54.The next place they visited was Açànkikè, where there was a house built of the white rock crystal, with a door made of all sorts of plants. It was called Tsegà¢iniçini-behogan (House of Rock Crystal) and was the home of Tcikè-¢igìni (Supernatural Young Woman, or Young Woman Goddess), who was the richest of all the ¢igìni. In the middle of the floor stood a large crystal in the shape of a kethàwn. Just as they were entering, Qastcèëlçi, who had disappeared from the Navajo’s sight at the house of the bears, here rejoined him, and the party now numbered five. The apartment, when they came into it, was very small, but Qastcèëlçi blew on the walls, which extended thereat until the room was one of great size. The goddess showed the Navajo how to make two kethàwns and directed him how to dispose of them.55.Thence they journeyed to Tsitsè-intyèli (Broad Cherry Trees), where, in a house of cherries with a door of lightning, there lived four gods named Dsilyi‘ Neyáni (Reared Within the Mountains). The Navajo was surprised to find that not only had they the same name as he had, but that they looked just like him and had clothes exactly the same as his, His companions said to him: “These are the gods in whose beautiful form the Butterfly goddess has molded you. These are the gods whose name you bear.” The hosts bade their visitors be seated, and they ranged themselves around the fire, one at each of the cardinal points. Each held an arrow made of the cliff rose (Cowania mexicana) in his extended right hand. The head of the arrow was of stone, the fletching of eagle feathers, and the “breath feather” of the downy plume of the Tsenáhale (the Harpy of Navajo mythology). As they held the arrows they ejaculated, “ai‘, ai‘, ai‘, ai‘,” as they who dance the kátso-yisçàu do in the ceremonies to this day, and after the fourth ai‘ each one swallowed his arrow, head foremost, until the fletching touched his lips. Then he withdrew the arrow and they said: “Thus do we wish the Navajo to do in the dance which you will teach them; but they must take good care not to break off the arrowheads when they swallow and withdraw them.” Such is the origin of the dance of the kátso-yisçàn, orgreat plumed arrow. As they bade him good-bye, one of them said to the Navajo: “We look for you,” i.e., “We expect you to return to us,” an intimation to him that when he left the earth he should return to the gods, to dwell among them forever.56.From this place they journeyed on until they reached Açàdsil (Leaf Mountain), and found the house that was made of dew-drops (¢açò-behogan) and that had a door made of plants of many different kinds. This was the home of the Bitsès-ninéz (Long Bodies), who were goddesses. When they rose, as the strangers entered, the plumes on their heads seemed to touch the heavens, they were so very tall. The goddesses said to Dsilyi‘ Neyáni, “We give you no kethàwn, but look at us well and remember how we appear, for in your ceremonies you must draw our picture; yet draw us not, as we now stand, in the east, the south, the west, and the north; but draw us as if we all stood in the east.” This is the origin of the second picture that is painted on the sand. (Plate XVI.)57.Leaving the House of Dew they proceeded to Çonakàï (White Water Running Across). This was a stream which ran down the side of a hill and had its source in a great spring. Immediately above this spring was the home of Qastcèëlçi. The latter, as they approached his home, stopped at the foot of the hill and four times ordered his companions to go in advance; but four times they refused. After the last refusal Qastcèëlçi clapped his hands, uttered his cry of “hu‘hu‘hu‘hu‘!” and led the way. The house was of corn pollen; the door was of daylight; the ceiling was supported by four white spruce trees; rainbows ran in every direction and made the house shine within with their bright and beautiful colors. Neither kethàwn nor ceremony was shown the Navajo here; but he was allowed to tarry four nights and was fed with an abundance of white corn meal and corn pollen.58.Now Qastcèëlçi took him to a place called Lejpáhiço (Brown Earth Water) and led him to the top of a high hill, from which they could see in the far distance Gángiço, where the prophet’s family dwelt; for they had moved away from the valley in¢epéntsa, where he left them. Then the yay showed him the shortest road to take and bade him return to his people.59.When he got within sight of his house his people made him stop and told him not to approach nearer until they had summoned a Navajo shaman. When the latter, whose name was Red Queue, came, ceremonies were performed over the returned wanderer, and he was washed from head to foot and dried with corn meal; for thus do the Navajo treat all who return to their homes from captivity with another tribe, in order that all alien substances and influences may be removed from them. When he had been thus purified he entered the house and his people embraced him and wept over him. But to him the odors of the lodge were now intolerable and he soon left the house and sat outside. Seeing this, the shaman gave it as his opinion that the purification alreadymade was not sufficient, and that it would be well to have a great dance over him. In those days the Navajo had a healing dance in the dark corral; but it was imperfect, with few songs and no kethàwns or sacrificial sticks. It was not until Dsilyi‘ Neyáni recounted his revelations that it became the great dance it now is among the Navajo.60.It was agreed that before the dance began Dsilyi‘ Neyáni should be allowed four days and four nights in which to tell his story and that the medicine man should send out a number of young men to collect the plants that were necessary for the coming ceremony. For four nights and for four days he was busy in relating his adventures and instructing his hearers in all the mysteries he had learned in the homes of the ¢igìni. Then they built the medicine lodge and got all things ready for the new rites and for the purification of the one who had returned. The shaman selected from among the plants brought him by the young men such as he thought would best cleanse his patient of all the strange food he had taken among the alien Indians and in the houses of the supernatural ones whom he had visited. On the first day he gave him pine and spruce; on the second day, big and little willows; on the third day, a plant called litci and the aromatic sumac; on the fourth day, cedar and piñon. Of these the prophet drank cold and hot infusions in the morning by the fire.61.During these four days the ceremonies which Dsilyi‘ Neyáni had introduced were in progress. On the fifth day it was proposed they should send out the akáninili (meal sprinkler) or courier to invite their neighbors to the great dance. There were two couriers to be sent: one was to go to the north, to a place called Çògojilá‘ (Much Grease Wood), to invite some friendly bands of Ute, some distant bands of Navajo, and some Jicarilla who dwelt there; the other was to go to the south, to Tse‘lakàī-silà (Where Two White Rocks Lie), to ask the Southern Apache, the White Mountain Apache, the Cohonino, and a tribe called¢ildjèhe, to attend. To the camp in the north it was a journey of two days and two nights, and it would take the fleetest runner the same time to return. To the home of their neighbors in the south it was as far. As these long journeys must be made on foot and running, they could not find a single young man in the camp who would volunteer for the task. The men counseled about the difficulty all day and tried much persuasion on the youths, but none were found willing to make either journey.62.As night approached an old woman entered the medicine lodge and said: “I will send my grandson as an akáninili.” This old woman’s lodge was not far from where the medicine lodge was built and all present knew her grandson well. Whenever they visited her lodge he was always lying on the ground asleep; they never saw him go abroad to hunt, and they all supposed him to be lazy and worthless; so when she made her offer they only looked at one another and laughed. She waited awhile, and getting no response she again offered the services of her grandson, only to provoke again laughter and significant looks.A third and a fourth time she made her proposal, and then she said: “Why do you not at least answer me? I have said that I will let my grandson take your messages to one of these camps and you laugh at me and thank me not. Why is this?” Hearing her words, the chief medicine man, who came from a distant camp and did not know her, asked the men who were present who the woman was and what sort of a young man her grandson was; but again the men laughed and did not answer him either. He turned to the old woman and said: “Bring hither your grandson, that I may see him.” The woman answered: “It is already late; the night is falling and the way is long. It is of no use for you to see him to-night; let us wait until the morning.” “Very well,” said the shaman; “bring him at dawn to-morrow.” She left the lodge promising to do as she was bidden; and the moment she was gone the long suppressed merriment of the men broke forth. They all laughed inordinately, made many jokes about the lazy grandson, and told the medicine man that there was no use in sending such a person with the message when the best runners among them did not dare to undertake the journey. “He is too weak and lazy to hunt,” said they; “he lives on seeds and never tastes flesh.”63.As soon as there was light enough in the morning to discern objects, a man who was looking out of the door of the medicine lodge cried out, “He comes,” and those inside laughed and waited. Presently Tlà¢esçìni (such was the name of the old woman’s grandson) entered and sat down near the fire. All looked at him in astonishment. When last they saw him his hair was short and matted, as if it had not been combed or washed for three years, and his form was lean and bent. Now he appeared with thick glossy locks that fell below his knee; his limbs were large and firm looking; he held his head erect and walked like a youth of courage; and many said to one another, “This cannot be the same man.” In a little while another young man named Indsiskàï (Radiating White Streaks), as fair and robust as the first, entered and sat down by the fire on the side opposite to where Tlà¢esçìni sat. The white earth and the charcoal for painting the akáninili were already prepared; so some of the young men in the lodge, when they beheld this pair of fine couriers, arose without a word of debate and began to paint the latter and to adorn their persons for the journey. When the toilet was done, the medicine man sent the couriers forth with many messages and injunctions and told them to blow on their whistles four times before they got out of hearing of the lodge. Tlà¢esçìni went to the north and Indsiskàï to the south, and they walked so slowly that all the spectators again laughed and made merry, and many said: “They will never reach the camps whither we have sent them.” They passed out of sight just before the sun rose. Those who remained in camp prepared to amuse themselves. They cleared the ground for the game of nánjoj, and brought out their sticks and hoops. Some said: “We will have plenty of time for play before the couriers return.” Others said: “Atyonder tree we saw Tlà¢esçìni last. I suppose if we went there now we would find him asleep under it.”64.About the middle of the afternoon, while they were playing their games, one looked to the north, and, at a distance, he saw one of the messengers approaching them, and he cried out, “Here comes Tlà¢esçìni; he has wakened from his sleep and is coming back for something to eat.” A moment later Indsiskàï was announced as approaching from the south. They both reached the door of the medicine lodge at the same time; but Tlà¢esçìni entered first, handed his bag to the medicine man, and sat down in the same place where he sat when he entered in the morning. Indsiskàï followed and, handing his bag to the shaman, sat down opposite his companion. Now, many who were without thronged into the lodge to enjoy the sport, and they laughed and whispered among themselves; but the couriers were grave and silent, and, while the medicine man opened the bags, they took off their ornaments and washed the paint from their bodies. In the bag of Tlà¢esçìni were found four ears of léjyipĕj (corn baked in the husk underground). They were still hot from the fire, and the shaman broke them into fragments and passed the pieces around. From the bag of Indsiskàï two pieces of noçá‘ (the hard sugar of the maguey), such as the Apache make, were taken. When the young men had finished cleaning themselves, they passed out in silence, without a glance for any one.65.At nightfall they returned to the lodge, and entering, sat down in the west, one on each side of the medicine man, and Tlà¢esçìni addressed him, saying: “When we came to the lodge this afternoon, we did not give you an account of our journeys because the people who are with you are fools, who laughed when we came home from the long journey which they feared to undertake; but now we have come to tell you our adventures. I,” continued Tlà¢esçìni, “went to the north. On my way I met another messenger who was traveling from a distant camp to this one to call you all to a dance in a circle of branches of a different kind from ours. When he learned my errand he tried to prevail on me to return hither and put off our dance till another day, so that we might attend their ceremony and that they in turn might attend ours; but I refused, saying our people were in haste to complete their dance. Then we exchanged bows and quivers as a sign to our people that we had met and that what we would tell on our return was the truth. You observe that the bow and quiver I have now are not those with which I left this morning. We parted, and I kept on my way towards the north. It was yet early in the day when I reached Çògojilá‘, where the Jicarilla and friendly Ute were encamped. There I sprinkled meal on the medicine man and gave him my message. When I arrived they were just opening a pit in which they had roasted corn, and they gave me the ears which I have brought home. They promised to be here in our camp at the end of the third day, which will be the night of our dance.”66.When Tlà¢esçìni had done speaking, Indsiskàï gave the following account of himself: “It was but a little while after sunrise when I reached Tse‘lakàï-silà and entered the camps of the four tribes. In one they were just taking some noçá‘ out of a pit, and they gave me those pieces which I brought home. I entered the lodge of a medicine man in each tribe, scattered on him the sacred meal, and announced to him when our dance would take place. They all promised to be here with their people on the end of the third day, which will be on the night we hold our ceremony.”67.When the akáninilis came to tell their adventures to the medicine man, they were beautifully attired. They wore earrings and necklaces of turquoise, coral, and rare shells. They had on embroidered blankets of a kind we see no longer, but the gods wore them in the ancient days. They rustled like dry leaves. The blanket of one was black and that of the other was white. When they came out of the medicine lodge they went around among the huts and inclosures of those who were assembled, visiting the wives and the sweethearts of the silly men who had laughed at them in the morning; and everywhere the women smiled on the beautiful and well dressed youths. The next morning the men laughed and sneered at them no more, nor whispered in their presence, but glanced at them with sulky or shamefaced looks. During the day the akáninilis took part in the game of nánjoj with those who once jeered at them, and won many articles of great value.68.On the afternoon of the third day following the one on which the akáninilis made their journeys, a great cloud of dust was observed on the northern horizon and a similar cloud was seen in the south. They grew greater and came nearer, and then the invited Indians began to arrive from both directions. They continued to come in groups until nightfall, when a great multitude had assembled to witness the dance. After the guests began to arrive the young men set to work to cut trees for the corral, and when the sun had set the building of the dark circle of branches began. While the young men were making the circle the old men were making speeches to the multitude, for the old men always love to talk when the young men are hard at work. It was the greatest corral that has ever been built in the Navajo country. It was as broad as from Cañon Bonito to “the Haystacks” (a distance of about six miles), yet