Another and very common form of dwellings is the caves, which are excavated in the cliffs by means of stone picks or other implements. They are found in all suitable localities that are contiguous to water and good agricultural land, but are most numerous in the vicinity of large casas grandes. Most of them are in limestone cliffs, as the substratum of sandstone is not as commonly exposed in the canons and cliffs, but many cavate dwellings are in sandstone.
The additional remains observed by me are mounds in the vicinity of ancient dwellings, extensive walls of stone and mortar, large quantities of stone implements and fragments of broken pottery, acequias or irrigating ditches, ancient burial grounds, and hieroglyphic inscriptions on stones and cliffs—the last two to be doubtfully referred to the cliff-dwellers..
Fig. 1.—Casa Grande in Right Bluff of a Cañon entering the Verde River from the East, about twelve miles southeast of Fort Verde.
Of the cliff-houses, as contradistinguished from those of Pueblo pattern, many excellent examples are found in the Verde region. One, into which I was probably the first white man to set foot, is built in the right wall of a deep cañon, between Hackberry Flat and the Rio Verde. It was found when searching for a still larger
