Altogether it is very evident that the cliff houses have been used in comparatively modern times; at any rate, since the people owned asses, goats, and sheep. The rock is of such a friable nature that it will not stand atmospheric degradation very long, and there is abundant evidence of this character testifying to the recent occupancy of these cavate dwellings. [Illustration: Plate XXX. WALLED FRONT CAVATE LODGES ON THE RIO SAN JUAN.] [Illustration: Plate XXXI. CAVATE LODGES ON THE RIO GRANDE.] Above the cliffs, on the mesas, which have already been described, evidences of more ancient ruins were found. These were pueblos built of cut stone rudely dressed. Every mesa had at least one ancient pueblo up off it, evidently far more ancient than the cavate dwellings found in the face of the cliffs. It is, then, very plain that the cavate dwellings are not of great age; that they have been occupied since the advent of the white man, and that on the summit of the cliffs there are ruins of more ancient pueblos. [Footnote 7: Seventh Ann. Rep. Bur. Eth., op. cit., p. XXII.] Major Powell obtained a tradition of the Santa Clara Indians, reciting three successive periods of occupancy of the cavate lodges by them, the last occurring after the Spanish conquest of New Mexico in the seventeenth century. It will be noticed that here again the cavate lodges and village ruins are associated, although in this case the village ruins on the mesas above are said to be more ancient than the cavate lodges. A general view of a small section of cliff containing lodges is given in plate XXXI for comparison with those on the Verde. The lodges on the Rio Grande seem to have been more elaborate than those on the Verde, perhaps owing to longer occupancy; but the same arrangement of a main front room and attached back rooms, as in the cavate lodges on the Verde, was found. As the cavate lodges of the San Francisco mountain region have been assigned to the Havasupai Indians of the Yuman stock, and those of the Rio Grande to the Santa Clara pueblo Indians of the Tanoan stock, it may be of interest to state that there is a vague tradition extant among the modern settlers of the Verde region that the cavate lodges of that region were occupied within the last three generations. This tradition was derived from an old Walapai Indian whose grandfather was alive when the cavate lodges were occupied. It was impossible to follow this tradition to its source, and it is introduced only as a suggestion. Attention is called, however, to the tradition given in the introduction to this paper with which it may be connected. [Illustration: Figure 291. Plan of cavate lodges, group _D_.] [Illustration: Plate XXXII. INTERIOR VIEW OF CAVATE LODGE, GROUP D.]