CHAPTER IVThe Rites in the Kiva
For an hour Kwasa had been sitting stiffly on the stone ledge that ran around the outer wall of the kiva, trying to get used to the smothering mask Mosu had put over his head. This mask was a gorgeously painted affair representing the head of a duck. Feathers of green and black were fastened to the crest, and a huge bill of yellow cane projected from the mouthpiece. In it Kwasa became for the time a Katcina, or one of the supernatural beings which mediate between gods and men. As a Katcina he represented one of the ancestral forms which had emerged from the Lower World upon the day of Creation.
A tunic of cotton cloth reached to his knees. It was brown, and upon it were painted zigzag white lines representing lightning. Over one shoulder was a yellow scarf upon which the same design was repeated, and on his feet were beautifully beaded moccasins, over which his grandmother had bent for weeks, that they might be ready when the time should come for her favorite’s adoption into the ranks of the men. Around his neck, securely tied in a little buckskin bag, hung a charm, an exquisite turquoise, blue as the spring skies and half as large as a swallow’s egg. Old Tcua had fastened this on with trembling fingers as Kwasa left her to descend to the kiva, saying as she did so:
“It is for luck. My father had it from an Antelope priest far to the south. It is yours from this day.”
But Tcua did not know that Kwasa had another charm which to his boyish imagination was more potent than the turquoise. Fastened in a fold of his belt were three red and white sticks of cane, and as the lad sat waiting on the ledge in the kiva he said to himself:
“I am glad I kept the dice: they have brought me much of good.”
He felt something thrust into his hand, and looking at it as closely as he could through the eye-slits in his mask, he saw it was a prayer-plume, or a short stick to which were fastened four feathers, white for the north, red for the east, yellow for the west and green for the south. This he knew he was to carry in the solemn ceremonies to follow, as an invocation to the deities who dwell at the four quarters of the earth.
“Come,” said the masked figure that had brought the prayer-plume, “the gods wait for us.”
At the word, Kwasa slipped down from his seat and took his place in a long line of youths and men which was being formed at one end of the kiva. He saw Wiki, also carrying a prayer-plume, and wearing a beaver’s mask. In the weird, flickering light from the fire at one end of the chamber he could not distinguish many that he knew, and this, together with the strangeness of the sacred mysteries in which he was about to play a part, awed and half frightened him.
As the line formed the participants stamped softly upon the ground with their moccasined feet, not advancing, but marking time to a wild and monotonous chant which was accentuated by the rattling of small gourds in the hands of the priests and their throaty “hi-yi-yi” as they moved with cat-like tread about the sipapuh in the middle of the kiva.
At last the line began to move forward. Mosu took his place at the head and led it around the outer edge of the kiva, close to the ledge. Round and round they marched, each time drawing a little closer to the sipapuh. At last they formed a compact row about the sacred opening, and in this way encircled it four times more, each in passing stamping his foot on the stone slab as a hint to the listening gods that their attention was asked. At last, at a sign from Mosu, the line halted.
And now came the supreme moment. The participant who was to be most highly honored was to be chosen to hold the sacred bowl above the sipapuh while from themouth of the great snake effigy which was suspended from above should drop the Kawa-blessed seeds for planting. Everyone in the circle fixed his eyes upon Mosu, each secretly hoping that some deed of his own might be thought worthy such honored recognition.
Kwasa held his breath with the rest, wondering which one of all the line should be adjudged the most worthy. And for a moment the tumultuous beating of his heart made him faint and dizzy as Mosu, beckoning to him and speaking his name, put the great red and black bowl in his hands.
“Trembling till he could hardly stand, Kwasa extended his arms until the bowl was directly above the opening.”
“Trembling till he could hardly stand, Kwasa extended his arms until the bowl was directly above the opening.”
“Trembling till he could hardly stand, Kwasa extended his arms until the bowl was directly above the opening.”
Trembling till he could hardly stand, Kwasa, at a sign from the priest, extended his arms until the bowl was directly above the openingin the slab and under the swinging head of the hollow effigy above. Then through the tube came the seeds, first the yellow and white corn, then the beans, the squash and melons, greenish cotton seeds and rich-smelling brown grains of wheat. At last, when the bowl was nearly full, there was poured down the colored corn for the sacred meal, rounding and covering the rest.
Then Mosu motioned Kwasa to stand to one side, while Wiki was called forward and given a similar bowl. Delighted at his friend’s good fortune, Kwasa hardly heard the muttered congratulations that greeted him as he stepped back into the circle. But stealthily fingering his belt he patted the three red and white canes, telling himself that his own luck and Wiki’s had been unchangeably entwined since the day they had tossed the dice in the court.
But he had not time for more than a fleeting thoughteven for such momentous things, for something else was happening above the sipapuh. This time the attendant at the hatchway of the kiva poured through the snake effigy into the sacred bowl a small stream of water, signifying that thus would the snake deities of the clouds bless the planted seeds.
At another sign from Mosu, Wiki stepped back into the circle, and Kwasa came forward to distribute to each person a handful of the Kawa-blessed seeds. Then, taking a short stick tipped with stiff turkey feathers, Mosu sprinkled the water from Wiki’s bowl to the six cardinal points, north, east, south, west, the zenith and the nadir.
And the ceremony of the Blessing of Seeds was over.
Kwasa was glad to get out of the stifling air of the kiva and follow the rest up the ladder into the court above, where the final great rain-prayer rite was to be performed. In this he had no part, though he still retained his mask and personated the pawik (duck) katcina in the great circle that made the background for the principal actors.
Into this circle marched the long line of Snake and Antelope priests, participants in this supreme drama of the year. Very awe-inspiring they looked, their bodies rubbed with red paint, their blackened chins rimmed with a broad line of white and their bare arms glittering with barbaric ornaments. To a sort of hissing chant they marched about an improvised sipapuh which had been located in the broadest part of the court, shaking their rattles and stamping their feet upon the slab as they passed. Four times they made the circuit, as in theceremony in the kiva, then suddenly breaking into groups of three they rushed to the bush-covered kisi near the end of the circle. A group stopped for a moment before this shrine, and in a moment proceeded, the foremost priest, one of the Snake Clan, carrying in his mouth a squirming snake. The Antelope priest who followed him, in an apparent frenzy of excitement, waved a feathered prayer-stick to and fro to attract the reptile’s attention, but the snake only coiled the more tightly about the head and shoulders of the carrier. One after another each group paused at the kisi and secured one of the wriggling reptiles.
Round and round they marched, and then, at a sign from Mosu, an attendant suddenly darted forward and outlined a circle on the floor with sacred meal. Into this the snakes were dropped, to be sprinkled with meal as they fell. A wild scramble ensued, and in a few minutes the snakes were recaptured by the third priests of the groups, who darted across the court and down the niche stairway to replace the reptiles in their native dens. From there they would carry the prayers for rain to the deities of the clouds, the lightning and the thunder, who would thus be brought to bless the crops and insure abundance for the coming year.
“And now we are done with games,” said Wiki softly, as he and Kwasa descended the ladder into the kiva to remove their masks and deposit their prayer-plumes before the sanded altar at the end of the chamber.
“Yes,” returned Kwasa soberly, “but I shall keep the dice. They have brought us good luck.”