the visiting tribes were so numerous that they filled the circle full. In the mean time the sounds of singing and of the drum were heard all around, for many different parties of dancers, who were to take part in the night’s entertainment, were rehearsing.69.There was some delay after the inclosure was finished before the first dancers made their appearance. A man entered the corral and made a speech begging the atsáleï, or first dancers, to hasten, as there were so many parties from a distance who wished to perform during the night. Soon after he had spoken, the two atsáleï who led in the dance of the great plumed arrow entered, and after them came six more, andperformed this healing dance over Dsilyi‘ Neyáni as it is performed to this day. (See paragraph131.) When this was concluded various groups from among the strangers entered, one after another, and conducted their different alìlis, or shows, which the Navajo then learned and have since practiced when they sing their songs in the dark circle of branches.70.When the dance began in the evening there was one of the invited tribes which, it was noticed, had not arrived. This was the Beqai, or Jicarilla. The Navajo asked the Ute where the missing ones were, and the Ute answered that they had passed the Jicarilla on the way; that the latter were coming, but had stopped to play a game of roulette, or nánjoj, and were thus delayed. Shortly before dawn the Jicarilla came and entered the corral to exhibit their alìli or show. It was a dance of the nánjoj, for the wands and implements of the dance were the sticks and wheels used in playing that game.71.During the night a chief of the Navajo, while walking through the crowd, observed the grandmother of Tlà¢esçìni sitting on the ground. He approached her and said: “Your grandson and his friend have done a great deed for us; they have made a long journey. Many doubted whether they had really made it until we saw the multitude gathering in our camp from the north and from the south in obedience to their summons. Now we know that they have spoken the truth. Tell me, I beg you, how they did this wonderful thing.” She answered: “They are ¢igini. My grandson for many years has risen early every morning and run all around Tsòtsil (Mount Taylor, or San Mateo) over and over again before sunrise. This is why the people have never seen him abroad during the day, but have seen him asleep in his hogán. Around the base of Tsòtsil are many tse‘ná‘djihi (heaps of sacrificial stones). These were all made by my grandson; he drops a stone on one of these piles every time he goes round the mountain.”72.When day began to dawn there were yet several parties who came prepared to give exhibitions, but had not had a chance; still, at the approach of day the ceremonies had to cease. At this time, before the visitors began to leave the corral, the Navajo chief who had spoken with the grandmother arose and addressed the assembly. He told them all he knew about the swift couriers and all the grandmother had told him. He remarked that there were yet many who could not believe that the young men had made the journey; so, to satisfy all, he proposed that within twelve days they should have a race between the two fleet akáninili around the base of Tsòtsil, if all would agree to reassemble to witness it, and he begged them to invite their neighbors of the Pueblo and other tribes to come with them. Then other chiefs arose to speak. In the end the proposition of the Navajo chief was agreed to. All promised to return within eleven days and decided that the race should take place on the morning following. Then they dispersed to their homes.73.On the afternoon of the eleventh day, when they had reassembled according to their promises, the Navajo chief arose and addressed them. He invited the chiefs of the other tribes to come forward and complete the arrangements for the race. So the headmen all came together at the place where the Navajo was speaking, and, after some consultation, they agreed that the race should be around the peak of Tsòtsil, but not around the entire range of mountains. The Navajo separated themselves into one party and the alien tribes into another, the two parties standing at a little distance from one another. The aliens were given the first choice, and they chose Indsiskàï; therefore Tlà¢esçìni fell to the Navajo. Then the betting began. The stakes consisted of strings of coral, turquoise, and shell beads, of vessels of shells as large as the earthen basins of the Zuñi, of beautifully tanned buckskins, of dresses embroidered with colored porcupine quills, and of suits of armor made of several layers of buckskin. The warriors in those days wore such armor, but they wear it no longer. The beads and shells were laid in one pile; the buckskins, the embroidered dresses, and the armor in another; and the piles were of vast size.74.The homes of these young men were at Kaç-sakà¢tsé‘çqa (Lone Juniper Standing Between Cliffs), now Cobero Cañon. There is seen to day a rock shaped like a Navajo hogán. It stands near the wagon road and not far from the town of the Mexicans (Cobero). This rock was once the hut where Tlà¢esçìni dwelt. Not far from it is another rock of similar appearance, which once was the home of Indsiskàï. For this reason the runners were started at the Lone Juniper. They ran towards the west and five of the fleetest runners among the assembled Indians set out at the same time to see how long they could keep up with them. By the time these five men had reached the spur of the mountain opposite Çòsaço (Hot Spring, Ojo de los Gallinos, San Rafael), the two champions were out of sight. Then the five turned back; but before they could return to the Lone Juniper the runners had got in and the race was decided. Tlà¢esçìni had won by about twice the length of his own body, and all the wagered wealth of the other nations passed into the hands of the Navajo.75.When all was done the strangers were dissatisfied; they mourned over their losses and talked about the whole affair among themselves for a long time. Finally they decided to give the Navajo another challenge if the latter would agree to a longer racecourse, which should include all the foothills of the San Mateo range. The Navajo accepted the challenge and agreed to have the race at the end of another twelve days. Early on the eleventh day the strangers began to assemble from all quarters; they continued to arrive all day, and when night fell they were all in. Then the headmen addressed them, explaining all the conditions of the challenge and describing carefully the racecourse decided on. The betting did not run as high this time as before.The Navajo bet only about one-half of what they won on the former race. Again they started the two runners, and in such time as you could just mark that the sun had moved, they were back at the goal; but this time Indsiskàï, the champion of the alien races, won by about the same distance as he had lost on the previous occasion.76.Then the strangers were satisfied and said, “We will try no more. Many of our goods are still with the Navajo; but we have done well to rescue what we have.” One of the wise men among them said, “Yes, you have done well, for had you lost the second race you would have lost with it the rain and the sunshine and all that makes life glad.” It is because the Navajo won so much wealth on this occasion that they have been richer than the neighboring races ever since.77.The ceremony cured Dsilyi‘ Neyáni of all his strange feelings and notions. The lodge of his people no longer smelled unpleasant to him. But often he would say, “I know I cannot be with you always, for the yays visit me nightly in my sleep. In my dreams I am once more among them, and they beg me to return to them.”78.From Lejpáhi¢o the family moved to Dsildjoltcín¢i (Mountain of Hatred). Thence they went to Tsinbiláhi (Woods on One Side), and from there to Tse‘yuçáhia‘ (Standing Rock Above). In this place they encamped but one night, and next day they moved to¢epè-aça¢ (Sheep Promontory), and went on to¢epè-¢asi¢i (One Sheep Lying Down). Here again they camped for the night. Next day they traveled by Tse‘atcàlçali (Rock Cracked in Two) to Tcoyàjnaskíç (Hill Surrounded With Young Spruce Trees), to Nigàqokaï (White Ground), and to Tse‘yistci¢ (Dipping Rocks, i.e., dipping strata), where they stopped to rest for the night. On the following day they journeyed to Çosakázi (Cold Water), in which place they encamped again.79.When the morning came, Dsilyi‘ Neyáni said to his younger brother, “Let us go out and try to shoot some deer, so that we may make beça‘ (deer masks), such as we wore in¢epéntsa, where we killed so many deer.” The brothers departed on the hunt and came to a place called Dsil-líjin (Black Mountains), and they sat down on the side of the mountains looking towards Tsòtsil. As they sat there Dsilyi‘ Neyáni said, “Younger brother, behold the ¢igìni!” (holy ones); but the younger brother could see no one. Then he spoke again, “Farewell, younger brother! From the holy places the gods come for me. You will never see me again; but when the showers pass and the thunder peals, ‘There,’ you will say, ‘is the voice of my elder brother,’ and when the harvest comes, of the beautiful birds and grasshoppers you will say ‘There is the ordering of my elder brother.’”80.As he said these words he vanished. The younger brother looked all around, and seeing no one he started for his home. When he returned to his people he told them of the departure of Dsilyi‘ Neyáni, and they mourned as for one dead.THE CEREMONIES OF DSILYÍDJE QAÇÀL.81.It has been my lot to see portions of these ceremonies at various times. The most complete view I had of them was during a visit made to a place called Niqotlizi (Hard Earth), some twenty miles northwest from Fort Wingate, New Mexico, and just within the southern boundary of the Navajo Reservation. This was the only occasion when I obtained full access to the medicine lodge on the later days of the ceremonies and had an opportunity of observing the wonderful pictures on sand which are illustrated in color in the accompanying plates.82.On October 21, 1881, when I arrived at this place, the patient for whose benefit the rites were celebrated and a few of her immediate relations were the only people encamped here. They occupied a single temporary shelter of brushwood, within a few paces of which I had a rude shelter erected for my own accommodation. The patient was a middleaged woman, who apparently suffered from no ailment whatever; she was stout, ruddy, cheerful, and did her full share of the household work every day; yet she was about to give away for these ceremonies sheep, horses, and other goods to the value of perhaps two hundred dollars. No ceremonies whatever were in progress when I came. Everything, so the Indians said, was waiting for the qaçàli. (Paragraph2.) Some men were engaged in building a corral for the sheep that were to be slaughtered for the guests, and some old women were grinding corn to feast the men who were to work in the medicine lodge, which had been completed six days before.83.This lodge was a simple conical structure of large, partly hewed piñon logs, set on end and inclined at an angle of about forty-five degrees, so as to join one another on top, where they formed the apex of the lodge. The circle of logs was incomplete in the east, where the openings for the door and the smoke hole were. A passage, or entry, about five feet high and three feet wide, led from the body of the lodge to the outer doorway, where some blankets hung as portières. The frame of logs was covered with sods and loose earth to keep out wind and rain. Internally, the lodge was eight feet in height under the apex of the cone and on an average twenty-five feet in diameter at the base. The diameter was increased at the east (to allow for the entry) and at the north. The irregularity in the circumference in the north was at first conjectured to be a mere accident; but in the ceremonies of the first night its use became apparent as affording a hiding place for the man dressed in evergreens. (Paragraph96.)BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGYFIFTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. Xsee captionMEDICINE LODGE, VIEWED FROM THE SOUTH.84.The first four days’ceremonies in this case had been performed during the previous year. Such a division of the work is sometimes made, if more convenient for the patient and his friends, but usually all is done in nine consecutive days. These first days have less of interest than the others. Early each morning, before eating, all who desire, men and women, enter the medicine lodge, where, in a stiflingatmosphere, seated around a fire of dry wood of four different kinds—cedar, big willow, little willow, and spruce—they take the hot emetic infusion of fifteen different kinds of plants mixed together. A little sand is placed in front of each to receive the ejected material. After the emetic has acted the fire is removed, deposited some paces to the north of the lodge, and allowed to die out. Each devotee’s pile of sand is then removed (beginning with that of the man who sat in the east and going round the circle) and deposited, one after another, in a line north of the sacred fire. Each succeeding day’s deposits are placed farther and farther north in a continuous line. Next all return to the lodge, which has been allowed to cool; the shaman spits on each some medicine which has been mixed with hoar-frost and is supposed to cool. When all have left the lodge, a new fire of ordinary wood is kindled, and the kethàwns, or sacrificial sticks, appropriate to the day are made.85.Fifth day.The chanter did not arrive until the afternoon of October 23. His ceremonies in the medicine lodge began on the morning of the 24th. The forenoon was devoted to the preparation and sacrifice of certain kethàwns (keçàn)—the sacrificial sticks, to the origin of which so much of the foregoing myth is devoted—and of sacrificial cigarettes. About eight o’clock the sick woman entered the medicine lodge, followed by the chanter. While she sat on the ground, with her limbs extended, he applied some powdered substance from his medicine bag to the soles of her feet, to her knees, breasts, shoulders, cheeks, and head, in the order named, and then threw some of it towards the heavens through the smoke hole. Before applying it to the head he placed some of it in her mouth to be swallowed. Then, kneeling on a sheep skin, with her face to the east, and holding the bag of medicine in her hand, she recited a prayer, bit by bit, after the chanter. The prayer being finished, she arose, put some of the medicine into her mouth, some on her head, and took her seat in the south, while the shaman went on with the preparation of the sacrifices.86.An assistant daubed a nice straight branch of cherry with some moistened herbaceous powder, after which he divided the branch into four pieces with a flint knife. Two of the pieces were each about two inches long and two each about four inches long. In each of the shorter ones he made one slight gash and in each of the longer ones two gashes. The sticks were then painted, a shred of yucca leaf being used for the brush, with rings of black, red, and white, disposed in a different order on each stick. The two cigarettes were made by filling sections of some hollow stem with a mixture of some pulverized plants. Such cigarettes are intended, as the prayers indicate, to be smoked by the gods. (Paragraph88.)87.While the assistants were painting the sticks and making the cigarettes the old chanter placed on a sheep skin, spread on the floor woolly side down, other things pertaining to the sacrifice: five bundles of assorted feathers, five small pieces of cotton sheeting to wrap the sacrificesin, and two round flat stones, each about four inches in diameter. The upper surfaces of these he painted, one blue and one black, and he bordered each with a stripe of red. When the kethàwns and cigarettes were ready, the qaçàli distributed them along with the bunches of plumes, on the five pieces of cotton cloth, which were then rolled up around their contents, making five bundles of sacrifices. On the completion of this work there was prayer, song, and rattling; the medicinal powder was applied to the body of the patient as before (paragraph85); two of the little sacrificial bundles were placed in her right hand, and while she held them she again repeated a prayer, following again phrase by phrase, or sentence by sentence, the words of the priest. The latter, when the prayer was ended, took the sacrifices from her hand and pressed them to different parts of her body in the order previously observed, beginning with the soles of the feet and going upwards to the head, but