Arizona weekly citizen., 1895-04-13
SAVING OF A NATION.
How th9 ChimahueviS Grew From
 Two to 6 Hundred.
All in the Memory of Man The Story of ths Family Of Chief Bill
 and His Squaw.
l.. A. Herald.

As O luk udus Iilo ueECuduL Ol luQlC
 has fund of Indian stories that is inex-
 haustible. His best, certainly hls most
 poetic, be recently told to a Herald re-
 porter, and it illustrates the fact that
 Indian tribes do not die out so easily as
 s sometimes thought. MT. Tingman's s
 story is as follows.
 | A number of old timers, real old
 timers, can remember that there was a
 werlike race of Indians called the China huev's settled along the Mojave river
 who committed so many depredations on | emIgrants that the government found it
 necessary to establish Fort Cody, and a
 war resulted, which left but handful
 of the tribe alive. These settled at l what is now known as Twenty-nine Palms, where there was but 6 spring of
 water, and they rapidly died of, leaving
 but two, old Chief Bill and bis squaw,
 the last of the once powerful nation. Chief Bill had no children, and this fact caused him great sorrow, for he saw that with his death the once great tribe would become extinct. The old couple were sun worshlpers, and every morning and evening prayed to the great sod of fire that they might be blessed with papoO5es, but several years pass ed by and there was DO batter of child reh's feet about the wickiup. One morning the squsw went to the spring to till her Olla and said her prayer to the sun, ard then bent over the clear pool of water to fill the olla, when 10 her astonishment and fear, she saw under the surface the beautiful face of a baby, a real Chimahuevi urchin, with it's coarse black hair, serious, earnest black eyes, clean brolzs skin, and it's little mouth already showing the lines of de- termination and courage characteristic of the race.
 The face was such @ winsome one th at 1t aroused into a passion the squaW's motherly instincts, which had been kept alive by her prayers and her hopes, and the knowledge that on her self depended the continuance of a race which had once been the lords of the desert she and Chief Bill loved go we'll She stretched her lean brown arms into the pool as if to clasp the babe to her fast beating heart, but with a gesture it repelled her, and by signs told her that the water of that spring was only good enough to grow corn and tobacco, and if she wished any papooses in her wickiup she and Bill nut move to another water hole, about twelve miles away toward where Iudio now is, and then the lovely babe appeared to melt away into the bubbles of the spring dissolved into little ripples that danced merrily in the beams of the smiling suu, to whom the old squaw lifted her voice in thanks giving
 Chief Bill, when he heard the squaw's story, pulled down his wickiup and moved to the spring at Indio, and in due course of time a lusty man child arrived to gladden. the old couples heart, and then came others, girls and boys until all told the Chimahuevis numbered twelve sO1ls.
 The youngsters grew fast and in the kindling atmosphere of the desert ma turity comes quickly; 1t was not many years before the eldest of the dozen children began to think of wives and husbands, and the boys went among the MOjaves and chose their squaws and the MOjave young bucks came to Chief Bills camp and married his daughters, but Bill always insisted Tn the latter case must join his tribe and remain, and his family grew wonderfully fast. ALd Chi-f Bill and his squsw moved back to their home at rwenty-niEe Palms, for the spell was broken and they saw the Chimaheuvis were not to become extinct.
 Whatevsr may be the virtue of the water or the truth of the old squaws story, it is now a fact that old Bill in place of, as was once the case being the chief of tribe consisting of only his wife and himself now rules over a family of more than one hundred de- cendsnts, and one which each year is materially augmented.
 As he holds up his latest great-grand- child to the edmiriUg gsze of visitors Chef Bill looks as happy and wIse as Solomon, and grunts "Ugh! Heap Iniuu
 now. Water long way dows gulch heap
 good"
 ''I visited the spring recently" said | Mir. Tiugm6n to d Herald man, and l found Yankee Drospector there. who was making arrangements with Bill to
 bottle the water and put it on the mar
 ket"