of which is as hard as poh. Metals are out of the question, and the shaping of a sapphire point equally improbable. All efforts for years to obtain this information have been without result, and the unvarying answer is, "Moul kabéy bechú" (Some little rock). It is positive, however, that the stone was immersed while bored, and experiments indicate that either of the three minerals mentioned render the process possible, though excessively tedi

1

We have now the three Pomo bases of finance, ká yah, hot sy dáh (clamshell hinge), and póh, each of them with a purchasing power among the Indians, comparing respectively to our coppers, bits (twelve and one-half cents), and gold. There is no standard size and weight, each piece is valued according to its finish, size, and material.

Counterfeits appeared as early as 1816, when the Russian explorer Kuskoff ordered made and sent him a certain pattern of glass beads to trade with wild tribes in New Albion. A number of these beads were exhumed from a very old grave not long ago, and prove to be good imitations, both in form and color, but quite lacking in luster. It is recorded that the wild tribes soon detected the cheat and cast them out with abhorrence. Tradition confirms the record with added details of how three Russian traders of charlil kol (devil's beads) were taken unawares and their heads burnt with the beads.

Visitors at the rancheria cannot fail to note the number of coiners at work, and knowing that wampum has no favor with the grocer, often ask why so much labor is spent on a money that will not buy.

No, it does not directly buy any more than our dollar would in some ultra-foreign shop. It must be exchanged first and the coin of that country proffered instead. So with the Pomo when in need of a commodity and short of cash, he takes a string of ka yah to his neighbor and exchanges one hundred and twenty pieces for a silver dollar, or a ten dollar póh for eight dollars cash. He is content, while the neighbor

1 Since writing the above I have been fortunate enough to secure a specimen of the ancient kawin. It is a simple straight round stick about eighteen inches long, to the end of which is attached a pointed bit of flint by fibers probably of deer sinew. This was worked by rolling it between the hands. The rudeness of this device made it impossible to bore cylinders of the size now made.

Photo by Carpenter

BASKETS ORNAMENTED WITH KA YAH AND FEATHERS

makes a good brokerage on the transaction.

Pomo wampum appreciates with distance from its makers, in fact is at a handsome premium in the Sacramento valley and in other distant rancherias. Bearing this fact in mind, Captain Jack, reported the shrewdest of Pomo chiefs, makes several journeys yearly to trade with interior tribes. If it be winter two scrawny horses drag a wagon containing only a sack of wampum and the driver's immediate necessities, but the return some weeks later looks like the march of Plenty. A pair of sleek Wylákki ponies speed a new wagon loaded to the axles with articles of varied description, from a sewing machine down to bundles of otter skins. This seems substantial proof that wampum is legal tender.

Besides its legitimate function as money, the kayah is frequently found ornamenting