on this occasion touching also the back, and touching it last. Each time after pressing the sacrifices to her body he held them up to the smoke hole and blew on them in that direction a quick puff, as if blowing away some evil influence which the sacrifices were supposed to draw from her body. Then the three remaining bundles were put in her hands and the rites observed with the former bundles were repeated in every respect, including the prayer, which was followed by singing and rattling. When the song had ceased some of the assistants took the bundles of sacrifices out of the lodge, no doubt to bury them according to the method proper for those particular kethàwns. The round painted stones were also carried out.88.The prayers which the woman repeated varied but little. They all sounded nearly alike. The night the shaman arrived he rehearsed some of these prayers with the woman, at her own hogán, to make her familiar with them before she repeated them, in the medicine lodge. The prayer addressed to Dsilyi‘ Neyáni, when she held in her hand the offering sacred to him, was as follows:Reared Within the Mountains!Lord of the Mountains!Young Man!Chieftain!I have made your sacrifice.I have prepared a smoke for you.My feet restore thou for me.My legs restore thou for me.My body restore thou for me.My mind restore thou for me.My voice restore thou for me.Restore all for me in beauty.Make beautiful all that is before me.Make beautiful all that is behind me.Make beautiful my words.It is done in beauty.It is done in beauty.It is done in beauty.It is done in beauty. (Paragraphs261-4.)BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGYFIFTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XIsee captionMEDICINE LODGE, VIEWED FROM THE EAST.89.The next part of the ceremonies (or, shall I say, the treatment?) was a fumigation. The medicine man took from the fire a large glowing coal, placed it beside the woman, and scattered on it some powdered substance which instantly gave forth a dense smoke and a strong fragrance that filled the lodge. The woman held her face over the coal and inhaled the fumes with deep inspirations. When the smoke no longer rose the coal was quenched with water and carried out of the lodge by the chief, Manuelito, probably to be disposed of in some established manner. Then the woman left the lodge and singing and rattling were resumed.90.While the rites just described were in progress some assistants were busy with other matters. One made, from the spotted skin of a fawn, two bags in which the akáninilis or couriers were to carry their meal on the morrow’s journey. Another brought in and hung over the doorway a bundle of dry, withered plants which he had just gathered. Glancing up at them I recognized theGutierreziaand theBouteloua. The bundle may have contained the other plants mentioned in the myth (paragraph44). They were hung up there till the next day, to be then used in a manner which will be described (paragraph101).91.The sheepskin on which the sacrifices had been placed was taken away and a blanket was spread on the ground to receive some more sacred articles from the bag of the chanter. These were five long notched wands, some tail feathers of the wild turkey, some small downy feathers of the eagle, and some native mineral pigments—yellow ocher, a ferruginous black, and a native blue. With the pigments the assistants painted the notched wands; with the plumes the chanter trimmed them. (SeeFig. 51andPlate XI.) Then they were called çobolçà, a word of obscure etymology, or in¢ia‘, which signifies sticking up or standing erect. They are called in this paper “plumed wands.”92.While some were making the çobolçà others busied themselves grinding, between stones, large quantities of pigments, coarser than those referred to above, to be used in making the sand pictures or dry paintings of the ceremony. They made five colors: black, of charcoal; white, of white sandstone; red, of red sandstone; yellow, of yellow sandstone; and “blue,” of the black and white, mixed in proper proportions; of course this was a gray, but it was their only cheap substitute for the cerulean tint, and, combined with the other colors on the sanded floor, in the dim light of the lodge, it could not easily be distinguished from a true blue. It may be remarked in passing that the Navajo apply to many things which are gray the term they use for blue (çolíj); thus the gray fox is called màï-çolíj (blue coyote) and a gray sheep is called a blue sheep. Yet that they make a distinction between these colors is, I think, fairly evident from the fact that in painting small articles, such as kethàwns and masks, they use the more costly articles of turquoise, malachite, and indigo. These coarse pigments for the dry paintings were put for convenience on curved pieces of piñon bark.From time to time, during this and the following days, as the heaps of colored powder diminished under the hands of the artists, more stones and charcoal were pulverized to replenish them.93.About noon they cleared off that portion of the floor of the lodge which lay west of the fire, and brought, in blankets, a quantity of dry sand, which they spread out over the cleared portion of the floor in a layer of the nearly constant depth of three inches. They smoothed the surface with the broad oaken battens used in weaving. Now for a time all operations were suspended in the lodge while the chanter went out to plant the çobolçà, or plumed wands, in front of the medicine lodge, and to lay beside them the collars of beaver skins and the symbols for wings which the couriers were to wear next day. (Fig. 51.) These articles, it was said, were placed outside as a sign to the gods that the holy pictures were being drawn; but it is not improbable that they were intended also as a sign to uninitiated mortals. However that may be, they were taken in as soon as the picture was finished. The great painting was begun about 1 o’clock p.m., was finished about 3, and was allowed to remain until the ceremonies at night were concluded. It will be described later. (Paragraphs160et seq.)see captionFig. 51.The çobolçà,or plumed wands, as seenfrom the door ofthe medicine lodge.94.When the picture was completed food was brought in, and there was a good deal of eating and sleeping and smoking done. Being informed that nothing more would be done until after nightfall, I went to my own shelter, to elaborate some of my more hasty sketches while matters were still fresh in my mind. At 7 o’clock a messenger came to tell me that ceremonies were about to be resumed. During my absence the principal character in the night’s performance—a man arrayed in evergreens—had been dressed.95.I found, on returning to the lodge, a number of spectators seated around close to the edge of the apartment. The fire burned in the center. The sick woman, with some companions, sat in the south. The qaçàli, with a few assistants who joined him in singing and shaking rattles, was seated at the north, at the place where the circumference of the lodge was enlarged. (Paragraph83.) There was a space about two feet wide and six feet long between them and the wall, or roof if you choose so to call it, of the lodge. I was assigned a place in the west. The sick woman was directed to move from the position she occupiedin the south, and sit, with her face to the east, at the junction of the two white serpents that cross one another on the picture. (Plate XV.)96.When she was seated the qaçàli began a song, accompanied by the usual rattling and drumming. At a certain part of the song the chanter was seen to make a slight signal with his drumstick, a rapid stroke to the rear, when instantly a mass of animate evergreens—a moving tree, it seemed—sprang out from the space behind the singers and rushed towards the patient. A terrifying yell from the spectators greeted the apparition, when the man in green, acting as if frightened by the noise, retreated as quickly as he came, and in a moment nothing could be seen in the space behind the singers but the shifting shadows cast by the fire. He was so thoroughly covered with spruce twigs that nothing of his form save his toes could be distinguished when he rushed out in the full glare of the fire. This scene was repeated three times, at due intervals.97.Some time after the third repetition, the chanter arose, without interrupting his song, and proceeded to erase the picture with his rattle. He began with the mountain in the west (paragraph162), which he completely leveled; next in order he erased the track of the bear; next, the hole in the center; and then, one by one, the various other figures, ending with the serpents on the outside. In erasing the serpents, he began with the figures in the east and followed the apparent course of the sun, ending with the figures in the north. When the picture was completely obliterated, the sand on which it had been drawn was collected, put in a blanket, and carried out of doors, to be thrown away.98.Then the sick woman was lifted by two other women and laid on her side where the picture had been, with her face to the east. While she lay there, the medicine man, amid much singing, walked around her, inscribed on the earth at her feet a straight line with his finger and erased it with his foot, inscribed at her head a cross and rubbed it out in the same manner, traced radiating lines in all directions from her body and obliterated them, gave her a light massage, whistled over her from head to foot and all around her, and whistled towards the smoke hole, as if whistling something away. These acts were performed in the order in which they are recorded. His last operation on her was a severe massage, in which he kneaded every part of her body forcibly and pulled her joints hard, whereat she groaned and made demonstrations of suffering. This concluded, she rose. A blanket was spread on the ground on the north of the fire, near where the man in evergreens was concealed. At the last appearance of the man in evergreens the woman fell back apparently paralyzed and suffering from difficulty of breathing, all of which was probably feigned, but was supposed to be a sign that the right remedy or ceremony for her ailment had been found and that none other need be tried. The medicine man now proceeded to restore her to consciousness by drawing zigzag lines from her bodyeast and west and straight lines north and south, like their symbols for the chain and sheet lightnings, by stepping over her in different directions, and by rattling. When she had apparently recovered, he pressed the plumed wands and the symbols for wings to different parts of her body, in the order and with the ceremonies described when referring to previous application made to her body.99.There were no more ceremonies that night. I remained in the medicine lodge until it was quite late. The men occupied their time in singing, rattling, gambling, and smoking. After a while some grew weary and lay down to sleep. Being repeatedly assured that nothing more would happen until the whistle sounded in the morning, I left the lodge to roll myself in my blankets. Yet frequently during the night, fearing I might have been deceived, I stealthily arose and visited the medicine lodge, only to find all slumbering soundly.100.Sixth day.At five in the morning (Saturday, October 25) the whistle sounded and I hastened to the medicine lodge. There was much to be done; the couriers were to be dressed and sent on their way, and a large picture was to be painted; so the work had to begin early.see captionFig. 52.Akániniliready for the journey.101.The first thing done was to burn to charcoal the bundle of plants which had been gathered on the previous morning and hung over the door of the lodge inside. (Paragraph90.) The charcoal was used in painting the limbs of the akáninilis or couriers. A basin of water containing soap root or amolë (the root ofYucca baccata, and other species of yucca) was brought in, and after the medicine man had dabbed them with a little of the suds the akáninilis-elect washed themselves with it from head to foot, cleaning their hair well. When the bath was done, they were dabbed by the qaçàli with some other mixture contained in a waterproof wicker basin and were made to inhale the fragrantfumes of some vegetable powder scattered on a live coal, which, as usual, was “put out,” in a double sense, when the fumigation was over. Then the young men were dressed and adorned to look like Dsilyi‘ Neyáni after his toilet in the house of the butterflies. (Paragraph44.) Their legs and forearms were painted black, to represent the storm cloud. The outer aspects of these members were decorated with white zigzag streaks, to indicate the white lightning. Their faces were painted partly white and small white spots were scattered over their bodies. Downy eagle feathers were fastened to their hair; necklaces of shell and coral were hung around their necks, and over these were laid collars of beaver skin, with whistles attached, which had lain in front of the lodge the day before, near the plumed wands. (Paragraph93,Fig. 51.) Small objects to represent wings were tied to their arms. Each was given one of the fawn skin bags (paragraph90) with corn meal in it. In the hand of the akáninili who was to go to the south was placed one of the çobolçà, or plumed wands, whose stem was painted black, the color of the north, as a sign to all he might meet that he was a duly authorized messenger from a medicine lodge in the north. In the hand of the other akáninili was placed a blue shafted wand, to show that he came from the south. Thus equipped they were all ready for the journey. (Fig. 52.)102.The chanter gave them his messages, telling them where to go, what places they were to visit, what other chanters they were to see, what dancers they were to invite, and what gifts they were authorized to offer to the visiting performers for their trouble. Having given these special instructions, he closed with the general instructions, which are always given to the akáninili, as follows:These [pointing to the eagle feathers on the head] will make for you a means of rising as you progress.These [pointing to the wing symbols on the arm] will bear you onward.This [pointing to the collar of beaver skin] will be a means of recognition for you. For this reason it hangs around your neck.Sprinkle meal across a little valley, across a big arroyo.Across the roots of a tree sprinkle meal and then you may step over.Sprinkle meal across a flat rock.Then the plumed wand. For this purpose you carry it, that they will recognize you as coming from a holy place.103.The akáninili on his journey scatters meal before him as directed in these charges. He also scatters it on the medicine men whom he visits, and for this reason he is called akáninili, which signifies meal sprinkler.104.When the last word of the instructions was uttered, the couriers departed, one to the north and one to the south. It was not later than 7 o’clock when they left. As soon as they were gone, the work of painting the picture appropriate to the day was begun. It was much more elaborate than the painting of the previous day. Although a dozen men worked on it, it was not finished until two o’clock. About the timeit was done, the akáninili from the south returned. He was carefully divested of all his ornaments. The white paint was scraped carefully from his body and preserved in the medicine bags of those who scraped it off. Then he was led out of the lodge.105.When the picture was finished, the shaman, having applied pollen in three places to each god, stuck around it in the ground, at regular intervals, the three plumed wands which had stood before the door of the lodge all day and the wand which the akáninili from the south had just brought back with him. This wand he placed at the south of the picture, and laid beside it the collar, wings, and plumes which the akáninili had worn. The fifth, or north, wand was still absent with the courier who went to the north.106.All was ready now for the treatment of the sick woman. She was sent for, and a crier went to the door of the lodge to announce that song and ceremony were to begin. Accompanied by another woman, she entered, carrying a basket with corn meal in it. This she sprinkled lightly over the picture and then handed it to some of the assistants, who finished the work she had begun by strewing the meal plentifully on the figures. She sat on the form of the god in the east, facing the door, with her feet extended, and her companion sat on the figure of the cornstalk in the southeast. (Plate XVI.) In the mean time the medicine man had made a cold infusion in an earthen bowl and placed it on the hands of the rainbow figure (paragraph169), laying over it a brush or sprinkler made of feathers, with