The southern cemetery lies between the outer edge of the ruin on that side and the decline to the plain, a few hundred feet from the southern row of houses. Two conspicuous bowlders mark the site of most of the excavations in that direction. The mortuary objects from this cemetery are not inferior in character or number to those from the other burial places. All attempts to discover a cemetery on the eastern side of the pueblo failed, although a single food basin was brought to the camp by an Indian who claimed he had dug it out of the deep sand on the eastern side of the ruins. Another bowl was found in the sand drift near the trail over the mesa to Kanelba, but careful investigation failed to reveal any systematic deposit of mortuary vessels east of the ruin.[111] The method of excavation pursued in the cemeteries was not so scientific as I had wished, but it was the only practicable one to be followed with native workmen. Having found the location of the graves by means of small prospecting holes sunk at random, the workmen were aligned and directed to excavate a single long, deep trench, removing all the earth as they advanced. It was with great difficulty that the Indians were taught the importance of excavating to a sufficient depth, and even to the end of the work they refused to be taught not to burrow. In their enthusiasm to get the buried treasures they worked very well so long as objects were found, but became at once discouraged when relics were not so readily forthcoming and went off prospecting in other places when our backs were turned. A shout that anyone had discovered a new grave in the trench was a signal for the others to stop work, gather around the place, light cigarettes, and watch me or my collaborators dig out the specimens with knives. This we always insisted on doing, for the reason that in their haste the Indians at first often broke fragile pottery after they had discovered it, and in spite of all precautions several fine jars and bowls were thus badly damaged by them. It is therefore not too much to say that most of the vessels which are now entire were dug out of the impacted sand by Mr Hodge or myself. No rule could be formulated in regard to the place where the pottery would occur, and often the first indication of its presence was the stroke of a shovel on the fragile edge of a vase or bowl. Having once found a skeleton, or discolored sand which indicated the former presence of human remains, the probability that burial objects were near by was almost a certainty, although in several instances even these signs failed. A considerable number of the pottery objects had been broken when the soil and stones were thrown on the corpse at interment. So many were entire, however, that I do not believe any considerable number were purposely broken at that time, and none were found with holes made in them to "kill" or otherwise destroy their utility.