78 A BOOK-LOVER'S HOLIDAYS 



snakes, the brothers of men, as are all living 

 things in the Hopi creed, are besought to tell 

 the beings of the underworld man's need of 

 water. 



As a former great chief at Washington I 

 was admitted to the sacred room, or one- 

 roomed house, the kiva, in which the chosen 

 snake priests had for a fortnight been getting 

 ready for the sacred dance. Very few white 

 men have been thus admitted, and never un- 

 less it is known that they will treat with cour- 

 tesy and respect what the Indians revere. 

 Entrance to the house, which was sunk in the 

 rock, was through a hole in the roof, down a 

 ladder across whose top hung a cord from which 

 fluttered three eagle plumes and dangled three 

 small animal skins. Below was a room perhaps 

 fifteen feet by twenty-five. One end of it, oc- 

 cupying perhaps a third of its length, was 

 raised a foot above the rest, and the ladder 

 led down to this raised part. Against the rear 

 wall of this raised part or dais lay thirty odd 

 rattlesnakes, most of them in a twined heap in 

 one corner, but a dozen by themselves scattered 

 along the wall. There was also a pot containing 

 several striped ribbon-snakes, too lively to be 

 left at large. Eight or ten priests, some old, 

 some young, sat on the floor in the lower and 