a handle of colored yarn. When the women were seated, the chanter dipped his brush in the solution; sprinkled the picture plentifully; touched each divine figure with the moistened brush in three places-brow, mouth, and chest; administered the infusion to the women, in two alternate draughts to each; drained the bowl himself; and handed it to the bystanders, that they might finish the dregs and let none of the precious stuff go to waste. Next came the fumigation. The woman whom we have designated as the companion rose from her seat on the picture and sat on the ground beside the door. The principal patient retained her seat on the eastern god. Near each a live coal was laid on the ground. On the coal a strong scented but rather fragrant mixture was thrown, and as the fumes arose the women waved them towards their faces and breathed them in as before. The coal was extinguished and carefully removed, as on previous occasions. The application of the sacred dust to the body of the patient followed. The shaman moistened his hands with saliva and pressed them to the feet of all the gods. Some of the powder, of course, stuck to his palms. This he applied to the feet of the patient. Thus he took dust from the knees, abdomens, chests, shoulders, and heads of the figures and applied it to corresponding parts of the patient’s form, making a strong massage with each application.107.When the patient had departed many of the spectators advanced to the picture and gathered the corn pollen (paragraphs105and112), nowrendered doubly sacred, and put it in their medicine bags. Some took portions of the remaining dust from the figures, after the manner of the shaman, and applied it to ailing portions of their persons. If the devotee had disease in his legs, he took dust from the legs of the figures; if in his head, the dust was taken from the heads of the figures, and so on.108.By the time they were all done the picture was badly marred; yet its general form and some of the details were quite distinguishable. Then it became the province of the chanter to completely obliterate it. He began with the white god in the east and took in turn the figures in the southeast (corn), south, southwest, west, center, northwest, north, and northeast. Next, the figure of the rainbow was erased from foot to head, and, on his way, the chanter knocked down, with rather vicious blows, the plumed wands which stood up around the picture. When he came to the round figure in the center he dug up a cup which had been buried there. He erased the picture with a long slender wand and sang in the meantime, to the accompaniment of the rattling of his assistants, a plaintive chant in a minor key, which was perhaps the most melodious Indian song I ever heard. All was over at half past 2 in the afternoon.109.Later in the day it was announced that the other akáninili was approaching from the north. He could then be observed about a mile away in an open plain. As he advanced the sound of his whistle was heard. At exactly half past 4 he entered the medicine lodge, where the chanter motioned him to a seat in the south. Singing and rattling were at once begun and the akáninili was divested of his trappings in the following order: head plumes, beaver collar, necklace, right wing, left wing, belt, sash, moccasins. The white paint was removed and preserved as on the former occasion. He was led out of the lodge, where he was well washed from head to foot in a hot decoction of the detergent amolë and dried with corn meal. Two large blood blisters were to be seen on the inner aspects of his thighs, brought on by the friction of his breechcloth in running. He said that he had run constantly when not in sight from our camp, had traveled a long way since morning, and was very tired. It seems to be the custom with the akáninilis to walk slowly when near camp and to run when out of sight, probably to follow the mythic examples of Tlà¢esçìni and Indsiskàï. (Paragraph63.)110.With the toilet of the akáninili the ceremonies of the day ended. He returned to the lodge to relate his adventures and get some food. During the day visitors arrived occasionally from distant camps. In the afternoon there were several young men present, who busied themselves in grubbing and clearing the ground where the corral was to be built and the great dance of the last night was to be held. I remained in the lodge until it was quite late, and I frequently rose during the night to see if anything was going on; but the night passed without event, like the previous one.111.Seventh day.The painting of the picture and the treatment of the sick woman were the only works performed on this day (Sunday, October 26). The whistle sounded from the lodge at 6 a.m., but already the plumed wands and the beaver collars had been placed before the door of the medicine lodge and the sand for the groundwork of the picture had been brought in. As the picture (Plate XVII) was to be larger than those which preceded it, the fire was moved quite near to the door; the heated earth which lay under the fire in its former position was dug up and replaced with cold earth, probably for the comfort of the artists.112.The work of the painters was begun soon after 6 a.m. and was not completed until about 2 p.m. About a dozen men were engaged on it, and it occupied them, as we have seen, about eight hours. As usual, the qaçàli did very little of the manual labor; but he constantly watched the work and frequently criticised and corrected it. When the painting was done, it became his duty to apply the sacred corn pollen to the brow, mouth, and chest of each of the gods and to set up the bounding çobolçà or plumed wands. After this he placed a bowl of water on the left hand of the white god—the form second from the north—threw into it some powdered substance to make a cold decoction, and laid the sprinkler on top of it. (Paragraph106.)113.The whistle was blown. The herald announced that all was ready. The sick woman and her companion entered, and one after the other cast meal upon the floor. The former took off her moccasins and sat on the ground near the door while a song was sung. Then she sat on the form of the white god, her companion sat on the form of the blue god, and the singing and rattling were resumed. Without interrupting his song the chanter sprinkled the picture with the infusion, applied the moistened sprinkler to the breast, head, and brow of each of the gods in the following order: white, blue, yellow, black, and sat down to finish his chant. He administered the decoctions to his patient in two draughts, to her companion in two draughts, to himself (honest physician!) in the same manner, and gave as before (paragraph106) the dregs to the bystanders. He applied the dust from different parts of the divine figures to the sick woman, in much the same manner as on the previous day, and while doing this he obliterated the pictures of the little animals over the head of the white god. The fumigation of both women was repeated with exactly the same rites as on the second day, and the fumes had precisely the same odor on this occasion as on that. When the coals were extinguished and taken out, the chanter said to the women, “kaç” (now), whereat they arose and left the lodge.114.As soon as they were gone the work of obliteration began. The figures of the gods were rubbed out in the usual order (white, blue, yellow, black, rainbow), the erasure in each case proceeding from foot to head. The plumed wands fell as before, simultaneously with the destruction of the rainbow. The sand was carried out at half past 2 o’clock and no further rites were performed during the day.115.Eighth day.The picture painted on Monday (October 27) was of a simple character, and hence did not occupy much time. The work was begun at 7 a.m. and was finished at 10 a.m. Of the four shorter or interior arrows (Plate XVIII), that which stands second from the north was regarded as the arrow of the east and was begun first. On this arrow the sick woman was placed, sitting with her face to the east, when she came to be treated and fumigated. The bowl of infusion was laid on the point of the arrow immediately to her left, regarded as the arrow of the north. The medicine man put the pollen on the base, on the red cross lines near the center, and on the white tips. All the ceremonies which took place between the completion and the obliteration of the picture (the planting of the five plumed wands, the sprinkling of the picture with meal, the sprinkling and administration of the infusion, the application of the colored dust to the person of the patient, the fumigation of the two women, the whistling, the singing, and rattling) were essentially the same as those observed on the previous day. In taking the dust from the picture, however, the shaman applied his hands only to the bases of the arrows. The ceremony of obliteration was also a repetition of the rites of the previous day.see captionFig. 53.The great wood pile.116.The building of the great stack of wood (Fig. 53) which was to furnish the fire in the center of the corral on the last night went on simultaneously with the painting of the picture. Both tasks were begun and ended about the same time. The wood in the big pile was dead, long seasoned juniper and cedar, fuel of the most inflammable character. The pile was about twelve feet high and sixty paces in circumference.Large quantities of this dry wood were also brought and placed outside the space allotted to the corral, to replenish the fires when needed.117.In the afternoon there were no ceremonies in the medicine lodge. The qaçàli and his assistants took a half holiday, and not without deserving it, for they had wrought well for three days and they had a long day’s work and a long night’s work still before them. A large number of people had by this time assembled, and from time to time more arrived. Throughout the sparse grove which surrounded us, little temporary corrals and huts of boughs were going up in every direction. In more secret spots in the rugged walls of a cañon, about half a mile from the medicine lodge, other shelters were erected, where visiting performers were to prepare themselves on the last night. Many young men were busy in the afternoon cutting down the trees and lopping off the branches which were to form the great corral (the ilnásjin, the dark circle of branches) on the next day. Some of the visiting women were busy grinding meal and attending to different household duties; others played cards or engaged in the more aboriginal pastime of áz¢ilçil, a game played with three sticks and forty stones, the latter for counters.118.The friends of the sick woman prepared the alkàn, a great corn cake baked in the earth, the manufacture of which gave evidence of the antiquity of the process. The batter was mixed in one large hole in the ground lined with fresh sheepskin. It was baked in another hole in which a fire had been burning for many hours, until the surrounding earth was well heated. The fire was removed; the hole lined with corn husks; the batter ladled in and covered with more cornhusks; hot earth and hot coals were spread overall. The cake was not dug up until the following day, and was designed chiefly for the special entertainment of those who were at work in the medicine lodge.119.Ninth day (until sunset).On Tuesday (October 28) the work in the lodge consisted in preparing certain properties to be used in the ceremonies of the night. These were the wands to be used in the first dance, the kátso-yisçàn or great plumed arrows, and the trees which the dancers pretended to swallow.120.The wand of the nahikàï was made by paring down a straight slender stick of aromatic sumac, about three feet long, to the general thickness of less than half an inch, but leaving a head or button at one end. A ring was fashioned from a transverse slice of some hollow or pithy plant, so that it would slide freely up and down the slender wand, but would nob pass over the head. Eagle down was secured to the wooden head and also to the ring. In the dance (paragraph129) the eagle down on the stick is burned off in the fire while the ring is held in the palm of the hand. When the time comes for the wand to grow white again, as the name nahikàï expresses it, the ring is allowed to leave the palm and slide to the other end of the stick.121.The great plumed arrows were deceptions somewhat similar in character to the wands. One-half of the arrow was made of a slenderhard twig of cliff rose; the other half was formed of some pithy suffruticose herb which I could not determine satisfactorily, as I saw only the cut sections and was not permitted to handle these. The pith was removed so as to allow the wooden part to move into the herby part with a telescopic mechanism. The herbaceous portion was so covered with feathers that nothing could be seen of its surface. A large stone arrowhead was attached to the wooden shaft. When the actor pretended to swallow this he merely held the stone point firmly between his teeth and forced the upper or plumed shaft down on the lower or wooden shaft. It was an excellent deception, and presented to the ordinary observer all the appearance of genuine arrow swallowing.122.The piñon saplings, which the dancers also pretended to swallow, had no deceptive arrangement. They were slender little trees trimmed at the butt into a broad, thin, wedge shaped point, which was carefully smoothed by rubbing it with sandstone, so that no offensive splinters should present themselves to the lips of the dancers. The smooth end was painted red, probably to make the spectators, at night, by the uncertain firelight, suppose that the dissemblers had torn their throats in their great efforts. Sometimes the saplings have all their branches removed, and are then trimmed with cross pieces and circles of evergreen sprays. In most cases, however, I have seen the sapling used in its natural condition.123.As each set of implements was completed there was a ceremony with singing and rattling, the men who were to use them at night partook of powdered medicines on their extended tongues, from the hands of the chanter, and then practiced themselves in the use of the implements. Although they well knew the deceptive nature of these articles and fully understood the frauds they were preparing to perpetrate on the public, these young men seemed to view the whole work with high reverence and treat it with the greatest seriousness. For instance, when, in the secrecy of the lodge, they went through the motions of swallowing the trees they showed indubitable signs of fear: all looked anxious, some trembled quite perceptibly, and one looked as pale as a live Indian can look. They probably dreaded the displeasure of the gods if all were not done well.124.Last night.Just after sunset the old chanter posted himself some paces to the east of the great woodpile, on the spot where the gate of the corral was to be, and began a song. Simultaneous with the beginning of the song was the commencement of the building of the dark circle. All the young and middleaged men in camp assisted. They dragged the branches from where they had been cut down in the neighboring woods and put them in position in the circle with great celerity. The work was all done in less than an hour, during which time the chanter ceased not for an instant his song and rattle. When the fence was finished to his satisfaction he stopped his song and the labors of the workmen ceased with the sound. When finished the corral averagedabout forty paces in diameter, and the fence was about eight feet high, with an opening left in the east about ten feet wide.125.The moment the dark circle of branches was finished it inclosed sacred ground. Any dog who dared to enter was chased out with shouts and missiles. The man or woman who came must, on the first occasion, pass around to the left, i.e., to the south of the great woodpile. No one was allowed to peep through the fence or look over the edge of if to witness the ceremonies. That part of the auditorium was reserved for the spirits of the bears and other ancestral animal gods. No horse might be led into the inclosure until after sunrise next morning, when the fence was razed and all became common soil once more.126.When the night began to fall many of the visitors moved all their goods into the corral and lighted there a number of small fires close to the fence, temporarily abandoning their huts and shelters outside. Those who did not move in left watchers to protect their property; for there are thieves among the Navajo. The woods around the corral were lighted up in various directions by the fires of those who had not taken their property into the great inclosure and of parties who were practicing dances and shows of an exoteric character.
