The Seri Indians. (1898 N 17 / 1895-1896 (pages 1-344*))McGee, W J
History
The Seri Indians. (1898 N 17 / 1895-1896 (pages 1-344*))
McGee, W J
Seri Indians; Seri language; Yuman languages
When it is read in history fifty years hence that a handful
of murderous Ceris, certainly not more than 80 of the tribe
able to bear arms, was able to domineer in the midst of their
crimes with unexampled audacity on account of the debility
of the government and the inhabitants, it will be regarded
as a romance or a fable; for it seems impossible that in the
nineteenth century such a condition of things could exist to
degrade the reason, the morality, and the dignity of civilized
man.
Yet a final note, apparently added in press, recorded that—
In consequence of the last incident of the Ceris, the prefect
of Guaymas, Don Cayetano Navarro, took the field, returning
with 12 women and 16 children prisoners; also 2 striplings and
a vieillard. He slew 9 among those who had no leader. This was
on Isla Tiburon. The Indians fled thence, and are supposed to
be at Tepococ.[221]
[221] Boletin de la Sociedad Mexicana de Geografia y Estadistica, tomo
XI, 1862, pp. 124-125.
These may be considered as characteristic skirmishes attending the
Encinas war. Other episodes followed, including the outbreaks of 1879,
noted in part by M Pinart. Bacuachito suffered in various locally
important events that will never be written: when Don Jesus Omada,
a water-guide to the expedition of 1895, was asked about the Seri
at Bacuachito, he answered with cumulative vehemence, “They killed
my father. They killed my brother! They killed my brother’s wife!!
They have killed half my friends!!!” As he spoke he was feverishly
baring his breast; displaying a frightful scar over the clavicle, he
exclaimed, “There struck a Seri arrow”; then he stripped his arm with a
single sweep to reveal a ragged cicatrix extending nearly from shoulder
to wrist, and added in a tone tremulous with pent bitterness, “The Seri
have teeth!”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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