The smaller land game comprises a tortoise or two, all the local snakes and lizards, and a good many insects, besides various birds, including hawks and owls, as well as the eaters of seeds and insects. The crow and vulture are also classed as edible, though they are rare in Seriland, probably because of the effective scavengering of the province by its human residents. It is a significant fact that the smaller rodents, especially the long-tail nocturnal squirrel, are excluded from the Seri menu by a rigidly observed tabu of undiscovered meaning. A general consequence of this tabu is readily observed on entering Seriland; there is a notable rarity of the serpents, the high-colored and swift efts, and the logy lizards and dull phrynosomas so abundant in neighboring deserts, as well as of song birds and their nests; and this dearth is coupled with a still more notable abundance of the rodents, which have increased and multiplied throughout Seriland so abundantly that their burrows honeycomb hundreds of square miles of territory. A special consequence of the tabu is found in the fact that the myriad squirrel tunnels have rendered much of the territory impassable for horses and nearly so for pedestrians, and have thereby served to repel invaders and enable the jealous tribesmen to protect their principality against the hated alien. Seriland and the Seri are remarkable for illustrations of the interdependence between a primitive folk and their environment; but none of the relations are more striking than that exemplified by the timid nocturnal rodent, which, protected by a faith, has not only risen to the leading place in the local fauna, but has rewarded its protectors by protecting their territory for centuries. [Illustration: BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XXIX SERI ARCHER AT ATTENTION]