54.The next place they visited was Açànkikè, where there was a house built of the white rock crystal, with a door made of all sorts of plants. It was called Tsegà¢iniçini-behogan (House of Rock Crystal) and was the home of Tcikè-¢igìni (Supernatural Young Woman, or Young Woman Goddess), who was the richest of all the ¢igìni. In the middle of the floor stood a large crystal in the shape of a kethàwn. Just as they were entering, Qastcèëlçi, who had disappeared from the Navajo’s sight at the house of the bears, here rejoined him, and the party now numbered five. The apartment, when they came into it, was very small, but Qastcèëlçi blew on the walls, which extended thereat until the room was one of great size. The goddess showed the Navajo how to make two kethàwns and directed him how to dispose of them.
55.Thence they journeyed to Tsitsè-intyèli (Broad Cherry Trees), where, in a house of cherries with a door of lightning, there lived four gods named Dsilyi‘ Neyáni (Reared Within the Mountains). The Navajo was surprised to find that not only had they the same name as he had, but that they looked just like him and had clothes exactly the same as his, His companions said to him: “These are the gods in whose beautiful form the Butterfly goddess has molded you. These are the gods whose name you bear.” The hosts bade their visitors be seated, and they ranged themselves around the fire, one at each of the cardinal points. Each held an arrow made of the cliff rose (Cowania mexicana) in his extended right hand. The head of the arrow was of stone, the fletching of eagle feathers, and the “breath feather” of the downy plume of the Tsenáhale (the Harpy of Navajo mythology). As they held the arrows they ejaculated, “ai‘, ai‘, ai‘, ai‘,” as they who dance the kátso-yisçàu do in the ceremonies to this day, and after the fourth ai‘ each one swallowed his arrow, head foremost, until the fletching touched his lips. Then he withdrew the arrow and they said: “Thus do we wish the Navajo to do in the dance which you will teach them; but they must take good care not to break off the arrowheads when they swallow and withdraw them.” Such is the origin of the dance of the kátso-yisçàn, orgreat plumed arrow. As they bade him good-bye, one of them said to the Navajo: “We look for you,” i.e., “We expect you to return to us,” an intimation to him that when he left the earth he should return to the gods, to dwell among them forever.
56.From this place they journeyed on until they reached Açàdsil (Leaf Mountain), and found the house that was made of dew-drops (¢açò-behogan) and that had a door made of plants of many different kinds. This was the home of the Bitsès-ninéz (Long Bodies), who were goddesses. When they rose, as the strangers entered, the plumes on their heads seemed to touch the heavens, they were so very tall. The goddesses said to Dsilyi‘ Neyáni, “We give you no kethàwn, but look at us well and remember how we appear, for in your ceremonies you must draw our picture; yet draw us not, as we now stand, in the east, the south, the west, and the north; but draw us as if we all stood in the east.” This is the origin of the second picture that is painted on the sand. (Plate XVI.)
57.Leaving the House of Dew they proceeded to Çonakàï (White Water Running Across). This was a stream which ran down the side of a hill and had its source in a great spring. Immediately above this spring was the home of Qastcèëlçi. The latter, as they approached his home, stopped at the foot of the hill and four times ordered his companions to go in advance; but four times they refused. After the last refusal Qastcèëlçi clapped his hands, uttered his cry of “hu‘hu‘hu‘hu‘!” and led the way. The house was of corn pollen; the door was of daylight; the ceiling was supported by four white spruce trees; rainbows ran in every direction and made the house shine within with their bright and beautiful colors. Neither kethàwn nor ceremony was shown the Navajo here; but he was allowed to tarry four nights and was fed with an abundance of white corn meal and corn pollen.
58.Now Qastcèëlçi took him to a place called Lejpáhiço (Brown Earth Water) and led him to the top of a high hill, from which they could see in the far distance Gángiço, where the prophet’s family dwelt; for they had moved away from the valley in¢epéntsa, where he left them. Then the yay showed him the shortest road to take and bade him return to his people.
59.When he got within sight of his house his people made him stop and told him not to approach nearer until they had summoned a Navajo shaman. When the latter, whose name was Red Queue, came, ceremonies were performed over the returned wanderer, and he was washed from head to foot and dried with corn meal; for thus do the Navajo treat all who return to their homes from captivity with another tribe, in order that all alien substances and influences may be removed from them. When he had been thus purified he entered the house and his people embraced him and wept over him. But to him the odors of the lodge were now intolerable and he soon left the house and sat outside. Seeing this, the shaman gave it as his opinion that the purification alreadymade was not sufficient, and that it would be well to have a great dance over him. In those days the Navajo had a healing dance in the dark corral; but it was imperfect, with few songs and no kethàwns or sacrificial sticks. It was not until Dsilyi‘ Neyáni recounted his revelations that it became the great dance it now is among the Navajo.
60.It was agreed that before the dance began Dsilyi‘ Neyáni should be allowed four days and four nights in which to tell his story and that the medicine man should send out a number of young men to collect the plants that were necessary for the coming ceremony. For four nights and for four days he was busy in relating his adventures and instructing his hearers in all the mysteries he had learned in the homes of the ¢igìni. Then they built the medicine lodge and got all things ready for the new rites and for the purification of the one who had returned. The shaman selected from among the plants brought him by the young men such as he thought would best cleanse his patient of all the strange food he had taken among the alien Indians and in the houses of the supernatural ones whom he had visited. On the first day he gave him pine and spruce; on the second day, big and little willows; on the third day, a plant called litci and the aromatic sumac; on the fourth day, cedar and piñon. Of these the prophet drank cold and hot infusions in the morning by the fire.
61.During these four days the ceremonies which Dsilyi‘ Neyáni had introduced were in progress. On the fifth day it was proposed they should send out the akáninili (meal sprinkler) or courier to invite their neighbors to the great dance. There were two couriers to be sent: one was to go to the north, to a place called Çògojilá‘ (Much Grease Wood), to invite some friendly bands of Ute, some distant bands of Navajo, and some Jicarilla who dwelt there; the other was to go to the south, to Tse‘lakàī-silà (Where Two White Rocks Lie), to ask the Southern Apache, the White Mountain Apache, the Cohonino, and a tribe called¢ildjèhe, to attend. To the camp in the north it was a journey of two days and two nights, and it would take the fleetest runner the same time to return. To the home of their neighbors in the south it was as far. As these long journeys must be made on foot and running, they could not find a single young man in the camp who would volunteer for the task. The men counseled about the difficulty all day and tried much persuasion on the youths, but none were found willing to make either journey.
62.As night approached an old woman entered the medicine lodge and said: “I will send my grandson as an akáninili.” This old woman’s lodge was not far from where the medicine lodge was built and all present knew her grandson well. Whenever they visited her lodge he was always lying on the ground asleep; they never saw him go abroad to hunt, and they all supposed him to be lazy and worthless; so when she made her offer they only looked at one another and laughed. She waited awhile, and getting no response she again offered the services of her grandson, only to provoke again laughter and significant looks.A third and a fourth time she made her proposal, and then she said: “Why do you not at least answer me? I have said that I will let my grandson take your messages to one of these camps and you laugh at me and thank me not. Why is this?” Hearing her words, the chief medicine man, who came from a distant camp and did not know her, asked the men who were present who the woman was and what sort of a young man her grandson was; but again the men laughed and did not answer him either. He turned to the old woman and said: “Bring hither your grandson, that I may see him.” The woman answered: “It is already late; the night is falling and the way is long. It is of no use for you to see him to-night; let us wait until the morning.” “Very well,” said the shaman; “bring him at dawn to-morrow.” She left the lodge promising to do as she was bidden; and the moment she was gone the long suppressed merriment of the men broke forth. They all laughed inordinately, made many jokes about the lazy grandson, and told the medicine man that there was no use in sending such a person with the message when the best runners among them did not dare to undertake the journey. “He is too weak and lazy to hunt,” said they; “he lives on seeds and never tastes flesh.”
63.As soon as there was light enough in the morning to discern objects, a man who was looking out of the door of the medicine lodge cried out, “He comes,” and those inside laughed and waited. Presently Tlà¢esçìni (such was the name of the old woman’s grandson) entered and sat down near the fire. All looked at him in astonishment. When last they saw him his hair was short and matted, as if it had not been combed or washed for three years, and his form was lean and bent. Now he appeared with thick glossy locks that fell below his knee; his limbs were large and firm looking; he held his head erect and walked like a youth of courage; and many said to one another, “This cannot be the same man.” In a little while another young man named Indsiskàï (Radiating White Streaks), as fair and robust as the first, entered and sat down by the fire on the side opposite to where Tlà¢esçìni sat. The white earth and the charcoal for painting the akáninili were already prepared; so some of the young men in the lodge, when they beheld this pair of fine couriers, arose without a word of debate and began to paint the latter and to adorn their persons for the journey. When the toilet was done, the medicine man sent the couriers forth with many messages and injunctions and told them to blow on their whistles four times before they got out of hearing of the lodge. Tlà¢esçìni went to the north and Indsiskàï to the south, and they walked so slowly that all the spectators again laughed and made merry, and many said: “They will never reach the camps whither we have sent them.” They passed out of sight just before the sun rose. Those who remained in camp prepared to amuse themselves. They cleared the ground for the game of nánjoj, and brought out their sticks and hoops. Some said: “We will have plenty of time for play before the couriers return.” Others said: “Atyonder tree we saw Tlà¢esçìni last. I suppose if we went there now we would find him asleep under it.”
64.About the middle of the afternoon, while they were playing their games, one looked to the north, and, at a distance, he saw one of the messengers approaching them, and he cried out, “Here comes Tlà¢esçìni; he has wakened from his sleep and is coming back for something to eat.” A moment later Indsiskàï was announced as approaching from the south. They both reached the door of the medicine lodge at the same time; but Tlà¢esçìni entered first, handed his bag to the medicine man, and sat down in the same place where he sat when he entered in the morning. Indsiskàï followed and, handing his bag to the shaman, sat down opposite his companion. Now, many who were without thronged into the lodge to enjoy the sport, and they laughed and whispered among themselves; but the couriers were grave and silent, and, while the medicine man opened the bags, they took off their ornaments and washed the paint from their bodies. In the bag of Tlà¢esçìni were found four ears of léjyipĕj (corn baked in the husk underground). They were still hot from the fire, and the shaman broke them into fragments and passed the pieces around. From the bag of Indsiskàï two pieces of noçá‘ (the hard sugar of the maguey), such as the Apache make, were taken. When the young men had finished cleaning themselves, they passed out in silence, without a glance for any one.
65.At nightfall they returned to the lodge, and entering, sat down in the west, one on each side of the medicine man, and Tlà¢esçìni addressed him, saying: “When we came to the lodge this afternoon, we did not give you an account of our journeys because the people who are with you are fools, who laughed when we came home from the long journey which they feared to undertake; but now we have come to tell you our adventures. I,” continued Tlà¢esçìni, “went to the north. On my way I met another messenger who was traveling from a distant camp to this one to call you all to a dance in a circle of branches of a different kind from ours. When he learned my errand he tried to prevail on me to return hither and put off our dance till another day, so that we might attend their ceremony and that they in turn might attend ours; but I refused, saying our people were in haste to complete their dance. Then we exchanged bows and quivers as a sign to our people that we had met and that what we would tell on our return was the truth. You observe that the bow and quiver I have now are not those with which I left this morning. We parted, and I kept on my way towards the north. It was yet early in the day when I reached Çògojilá‘, where the Jicarilla and friendly Ute were encamped. There I sprinkled meal on the medicine man and gave him my message. When I arrived they were just opening a pit in which they had roasted corn, and they gave me the ears which I have brought home. They promised to be here in our camp at the end of the third day, which will be the night of our dance.”
66.When Tlà¢esçìni had done speaking, Indsiskàï gave the following account of himself: “It was but a little while after sunrise when I reached Tse‘lakàï-silà and entered the camps of the four tribes. In one they were just taking some noçá‘ out of a pit, and they gave me those pieces which I brought home. I entered the lodge of a medicine man in each tribe, scattered on him the sacred meal, and announced to him when our dance would take place. They all promised to be here with their people on the end of the third day, which will be on the night we hold our ceremony.”
67.When the akáninilis came to tell their adventures to the medicine man, they were beautifully attired. They wore earrings and necklaces of turquoise, coral, and rare shells. They had on embroidered blankets of a kind we see no longer, but the gods wore them in the ancient days. They rustled like dry leaves. The blanket of one was black and that of the other was white. When they came out of the medicine lodge they went around among the huts and inclosures of those who were assembled, visiting the wives and the sweethearts of the silly men who had laughed at them in the morning; and everywhere the women smiled on the beautiful and well dressed youths. The next morning the men laughed and sneered at them no more, nor whispered in their presence, but glanced at them with sulky or shamefaced looks. During the day the akáninilis took part in the game of nánjoj with those who once jeered at them, and won many articles of great value.
