Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-05-21
INDIANS BOOMERANGS
PUEBLoS IN NEW MEXICO THROW
THE CURVED STICK.
No Other Tribe of American Aborigines
Uses This Weapon-Specula-
ton of Scientists.

Santa Fee Correspondence New York Tribune.
| The Santa Clara Pueblo Indians recently
held rabbit hunt of enormous proportions,
! slaughtering thousands of the pests that
! have grown to be menace to southwestern
| ranchmen. At these rabbit hunts boom
erang throwers play leading part in the
| work of determination
| The New Mexican boomerang throwers
| have been using this primitive weapon for
| countless generations. When the Spaniards
| first penetrated New Mexico in search of
gold in the mining districts of the territory
| the Pueblos were using the boomerang al
| most exclusively as weapon. The Pueblo
Indian boy of today occasionally sallies
| forth with his bow and arrow, but most
of the tribe stick to the ancient boomerang,
especially when at their favorite sport of
rabbit hunting. The boomerang is not,
properly speaking, the returning boomerang
of the Australian savages, but is varia-
| ton of that deadly instrument 1t is simply
| curved club, which is thrown with won
derful skill and precision by the Pueblo In
dams, even to the smallest boys and girls.
Children Use Boomerang.
| The Indians begin practicing throwing
| the boomerang at an early age. Mere in
| fants can be seen on the sagebrush
| plateaus, initiating their larger brothers
| and sisters, and hurting tiny sticks at each
other, shouts of glee going up as some par
ticularly clever shot Is made. Some of the
older Indians manifest a degree of skill
| with the boomerang which is little short
of amazing. 1t is common sight to see
skilled boomerang thrower bring down a
bird on the wing, and to miss a jack rab-
bit on the run in the open is little short
| of disgrace. The rabbit hunts, which are
held every winter, are made the occasion
of festivities in the pueblos of the tribes.
The Indians have peculiar dances in which
they indulge just before the arrival of a
rabbit hunt day. These rabbit hunting
dances vary little from the deer ard corn
dances and other picturesque ceremonials
of the tribe.
The Pueblo Indians, the most civilized Of
all southwestern tribes, have suffered
severity owing to the depredations of rab-
bits. The Pueblos are expert farmers. They
had the science of irrigation at their finger
tips before the Spaniards first invaded
America. Today their irrigated farms are
models which the white man can follow
to good advantage. Consequently these alb
original farmers have taken to rabbit hunting
not only for sport. but as means of self
protection The Indians when hunting rabbits
scatter over broad area with shrill cries
that frighten the rabbits from their bur-
rows, and then the well-aimed boomerangs
| never fail to bring down the leaping ami
| mails. Where rabbit refuses to come
from his burrow, the Indian boys gather
about with sharpened sticks and dig until
the animal is forced to make a break for
liberty. The Indian dogs have their share
in the hunt, of course, and the scene is a
stirring one as the trbesmen scurry over
the plain, searching every arroyo for lurk-
ing rabbits.
Killing Jackrabbits.
The real feature of an Indian rabbit hunt
is the dexterity shown by individual BOOM
erang hunters. A sixteen-year boy,
straight as an arrow and 1.-THE as
young panther, will brighten a rabbit from
clump of sagebrush. To the eye of the
inexperienced there is no rabbit there, but
the Indian has not been deceived. AS soon
| as the jackrabbit starts from his place of
concealment and goes in long bounds,
which speedily carry him away from an
ordinary enemy, the Indian youth gives
shrill cry and draws back the hand holding
the deadly boomerang. Like base ball
pitcher he poises an instant, and then with
an overland swing, the boomerang is sent
forth, cutting the air with a swish, and al
most invariably sending the rabbit head
over heels. Inasmuch as the sportsman
must manifest a fair degree of skill with
the shotgun to shoot a jackrabbit when it is
well under way, the precision necessary to
kill one of the animals with a club can be
readily understood. The average white
boy, however he may pride himself on his
Skill III throwing the base Dali, would owe
it purely to luck should be bring down a
jackrabbit with a boomerang. Yet an In
dian boy thinks nothing of killing ten or a
dozen rabbits in a days hunt and not hav-
| ing single miss scored against him.
Scientists have speculated in vain as to
the use of the boomerang among these In
dams. No other tribesof the west or south
west use this weapon. which has figured
so long in the history of the Pueblos. Some
scientists have claimed that the boomerang
shows the Pueblos to be descendants of
some of the remote Asiatic tribes that used
similar weapons. This. however is regard
ed as mere speculation though the ancestry
of the Pueblos, as we'll as of several other
tribes of the southwest, is so shrouded in
darkness that one guess is seemingly as
good as ano. her. At any rate, the Pueblos
cannot be induced to part with their an
cient and favorite weapon. They use the
improved agricultural implements of the
white man. but they have no use for the
white mans gun. They cling to the boom
erang in preference to the revolver or the
repeating rifle, and In all probability this
primuve weapon will be in use as long as
the Pueblos exist as a nation.
CANNON BALLS WERE GOLD.