March, 1905. The Traditions of the Hopi — Voth. 1 1 7 



and the Badger Old Man gave me some medicine that knows about 

 this so that I could go and find out." "So that is what you have 

 come for; so that is why you have come here. Now you look at us. 

 Yes, we are thus." Thus they spoke to him, and then added: "This 

 is the way we are living here. It is not light here ; it is not as light as 

 where you live. We are living poorly here. You must go back again, 

 you cannot stay with us here yet ; your flesh is still strong and ' salty. ' 

 You eat food yet; we only eat the odor of the food. Now you must 

 work there for us. Make nakwakwosis for us at the Soydl ceremony. 

 These we tie around our foreheads and they represent dropping rain. 

 We then shall work for you here, too. We shall send you rain and 

 crops. You must wrap up the women when they die, in the 6wa, and 

 tie the big knotted belt around them, because these owas are not 

 tightly woven and when the Skeletons move along on them through 

 the sky as clouds, the thin rain drops through these owas and the big 

 raindrops fall from the fringes of the big belt. Sometimes you cannot 

 see the clouds very distinctly because they are hidden behind these 

 nakwakwosis just as our faces are hidden behind them." 



Looking around, the young man saw some of the Skeletons walking 

 around with big burdens on their backs, consisting of mealing stones, 

 which they carried over their forehead by a thin string that had cut 

 deeply into the skin. Other§ carried bundles of cactus on their backs, 

 and, as they had no clothes on, the thorns of the cactus would hurt 

 them. They were submitted to these punishments for a certain 

 length of time, when they were relieved of them and then lived with 

 the other people there. At another place in the Skeleton house he 

 saw the chiefs who had been good here in this world and had made a 

 good road for other people. They had taken their tiponis* with them 

 and set them up there, and when the people here in the villages have 

 their ceremonies and smoke during the ceremonies, this smoke goes 

 down into the other world to the tiponis or mothers and from there 

 rises up in the form of clouds. 



After the young man had seen everything at this place he re- 

 turned. When he arrived at the steep bluflF he again mounted his 

 kilt and a slight breeze at once lifted him up. The chief that was 

 living here at the top of the bluff who had assisted the young man in 

 getting down was a Kwaniita. He had a big horn for a head-dress. 

 This chief told him that he should return now. "You have now seen 

 how they live here; it is not good, it is not light here; no one should 

 desire to come here. Your father and mother are mourning for you 



' The tiponi is the palladium of the priest, and usually consists of an ear of com to which are 

 wrapped feathers of different birds, pieces of turquoise and shells, etc., and into which are some- 

 times placed different objects held sacred by the priest. 



