HOME SONGS OF THE 
Sometimes in the songs of this simple 
people there is an artfulness that takes 
you by surprise. Who can doubt that 
the young girl who sang the following 
lyric about her lover had a secret thought 
to comfort her? 
Oh, somewhere yonder in the west 
You go away to gather wood. 
And now you shout and now you sing. 
Oh yes, I remember! Abruptly you left me! 
Laughing was I, nevertheless, you left me! 
The gentle raillery of these verses 
might be contrasted with the unmistak- 
able sarcasm of another girl whose 
whilom swain returns from a far country 
and seeks to reéstablish the old relations. 
The song takes the form of a dialogue as 
do several others that I obtained. 
He speaks: 
Oh, Little Blue, at your door I wish to be, 
At your door that once was blue and open 
wide, 
But now isclosed. At your door, I wish to be 
Oh, my little breath! Oh, my little heart! 
She speaks: 
To Comanche girls you paid those words, 
those eyes! 
Your wish concerns me not and I can’t be 
killed 
For that! It was under guns that you dared 
to pay! 
It may be explained to those who do 
not catch the figure of speech that the 
girl’s name was really Povi tsa wi 1, 
that is, Blue Flower, and that the blue 
about her door was the flower after 
which she was named. The last sen- 
tence in the girl’s high-spirited answer, 
“Tt was under guns that you dared to 
pay’’ means, of course, that he took an 
open risk of losing her when he turned 
his attention to others. 
Songs of disillusion, supposed to be 
sung by young persons soon after mar- 
riage are a common type. The woman 
is usually the complainant. She tells 
how a few short weeks before she wore 
TEWA INDIANS iy 
Photo by Walton 
her gayest dress and went along by the 
side of her “arm-holding mother’”’ while 
the man in brand new clothes followed 
by the side of his “arm-holding father.” 
But the marriage ceremony over, gay 
dresses became a thing of the past. 
She continues in this fashion: ‘“ Now in 
the morning you wrap yourself in a 