68.On the afternoon of the third day following the one on which the akáninilis made their journeys, a great cloud of dust was observed on the northern horizon and a similar cloud was seen in the south. They grew greater and came nearer, and then the invited Indians began to arrive from both directions. They continued to come in groups until nightfall, when a great multitude had assembled to witness the dance. After the guests began to arrive the young men set to work to cut trees for the corral, and when the sun had set the building of the dark circle of branches began. While the young men were making the circle the old men were making speeches to the multitude, for the old men always love to talk when the young men are hard at work. It was the greatest corral that has ever been built in the Navajo country. It was as broad as from Cañon Bonito to “the Haystacks” (a distance of about six miles), yet the visiting tribes were so numerous that they filled the circle full. In the mean time the sounds of singing and of the drum were heard all around, for many different parties of dancers, who were to take part in the night’s entertainment, were rehearsing.
69.There was some delay after the inclosure was finished before the first dancers made their appearance. A man entered the corral and made a speech begging the atsáleï, or first dancers, to hasten, as there were so many parties from a distance who wished to perform during the night. Soon after he had spoken, the two atsáleï who led in the dance of the great plumed arrow entered, and after them came six more, andperformed this healing dance over Dsilyi‘ Neyáni as it is performed to this day. (See paragraph131.) When this was concluded various groups from among the strangers entered, one after another, and conducted their different alìlis, or shows, which the Navajo then learned and have since practiced when they sing their songs in the dark circle of branches.
70.When the dance began in the evening there was one of the invited tribes which, it was noticed, had not arrived. This was the Beqai, or Jicarilla. The Navajo asked the Ute where the missing ones were, and the Ute answered that they had passed the Jicarilla on the way; that the latter were coming, but had stopped to play a game of roulette, or nánjoj, and were thus delayed. Shortly before dawn the Jicarilla came and entered the corral to exhibit their alìli or show. It was a dance of the nánjoj, for the wands and implements of the dance were the sticks and wheels used in playing that game.
71.During the night a chief of the Navajo, while walking through the crowd, observed the grandmother of Tlà¢esçìni sitting on the ground. He approached her and said: “Your grandson and his friend have done a great deed for us; they have made a long journey. Many doubted whether they had really made it until we saw the multitude gathering in our camp from the north and from the south in obedience to their summons. Now we know that they have spoken the truth. Tell me, I beg you, how they did this wonderful thing.” She answered: “They are ¢igini. My grandson for many years has risen early every morning and run all around Tsòtsil (Mount Taylor, or San Mateo) over and over again before sunrise. This is why the people have never seen him abroad during the day, but have seen him asleep in his hogán. Around the base of Tsòtsil are many tse‘ná‘djihi (heaps of sacrificial stones). These were all made by my grandson; he drops a stone on one of these piles every time he goes round the mountain.”
72.When day began to dawn there were yet several parties who came prepared to give exhibitions, but had not had a chance; still, at the approach of day the ceremonies had to cease. At this time, before the visitors began to leave the corral, the Navajo chief who had spoken with the grandmother arose and addressed the assembly. He told them all he knew about the swift couriers and all the grandmother had told him. He remarked that there were yet many who could not believe that the young men had made the journey; so, to satisfy all, he proposed that within twelve days they should have a race between the two fleet akáninili around the base of Tsòtsil, if all would agree to reassemble to witness it, and he begged them to invite their neighbors of the Pueblo and other tribes to come with them. Then other chiefs arose to speak. In the end the proposition of the Navajo chief was agreed to. All promised to return within eleven days and decided that the race should take place on the morning following. Then they dispersed to their homes.
73.On the afternoon of the eleventh day, when they had reassembled according to their promises, the Navajo chief arose and addressed them. He invited the chiefs of the other tribes to come forward and complete the arrangements for the race. So the headmen all came together at the place where the Navajo was speaking, and, after some consultation, they agreed that the race should be around the peak of Tsòtsil, but not around the entire range of mountains. The Navajo separated themselves into one party and the alien tribes into another, the two parties standing at a little distance from one another. The aliens were given the first choice, and they chose Indsiskàï; therefore Tlà¢esçìni fell to the Navajo. Then the betting began. The stakes consisted of strings of coral, turquoise, and shell beads, of vessels of shells as large as the earthen basins of the Zuñi, of beautifully tanned buckskins, of dresses embroidered with colored porcupine quills, and of suits of armor made of several layers of buckskin. The warriors in those days wore such armor, but they wear it no longer. The beads and shells were laid in one pile; the buckskins, the embroidered dresses, and the armor in another; and the piles were of vast size.
74.The homes of these young men were at Kaç-sakà¢tsé‘çqa (Lone Juniper Standing Between Cliffs), now Cobero Cañon. There is seen to day a rock shaped like a Navajo hogán. It stands near the wagon road and not far from the town of the Mexicans (Cobero). This rock was once the hut where Tlà¢esçìni dwelt. Not far from it is another rock of similar appearance, which once was the home of Indsiskàï. For this reason the runners were started at the Lone Juniper. They ran towards the west and five of the fleetest runners among the assembled Indians set out at the same time to see how long they could keep up with them. By the time these five men had reached the spur of the mountain opposite Çòsaço (Hot Spring, Ojo de los Gallinos, San Rafael), the two champions were out of sight. Then the five turned back; but before they could return to the Lone Juniper the runners had got in and the race was decided. Tlà¢esçìni had won by about twice the length of his own body, and all the wagered wealth of the other nations passed into the hands of the Navajo.
75.When all was done the strangers were dissatisfied; they mourned over their losses and talked about the whole affair among themselves for a long time. Finally they decided to give the Navajo another challenge if the latter would agree to a longer racecourse, which should include all the foothills of the San Mateo range. The Navajo accepted the challenge and agreed to have the race at the end of another twelve days. Early on the eleventh day the strangers began to assemble from all quarters; they continued to arrive all day, and when night fell they were all in. Then the headmen addressed them, explaining all the conditions of the challenge and describing carefully the racecourse decided on. The betting did not run as high this time as before.The Navajo bet only about one-half of what they won on the former race. Again they started the two runners, and in such time as you could just mark that the sun had moved, they were back at the goal; but this time Indsiskàï, the champion of the alien races, won by about the same distance as he had lost on the previous occasion.
76.Then the strangers were satisfied and said, “We will try no more. Many of our goods are still with the Navajo; but we have done well to rescue what we have.” One of the wise men among them said, “Yes, you have done well, for had you lost the second race you would have lost with it the rain and the sunshine and all that makes life glad.” It is because the Navajo won so much wealth on this occasion that they have been richer than the neighboring races ever since.
77.The ceremony cured Dsilyi‘ Neyáni of all his strange feelings and notions. The lodge of his people no longer smelled unpleasant to him. But often he would say, “I know I cannot be with you always, for the yays visit me nightly in my sleep. In my dreams I am once more among them, and they beg me to return to them.”
78.From Lejpáhi¢o the family moved to Dsildjoltcín¢i (Mountain of Hatred). Thence they went to Tsinbiláhi (Woods on One Side), and from there to Tse‘yuçáhia‘ (Standing Rock Above). In this place they encamped but one night, and next day they moved to¢epè-aça¢ (Sheep Promontory), and went on to¢epè-¢asi¢i (One Sheep Lying Down). Here again they camped for the night. Next day they traveled by Tse‘atcàlçali (Rock Cracked in Two) to Tcoyàjnaskíç (Hill Surrounded With Young Spruce Trees), to Nigàqokaï (White Ground), and to Tse‘yistci¢ (Dipping Rocks, i.e., dipping strata), where they stopped to rest for the night. On the following day they journeyed to Çosakázi (Cold Water), in which place they encamped again.
79.When the morning came, Dsilyi‘ Neyáni said to his younger brother, “Let us go out and try to shoot some deer, so that we may make beça‘ (deer masks), such as we wore in¢epéntsa, where we killed so many deer.” The brothers departed on the hunt and came to a place called Dsil-líjin (Black Mountains), and they sat down on the side of the mountains looking towards Tsòtsil. As they sat there Dsilyi‘ Neyáni said, “Younger brother, behold the ¢igìni!” (holy ones); but the younger brother could see no one. Then he spoke again, “Farewell, younger brother! From the holy places the gods come for me. You will never see me again; but when the showers pass and the thunder peals, ‘There,’ you will say, ‘is the voice of my elder brother,’ and when the harvest comes, of the beautiful birds and grasshoppers you will say ‘There is the ordering of my elder brother.’”
80.As he said these words he vanished. The younger brother looked all around, and seeing no one he started for his home. When he returned to his people he told them of the departure of Dsilyi‘ Neyáni, and they mourned as for one dead.
81.It has been my lot to see portions of these ceremonies at various times. The most complete view I had of them was during a visit made to a place called Niqotlizi (Hard Earth), some twenty miles northwest from Fort Wingate, New Mexico, and just within the southern boundary of the Navajo Reservation. This was the only occasion when I obtained full access to the medicine lodge on the later days of the ceremonies and had an opportunity of observing the wonderful pictures on sand which are illustrated in color in the accompanying plates.
82.On October 21, 1881, when I arrived at this place, the patient for whose benefit the rites were celebrated and a few of her immediate relations were the only people encamped here. They occupied a single temporary shelter of brushwood, within a few paces of which I had a rude shelter erected for my own accommodation. The patient was a middleaged woman, who apparently suffered from no ailment whatever; she was stout, ruddy, cheerful, and did her full share of the household work every day; yet she was about to give away for these ceremonies sheep, horses, and other goods to the value of perhaps two hundred dollars. No ceremonies whatever were in progress when I came. Everything, so the Indians said, was waiting for the qaçàli. (Paragraph2.) Some men were engaged in building a corral for the sheep that were to be slaughtered for the guests, and some old women were grinding corn to feast the men who were to work in the medicine lodge, which had been completed six days before.
83.This lodge was a simple conical structure of large, partly hewed piñon logs, set on end and inclined at an angle of about forty-five degrees, so as to join one another on top, where they formed the apex of the lodge. The circle of logs was incomplete in the east, where the openings for the door and the smoke hole were. A passage, or entry, about five feet high and three feet wide, led from the body of the lodge to the outer doorway, where some blankets hung as portières. The frame of logs was covered with sods and loose earth to keep out wind and rain. Internally, the lodge was eight feet in height under the apex of the cone and on an average twenty-five feet in diameter at the base. The diameter was increased at the east (to allow for the entry) and at the north. The irregularity in the circumference in the north was at first conjectured to be a mere accident; but in the ceremonies of the first night its use became apparent as affording a hiding place for the man dressed in evergreens. (Paragraph96.)
84.The first four days’ceremonies in this case had been performed during the previous year. Such a division of the work is sometimes made, if more convenient for the patient and his friends, but usually all is done in nine consecutive days. These first days have less of interest than the others. Early each morning, before eating, all who desire, men and women, enter the medicine lodge, where, in a stiflingatmosphere, seated around a fire of dry wood of four different kinds—cedar, big willow, little willow, and spruce—they take the hot emetic infusion of fifteen different kinds of plants mixed together. A little sand is placed in front of each to receive the ejected material. After the emetic has acted the fire is removed, deposited some paces to the north of the lodge, and allowed to die out. Each devotee’s pile of sand is then removed (beginning with that of the man who sat in the east and going round the circle) and deposited, one after another, in a line north of the sacred fire. Each succeeding day’s deposits are placed farther and farther north in a continuous line. Next all return to the lodge, which has been allowed to cool; the shaman spits on each some medicine which has been mixed with hoar-frost and is supposed to cool. When all have left the lodge, a new fire of ordinary wood is kindled, and the kethàwns, or sacrificial sticks, appropriate to the day are made.
85.Fifth day.The chanter did not arrive until the afternoon of October 23. His ceremonies in the medicine lodge began on the morning of the 24th. The forenoon was devoted to the preparation and sacrifice of certain kethàwns (keçàn)—the sacrificial sticks, to the origin of which so much of the foregoing myth is devoted—and of sacrificial cigarettes. About eight o’clock the sick woman entered the medicine lodge, followed by the chanter. While she sat on the ground, with her limbs extended, he applied some powdered substance from his medicine bag to the soles of her feet, to her knees, breasts, shoulders, cheeks, and head, in the order named, and then threw some of it towards the heavens through the smoke hole. Before applying it to the head he placed some of it in her mouth to be swallowed. Then, kneeling on a sheep skin, with her face to the east, and holding the bag of medicine in her hand, she recited a prayer, bit by bit, after the chanter. The prayer being finished, she arose, put some of the medicine into her mouth, some on her head, and took her seat in the south, while the shaman went on with the preparation of the sacrifices.
86.An assistant daubed a nice straight branch of cherry with some moistened herbaceous powder, after which he divided the branch into four pieces with a flint knife. Two of the pieces were each about two inches long and two each about four inches long. In each of the shorter ones he made one slight gash and in each of the longer ones two gashes. The sticks were then painted, a shred of yucca leaf being used for the brush, with rings of black, red, and white, disposed in a different order on each stick. The two cigarettes were made by filling sections of some hollow stem with a mixture of some pulverized plants. Such cigarettes are intended, as the prayers indicate, to be smoked by the gods. (Paragraph88.)
