The colors of Mimbres ware are uniform and often striking. There are good specimens of black and white ware; also red, black, and yellow with brown decorations are numerous. Some of the best pieces are colored a light orange. Many of the fragments are made of the finest paste identical in color and finish with ware from Casas Grandes, Chihuahua, which furnishes the best prehistoric pottery from the Southwest. No effigy jar, or animal formed vase, however, exists in any collections from the Mimbres examined by the author. Ruins in the Lower Mimbres have thus far yielded a larger variety and a finer type of pottery than ruins on the banks of the river among the hills, which is in part due to the extent of excavations. The Oldtown potters developed a kind of pottery with characteristic ornamentation found both in ruins in the plain to the south and along the narrow valley of the Mimbres to the north. The Mimbres pottery, like all other ancient ware from the Southwest, frequently shows evidences of having been mended. Holes were drilled near the breaks and fibers formerly united the parts thus holding the bowl together even though broken. As one goes south, following the course of the river, the character of the pottery changes very slightly, but if anything is a little better. The food bowls generally have a rounded base, but one specimen is flat on the bottom. The edges of the bowls from the ruin at Black Mountain are curved outward, an exceptional feature in ancient Pueblo vessels but common in modern forms. PICTURES ON MIMBRES POTTERY The great value of the ceramic collection obtained from the Mimbres is the large number of figures representing men, animals, and characteristic geometrical designs, often highly conventionalized, depicted on their interiors. These figures sometimes cover a greater part of the inner surface, are often duplicated, and are commonly surrounded by geometrical designs or simple lines parallel with the outer rim of the vessel. It is important to notice the graceful way in which geometrical figures with which the ancient potters decorated their bowls are made to grade into the bodies of animals, as when animal figures become highly conventionalized into geometrical designs. Although these decorations are, as a rule, inferior to those of the Hopi ruin, Sikyatki, the figures of animals are more numerous, varied, and realistic. The ancients represented on their food bowls men engaged in various occupations, such as hunting or ceremonial dances, and in that way have bequeathed to us a knowledge of their dress, their way of arranging their hair, weapons, and other objects adopted on such occasions. They have figured many animals accompanied by conventional figures which have an intimate relation to their cults and their social organization. Although limited in amount and imperfect in its teaching this material is most instructive.