On our return, late in the summer of 1833, we found the valleys depopulated. From the head of the Sacramento to the great bend and slough of the San Joaquin, we did not see more than six or eight Indians; while large numbers of their skulls and dead bodies were to be seen under almost every shade-tree near water, where the uninhabited and deserted villages had been converted into graveyards; and on the San Joaquin River, in the immediate neighborhood of the larger class of villages, which, in the preceding year, were the abodes of a large number of those Indians, we found not only graves, but the vestiges of a funeral pyre. At the mouth of King's river we encountered the first and only village of the stricken race that we had seen after entering the great valley. This was the pandemic of 1833, concerning which, in comparison with some accounts, Warner's description is a model of conservatism. It is evident that a combination of circumstances prevents us from making an adequate assessment of the aboriginal population of the lower Merced River and adjacent segments of the San Joaquin. Our density figure is about half the expected value. If we had the full facts, we could perhaps double the estimated population. Under existing conditions we can feel reasonably sure of the value given for the area between the Mariposa and the San Joaquin rivers. MARIPOSA-SAN JOAQUIN ... 19,000 _______________________________ THE SOUTHERN SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY The southern end of the valley, beyond Tulare Lake and the Kaweah River, can best be considered in three parts. The first is the foothill strip from the Kaweah to the Tejon Pass, which was inhabited by the Yokuts tribes Koyeti, Yaudanchi, Bokninuwad, Kumachisi, Paleuyami, and Yauelmani (maps 1 and 2, area 1G). The second comprises the lower Kern River together with the former Buenavista Lake basin. This area was held by the Yokuts tribes Hometowoli, Tuhohi, and Tulamni. The third includes the peripheral fringe of relatively high foothill and mountain country of the southern Sierra Nevada and Tehachapi and was inhabited by non-Yokuts people: Tubatulabal, Kawaiisu, Kitanemuk, and the Tokya branch of the Chumash (maps 1 and 2, areas 1A to 1E).