87.While the assistants were painting the sticks and making the cigarettes the old chanter placed on a sheep skin, spread on the floor woolly side down, other things pertaining to the sacrifice: five bundles of assorted feathers, five small pieces of cotton sheeting to wrap the sacrificesin, and two round flat stones, each about four inches in diameter. The upper surfaces of these he painted, one blue and one black, and he bordered each with a stripe of red. When the kethàwns and cigarettes were ready, the qaçàli distributed them along with the bunches of plumes, on the five pieces of cotton cloth, which were then rolled up around their contents, making five bundles of sacrifices. On the completion of this work there was prayer, song, and rattling; the medicinal powder was applied to the body of the patient as before (paragraph85); two of the little sacrificial bundles were placed in her right hand, and while she held them she again repeated a prayer, following again phrase by phrase, or sentence by sentence, the words of the priest. The latter, when the prayer was ended, took the sacrifices from her hand and pressed them to different parts of her body in the order previously observed, beginning with the soles of the feet and going upwards to the head, but on this occasion touching also the back, and touching it last. Each time after pressing the sacrifices to her body he held them up to the smoke hole and blew on them in that direction a quick puff, as if blowing away some evil influence which the sacrifices were supposed to draw from her body. Then the three remaining bundles were put in her hands and the rites observed with the former bundles were repeated in every respect, including the prayer, which was followed by singing and rattling. When the song had ceased some of the assistants took the bundles of sacrifices out of the lodge, no doubt to bury them according to the method proper for those particular kethàwns. The round painted stones were also carried out.
88.The prayers which the woman repeated varied but little. They all sounded nearly alike. The night the shaman arrived he rehearsed some of these prayers with the woman, at her own hogán, to make her familiar with them before she repeated them, in the medicine lodge. The prayer addressed to Dsilyi‘ Neyáni, when she held in her hand the offering sacred to him, was as follows:
Reared Within the Mountains!Lord of the Mountains!Young Man!Chieftain!I have made your sacrifice.I have prepared a smoke for you.My feet restore thou for me.My legs restore thou for me.My body restore thou for me.My mind restore thou for me.My voice restore thou for me.Restore all for me in beauty.Make beautiful all that is before me.Make beautiful all that is behind me.Make beautiful my words.It is done in beauty.It is done in beauty.It is done in beauty.It is done in beauty. (Paragraphs261-4.)
89.The next part of the ceremonies (or, shall I say, the treatment?) was a fumigation. The medicine man took from the fire a large glowing coal, placed it beside the woman, and scattered on it some powdered substance which instantly gave forth a dense smoke and a strong fragrance that filled the lodge. The woman held her face over the coal and inhaled the fumes with deep inspirations. When the smoke no longer rose the coal was quenched with water and carried out of the lodge by the chief, Manuelito, probably to be disposed of in some established manner. Then the woman left the lodge and singing and rattling were resumed.
90.While the rites just described were in progress some assistants were busy with other matters. One made, from the spotted skin of a fawn, two bags in which the akáninilis or couriers were to carry their meal on the morrow’s journey. Another brought in and hung over the doorway a bundle of dry, withered plants which he had just gathered. Glancing up at them I recognized theGutierreziaand theBouteloua. The bundle may have contained the other plants mentioned in the myth (paragraph44). They were hung up there till the next day, to be then used in a manner which will be described (paragraph101).
91.The sheepskin on which the sacrifices had been placed was taken away and a blanket was spread on the ground to receive some more sacred articles from the bag of the chanter. These were five long notched wands, some tail feathers of the wild turkey, some small downy feathers of the eagle, and some native mineral pigments—yellow ocher, a ferruginous black, and a native blue. With the pigments the assistants painted the notched wands; with the plumes the chanter trimmed them. (SeeFig. 51andPlate XI.) Then they were called çobolçà, a word of obscure etymology, or in¢ia‘, which signifies sticking up or standing erect. They are called in this paper “plumed wands.”
92.While some were making the çobolçà others busied themselves grinding, between stones, large quantities of pigments, coarser than those referred to above, to be used in making the sand pictures or dry paintings of the ceremony. They made five colors: black, of charcoal; white, of white sandstone; red, of red sandstone; yellow, of yellow sandstone; and “blue,” of the black and white, mixed in proper proportions; of course this was a gray, but it was their only cheap substitute for the cerulean tint, and, combined with the other colors on the sanded floor, in the dim light of the lodge, it could not easily be distinguished from a true blue. It may be remarked in passing that the Navajo apply to many things which are gray the term they use for blue (çolíj); thus the gray fox is called màï-çolíj (blue coyote) and a gray sheep is called a blue sheep. Yet that they make a distinction between these colors is, I think, fairly evident from the fact that in painting small articles, such as kethàwns and masks, they use the more costly articles of turquoise, malachite, and indigo. These coarse pigments for the dry paintings were put for convenience on curved pieces of piñon bark.From time to time, during this and the following days, as the heaps of colored powder diminished under the hands of the artists, more stones and charcoal were pulverized to replenish them.
93.About noon they cleared off that portion of the floor of the lodge which lay west of the fire, and brought, in blankets, a quantity of dry sand, which they spread out over the cleared portion of the floor in a layer of the nearly constant depth of three inches. They smoothed the surface with the broad oaken battens used in weaving. Now for a time all operations were suspended in the lodge while the chanter went out to plant the çobolçà, or plumed wands, in front of the medicine lodge, and to lay beside them the collars of beaver skins and the symbols for wings which the couriers were to wear next day. (Fig. 51.) These articles, it was said, were placed outside as a sign to the gods that the holy pictures were being drawn; but it is not improbable that they were intended also as a sign to uninitiated mortals. However that may be, they were taken in as soon as the picture was finished. The great painting was begun about 1 o’clock p.m., was finished about 3, and was allowed to remain until the ceremonies at night were concluded. It will be described later. (Paragraphs160et seq.)
94.When the picture was completed food was brought in, and there was a good deal of eating and sleeping and smoking done. Being informed that nothing more would be done until after nightfall, I went to my own shelter, to elaborate some of my more hasty sketches while matters were still fresh in my mind. At 7 o’clock a messenger came to tell me that ceremonies were about to be resumed. During my absence the principal character in the night’s performance—a man arrayed in evergreens—had been dressed.
95.I found, on returning to the lodge, a number of spectators seated around close to the edge of the apartment. The fire burned in the center. The sick woman, with some companions, sat in the south. The qaçàli, with a few assistants who joined him in singing and shaking rattles, was seated at the north, at the place where the circumference of the lodge was enlarged. (Paragraph83.) There was a space about two feet wide and six feet long between them and the wall, or roof if you choose so to call it, of the lodge. I was assigned a place in the west. The sick woman was directed to move from the position she occupiedin the south, and sit, with her face to the east, at the junction of the two white serpents that cross one another on the picture. (Plate XV.)
96.When she was seated the qaçàli began a song, accompanied by the usual rattling and drumming. At a certain part of the song the chanter was seen to make a slight signal with his drumstick, a rapid stroke to the rear, when instantly a mass of animate evergreens—a moving tree, it seemed—sprang out from the space behind the singers and rushed towards the patient. A terrifying yell from the spectators greeted the apparition, when the man in green, acting as if frightened by the noise, retreated as quickly as he came, and in a moment nothing could be seen in the space behind the singers but the shifting shadows cast by the fire. He was so thoroughly covered with spruce twigs that nothing of his form save his toes could be distinguished when he rushed out in the full glare of the fire. This scene was repeated three times, at due intervals.
97.Some time after the third repetition, the chanter arose, without interrupting his song, and proceeded to erase the picture with his rattle. He began with the mountain in the west (paragraph162), which he completely leveled; next in order he erased the track of the bear; next, the hole in the center; and then, one by one, the various other figures, ending with the serpents on the outside. In erasing the serpents, he began with the figures in the east and followed the apparent course of the sun, ending with the figures in the north. When the picture was completely obliterated, the sand on which it had been drawn was collected, put in a blanket, and carried out of doors, to be thrown away.
98.Then the sick woman was lifted by two other women and laid on her side where the picture had been, with her face to the east. While she lay there, the medicine man, amid much singing, walked around her, inscribed on the earth at her feet a straight line with his finger and erased it with his foot, inscribed at her head a cross and rubbed it out in the same manner, traced radiating lines in all directions from her body and obliterated them, gave her a light massage, whistled over her from head to foot and all around her, and whistled towards the smoke hole, as if whistling something away. These acts were performed in the order in which they are recorded. His last operation on her was a severe massage, in which he kneaded every part of her body forcibly and pulled her joints hard, whereat she groaned and made demonstrations of suffering. This concluded, she rose. A blanket was spread on the ground on the north of the fire, near where the man in evergreens was concealed. At the last appearance of the man in evergreens the woman fell back apparently paralyzed and suffering from difficulty of breathing, all of which was probably feigned, but was supposed to be a sign that the right remedy or ceremony for her ailment had been found and that none other need be tried. The medicine man now proceeded to restore her to consciousness by drawing zigzag lines from her bodyeast and west and straight lines north and south, like their symbols for the chain and sheet lightnings, by stepping over her in different directions, and by rattling. When she had apparently recovered, he pressed the plumed wands and the symbols for wings to different parts of her body, in the order and with the ceremonies described when referring to previous application made to her body.
99.There were no more ceremonies that night. I remained in the medicine lodge until it was quite late. The men occupied their time in singing, rattling, gambling, and smoking. After a while some grew weary and lay down to sleep. Being repeatedly assured that nothing more would happen until the whistle sounded in the morning, I left the lodge to roll myself in my blankets. Yet frequently during the night, fearing I might have been deceived, I stealthily arose and visited the medicine lodge, only to find all slumbering soundly.
100.Sixth day.At five in the morning (Saturday, October 25) the whistle sounded and I hastened to the medicine lodge. There was much to be done; the couriers were to be dressed and sent on their way, and a large picture was to be painted; so the work had to begin early.
101.The first thing done was to burn to charcoal the bundle of plants which had been gathered on the previous morning and hung over the door of the lodge inside. (Paragraph90.) The charcoal was used in painting the limbs of the akáninilis or couriers. A basin of water containing soap root or amolë (the root ofYucca baccata, and other species of yucca) was brought in, and after the medicine man had dabbed them with a little of the suds the akáninilis-elect washed themselves with it from head to foot, cleaning their hair well. When the bath was done, they were dabbed by the qaçàli with some other mixture contained in a waterproof wicker basin and were made to inhale the fragrantfumes of some vegetable powder scattered on a live coal, which, as usual, was “put out,” in a double sense, when the fumigation was over. Then the young men were dressed and adorned to look like Dsilyi‘ Neyáni after his toilet in the house of the butterflies. (Paragraph44.) Their legs and forearms were painted black, to represent the storm cloud. The outer aspects of these members were decorated with white zigzag streaks, to indicate the white lightning. Their faces were painted partly white and small white spots were scattered over their bodies. Downy eagle feathers were fastened to their hair; necklaces of shell and coral were hung around their necks, and over these were laid collars of beaver skin, with whistles attached, which had lain in front of the lodge the day before, near the plumed wands. (Paragraph93,Fig. 51.) Small objects to represent wings were tied to their arms. Each was given one of the fawn skin bags (paragraph90) with corn meal in it. In the hand of the akáninili who was to go to the south was placed one of the çobolçà, or plumed wands, whose stem was painted black, the color of the north, as a sign to all he might meet that he was a duly authorized messenger from a medicine lodge in the north. In the hand of the other akáninili was placed a blue shafted wand, to show that he came from the south. Thus equipped they were all ready for the journey. (Fig. 52.)
102.The chanter gave them his messages, telling them where to go, what places they were to visit, what other chanters they were to see, what dancers they were to invite, and what gifts they were authorized to offer to the visiting performers for their trouble. Having given these special instructions, he closed with the general instructions, which are always given to the akáninili, as follows:
These [pointing to the eagle feathers on the head] will make for you a means of rising as you progress.
These [pointing to the wing symbols on the arm] will bear you onward.
This [pointing to the collar of beaver skin] will be a means of recognition for you. For this reason it hangs around your neck.
Sprinkle meal across a little valley, across a big arroyo.
Across the roots of a tree sprinkle meal and then you may step over.
Sprinkle meal across a flat rock.
Then the plumed wand. For this purpose you carry it, that they will recognize you as coming from a holy place.
103.The akáninili on his journey scatters meal before him as directed in these charges. He also scatters it on the medicine men whom he visits, and for this reason he is called akáninili, which signifies meal sprinkler.
104.When the last word of the instructions was uttered, the couriers departed, one to the north and one to the south. It was not later than 7 o’clock when they left. As soon as they were gone, the work of painting the picture appropriate to the day was begun. It was much more elaborate than the painting of the previous day. Although a dozen men worked on it, it was not finished until two o’clock. About the timeit was done, the akáninili from the south returned. He was carefully divested of all his ornaments. The white paint was scraped carefully from his body and preserved in the medicine bags of those who scraped it off. Then he was led out of the lodge.
105.When the picture was finished, the shaman, having applied pollen in three places to each god, stuck around it in the ground, at regular intervals, the three plumed wands which had stood before the door of the lodge all day and the wand which the akáninili from the south had just brought back with him. This wand he placed at the south of the picture, and laid beside it the collar, wings, and plumes which the akáninili had worn. The fifth, or north, wand was still absent with the courier who went to the north.
