40 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 92 



whatever food they had, saying a thousand fooHsh things to it, such 

 as: Why did you run aivay? Were you not better off among us? If 

 you had not run away, you woidd not have turned into a bird, and 

 other expressions of this sort. When the whole function was over, the 

 dance began, which lasted at least 3 days including the nights, in 

 which they committed a thousand brutal actions. 



I have not been able to learn what was the meaning of so great a 

 ceremony, neither have I been able to determine what may have been 

 the particular signification of the running of the single and married 

 girls at the beginning of the feast of the Fames while all the people, 

 men and women, watched them run, for it must contain its peculiar 

 mystery. What I conjecture in it is that as the Fames according to 

 their way of thinking was a girl who ran away from them, these 

 [girls], imitating her, run as if fleeing away, and therefore they run 

 without order, and watching them run must be for the purpose of per- 

 ceiving the girls who run swiftest and with least embarrassment — that 

 they may spend with them the days of the feast, for as they say, on 

 these days all intercourse was free. 



The Indians relate that the said Fames or bird was a girl who ran 

 away from a rancheria and went to the mountains, and that the God 

 Chinigchinix made her into Fames, or turned her into a bird, and this 

 is their belief ; and that every year although they kill her, she is born 

 again, and the nonsense does not stop here, but they believe that she 

 multiplies herself, for every year 3 or 4 or more birds were seen, 

 for all the chiefs gave the feast of the Fames, and since it was only one 

 girl who fled away from them, they believe that all these birds are the 

 same girl. This feast of the Fames or bird which they celebrated every 

 year was ordained by their God Chinigchinix. 



These Indians had in their gentility a dance for the commencing of 

 which they lighted first a great fire of chamize or of straw, and when 

 it was well lighted the men began to jump upon it and into the middle 

 of it until they put it out, while the women remained at some distance 

 crying, and when this bonfire was entirely extinguished the crying of 

 the women ceased and the dance began, and if it happened that it was 

 not thoroughly extinguished or that some sparks appeared, they re- 

 mained sad for a considerable time, for they held it to be a bad omen 

 and feared some mishappening. These dances were always at night. 

 If this dance was executed on the day of some great feast to which 

 they invited the neighboring rancherias, in addition to what has been 

 related they added [the following] : Before they began they sent 

 someone to bring water from a designated place, and it was always 

 somewhat distant. This water they put in its little well or hole, which 