106.All was ready now for the treatment of the sick woman. She was sent for, and a crier went to the door of the lodge to announce that song and ceremony were to begin. Accompanied by another woman, she entered, carrying a basket with corn meal in it. This she sprinkled lightly over the picture and then handed it to some of the assistants, who finished the work she had begun by strewing the meal plentifully on the figures. She sat on the form of the god in the east, facing the door, with her feet extended, and her companion sat on the figure of the cornstalk in the southeast. (Plate XVI.) In the mean time the medicine man had made a cold infusion in an earthen bowl and placed it on the hands of the rainbow figure (paragraph169), laying over it a brush or sprinkler made of feathers, with a handle of colored yarn. When the women were seated, the chanter dipped his brush in the solution; sprinkled the picture plentifully; touched each divine figure with the moistened brush in three places-brow, mouth, and chest; administered the infusion to the women, in two alternate draughts to each; drained the bowl himself; and handed it to the bystanders, that they might finish the dregs and let none of the precious stuff go to waste. Next came the fumigation. The woman whom we have designated as the companion rose from her seat on the picture and sat on the ground beside the door. The principal patient retained her seat on the eastern god. Near each a live coal was laid on the ground. On the coal a strong scented but rather fragrant mixture was thrown, and as the fumes arose the women waved them towards their faces and breathed them in as before. The coal was extinguished and carefully removed, as on previous occasions. The application of the sacred dust to the body of the patient followed. The shaman moistened his hands with saliva and pressed them to the feet of all the gods. Some of the powder, of course, stuck to his palms. This he applied to the feet of the patient. Thus he took dust from the knees, abdomens, chests, shoulders, and heads of the figures and applied it to corresponding parts of the patient’s form, making a strong massage with each application.
107.When the patient had departed many of the spectators advanced to the picture and gathered the corn pollen (paragraphs105and112), nowrendered doubly sacred, and put it in their medicine bags. Some took portions of the remaining dust from the figures, after the manner of the shaman, and applied it to ailing portions of their persons. If the devotee had disease in his legs, he took dust from the legs of the figures; if in his head, the dust was taken from the heads of the figures, and so on.
108.By the time they were all done the picture was badly marred; yet its general form and some of the details were quite distinguishable. Then it became the province of the chanter to completely obliterate it. He began with the white god in the east and took in turn the figures in the southeast (corn), south, southwest, west, center, northwest, north, and northeast. Next, the figure of the rainbow was erased from foot to head, and, on his way, the chanter knocked down, with rather vicious blows, the plumed wands which stood up around the picture. When he came to the round figure in the center he dug up a cup which had been buried there. He erased the picture with a long slender wand and sang in the meantime, to the accompaniment of the rattling of his assistants, a plaintive chant in a minor key, which was perhaps the most melodious Indian song I ever heard. All was over at half past 2 in the afternoon.
109.Later in the day it was announced that the other akáninili was approaching from the north. He could then be observed about a mile away in an open plain. As he advanced the sound of his whistle was heard. At exactly half past 4 he entered the medicine lodge, where the chanter motioned him to a seat in the south. Singing and rattling were at once begun and the akáninili was divested of his trappings in the following order: head plumes, beaver collar, necklace, right wing, left wing, belt, sash, moccasins. The white paint was removed and preserved as on the former occasion. He was led out of the lodge, where he was well washed from head to foot in a hot decoction of the detergent amolë and dried with corn meal. Two large blood blisters were to be seen on the inner aspects of his thighs, brought on by the friction of his breechcloth in running. He said that he had run constantly when not in sight from our camp, had traveled a long way since morning, and was very tired. It seems to be the custom with the akáninilis to walk slowly when near camp and to run when out of sight, probably to follow the mythic examples of Tlà¢esçìni and Indsiskàï. (Paragraph63.)
110.With the toilet of the akáninili the ceremonies of the day ended. He returned to the lodge to relate his adventures and get some food. During the day visitors arrived occasionally from distant camps. In the afternoon there were several young men present, who busied themselves in grubbing and clearing the ground where the corral was to be built and the great dance of the last night was to be held. I remained in the lodge until it was quite late, and I frequently rose during the night to see if anything was going on; but the night passed without event, like the previous one.
111.Seventh day.The painting of the picture and the treatment of the sick woman were the only works performed on this day (Sunday, October 26). The whistle sounded from the lodge at 6 a.m., but already the plumed wands and the beaver collars had been placed before the door of the medicine lodge and the sand for the groundwork of the picture had been brought in. As the picture (Plate XVII) was to be larger than those which preceded it, the fire was moved quite near to the door; the heated earth which lay under the fire in its former position was dug up and replaced with cold earth, probably for the comfort of the artists.
112.The work of the painters was begun soon after 6 a.m. and was not completed until about 2 p.m. About a dozen men were engaged on it, and it occupied them, as we have seen, about eight hours. As usual, the qaçàli did very little of the manual labor; but he constantly watched the work and frequently criticised and corrected it. When the painting was done, it became his duty to apply the sacred corn pollen to the brow, mouth, and chest of each of the gods and to set up the bounding çobolçà or plumed wands. After this he placed a bowl of water on the left hand of the white god—the form second from the north—threw into it some powdered substance to make a cold decoction, and laid the sprinkler on top of it. (Paragraph106.)
113.The whistle was blown. The herald announced that all was ready. The sick woman and her companion entered, and one after the other cast meal upon the floor. The former took off her moccasins and sat on the ground near the door while a song was sung. Then she sat on the form of the white god, her companion sat on the form of the blue god, and the singing and rattling were resumed. Without interrupting his song the chanter sprinkled the picture with the infusion, applied the moistened sprinkler to the breast, head, and brow of each of the gods in the following order: white, blue, yellow, black, and sat down to finish his chant. He administered the decoctions to his patient in two draughts, to her companion in two draughts, to himself (honest physician!) in the same manner, and gave as before (paragraph106) the dregs to the bystanders. He applied the dust from different parts of the divine figures to the sick woman, in much the same manner as on the previous day, and while doing this he obliterated the pictures of the little animals over the head of the white god. The fumigation of both women was repeated with exactly the same rites as on the second day, and the fumes had precisely the same odor on this occasion as on that. When the coals were extinguished and taken out, the chanter said to the women, “kaç” (now), whereat they arose and left the lodge.
114.As soon as they were gone the work of obliteration began. The figures of the gods were rubbed out in the usual order (white, blue, yellow, black, rainbow), the erasure in each case proceeding from foot to head. The plumed wands fell as before, simultaneously with the destruction of the rainbow. The sand was carried out at half past 2 o’clock and no further rites were performed during the day.
115.Eighth day.The picture painted on Monday (October 27) was of a simple character, and hence did not occupy much time. The work was begun at 7 a.m. and was finished at 10 a.m. Of the four shorter or interior arrows (Plate XVIII), that which stands second from the north was regarded as the arrow of the east and was begun first. On this arrow the sick woman was placed, sitting with her face to the east, when she came to be treated and fumigated. The bowl of infusion was laid on the point of the arrow immediately to her left, regarded as the arrow of the north. The medicine man put the pollen on the base, on the red cross lines near the center, and on the white tips. All the ceremonies which took place between the completion and the obliteration of the picture (the planting of the five plumed wands, the sprinkling of the picture with meal, the sprinkling and administration of the infusion, the application of the colored dust to the person of the patient, the fumigation of the two women, the whistling, the singing, and rattling) were essentially the same as those observed on the previous day. In taking the dust from the picture, however, the shaman applied his hands only to the bases of the arrows. The ceremony of obliteration was also a repetition of the rites of the previous day.
see caption
Fig. 53.The great wood pile.
116.The building of the great stack of wood (Fig. 53) which was to furnish the fire in the center of the corral on the last night went on simultaneously with the painting of the picture. Both tasks were begun and ended about the same time. The wood in the big pile was dead, long seasoned juniper and cedar, fuel of the most inflammable character. The pile was about twelve feet high and sixty paces in circumference.Large quantities of this dry wood were also brought and placed outside the space allotted to the corral, to replenish the fires when needed.
117.In the afternoon there were no ceremonies in the medicine lodge. The qaçàli and his assistants took a half holiday, and not without deserving it, for they had wrought well for three days and they had a long day’s work and a long night’s work still before them. A large number of people had by this time assembled, and from time to time more arrived. Throughout the sparse grove which surrounded us, little temporary corrals and huts of boughs were going up in every direction. In more secret spots in the rugged walls of a cañon, about half a mile from the medicine lodge, other shelters were erected, where visiting performers were to prepare themselves on the last night. Many young men were busy in the afternoon cutting down the trees and lopping off the branches which were to form the great corral (the ilnásjin, the dark circle of branches) on the next day. Some of the visiting women were busy grinding meal and attending to different household duties; others played cards or engaged in the more aboriginal pastime of áz¢ilçil, a game played with three sticks and forty stones, the latter for counters.
118.The friends of the sick woman prepared the alkàn, a great corn cake baked in the earth, the manufacture of which gave evidence of the antiquity of the process. The batter was mixed in one large hole in the ground lined with fresh sheepskin. It was baked in another hole in which a fire had been burning for many hours, until the surrounding earth was well heated. The fire was removed; the hole lined with corn husks; the batter ladled in and covered with more cornhusks; hot earth and hot coals were spread overall. The cake was not dug up until the following day, and was designed chiefly for the special entertainment of those who were at work in the medicine lodge.
119.Ninth day (until sunset).On Tuesday (October 28) the work in the lodge consisted in preparing certain properties to be used in the ceremonies of the night. These were the wands to be used in the first dance, the kátso-yisçàn or great plumed arrows, and the trees which the dancers pretended to swallow.
120.The wand of the nahikàï was made by paring down a straight slender stick of aromatic sumac, about three feet long, to the general thickness of less than half an inch, but leaving a head or button at one end. A ring was fashioned from a transverse slice of some hollow or pithy plant, so that it would slide freely up and down the slender wand, but would nob pass over the head. Eagle down was secured to the wooden head and also to the ring. In the dance (paragraph129) the eagle down on the stick is burned off in the fire while the ring is held in the palm of the hand. When the time comes for the wand to grow white again, as the name nahikàï expresses it, the ring is allowed to leave the palm and slide to the other end of the stick.
121.The great plumed arrows were deceptions somewhat similar in character to the wands. One-half of the arrow was made of a slenderhard twig of cliff rose; the other half was formed of some pithy suffruticose herb which I could not determine satisfactorily, as I saw only the cut sections and was not permitted to handle these. The pith was removed so as to allow the wooden part to move into the herby part with a telescopic mechanism. The herbaceous portion was so covered with feathers that nothing could be seen of its surface. A large stone arrowhead was attached to the wooden shaft. When the actor pretended to swallow this he merely held the stone point firmly between his teeth and forced the upper or plumed shaft down on the lower or wooden shaft. It was an excellent deception, and presented to the ordinary observer all the appearance of genuine arrow swallowing.
122.The piñon saplings, which the dancers also pretended to swallow, had no deceptive arrangement. They were slender little trees trimmed at the butt into a broad, thin, wedge shaped point, which was carefully smoothed by rubbing it with sandstone, so that no offensive splinters should present themselves to the lips of the dancers. The smooth end was painted red, probably to make the spectators, at night, by the uncertain firelight, suppose that the dissemblers had torn their throats in their great efforts. Sometimes the saplings have all their branches removed, and are then trimmed with cross pieces and circles of evergreen sprays. In most cases, however, I have seen the sapling used in its natural condition.
123.As each set of implements was completed there was a ceremony with singing and rattling, the men who were to use them at night partook of powdered medicines on their extended tongues, from the hands of the chanter, and then practiced themselves in the use of the implements. Although they well knew the deceptive nature of these articles and fully understood the frauds they were preparing to perpetrate on the public, these young men seemed to view the whole work with high reverence and treat it with the greatest seriousness. For instance, when, in the secrecy of the lodge, they went through the motions of swallowing the trees they showed indubitable signs of fear: all looked anxious, some trembled quite perceptibly, and one looked as pale as a live Indian can look. They probably dreaded the displeasure of the gods if all were not done well.
124.Last night.Just after sunset the old chanter posted himself some paces to the east of the great woodpile, on the spot where the gate of the corral was to be, and began a song. Simultaneous with the beginning of the song was the commencement of the building of the dark circle. All the young and middleaged men in camp assisted. They dragged the branches from where they had been cut down in the neighboring woods and put them in position in the circle with great celerity. The work was all done in less than an hour, during which time the chanter ceased not for an instant his song and rattle. When the fence was finished to his satisfaction he stopped his song and the labors of the workmen ceased with the sound. When finished the corral averagedabout forty paces in diameter, and the fence was about eight feet high, with an opening left in the east about ten feet wide.
125.The moment the dark circle of branches was finished it inclosed sacred ground. Any dog who dared to enter was chased out with shouts and missiles. The man or woman who came must, on the first occasion, pass around to the left, i.e., to the south of the great woodpile. No one was allowed to peep through the fence or look over the edge of if to witness the ceremonies. That part of the auditorium was reserved for the spirits of the bears and other ancestral animal gods. No horse might be led into the inclosure until after sunrise next morning, when the fence was razed and all became common soil once more.
126.When the night began to fall many of the visitors moved all their goods into the corral and lighted there a number of small fires close to the fence, temporarily abandoning their huts and shelters outside. Those who did not move in left watchers to protect their property; for there are thieves among the Navajo. The woods around the corral were lighted up in various directions by the fires of those who had not taken their property into the great inclosure and of parties who were practicing dances and shows of an exoteric character.