318 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 175 



The third, and perhaps most important, frustration experienced 

 by the reservation Moliave ^vas the depressing realization that the 

 world in which they now lived, and which affected their welfare, 

 stretched far beyond their horizon and was almost entirely beyond 

 their control. This change in the size and center of gravity of the 

 Mohave's human universe was as distressing for him as was for post- 

 Copernican European man the realization that the earth was not the 

 center of the universe, nor the Delphic Omphalos the navel of the 

 world.''* Closely related to this was their realization that the whites 

 could produce and control absolutely things the tribe now needed, but 

 could neither produce nor control. Being, therefore, no longer in full 

 control of their own fate, they began to feel less responsible for it, 

 and began to seek escapes where formerly they looked for commit- 

 ments and responsibilities within their "universe," which they con- 

 trolled as the leading military power and cultural model (Kroeber, 

 1920) of their cultural sub-area. In aboriginal times the world 

 which the Mohave had, in William James' terminology, an "acquaint- 

 ance with" and the world they had "knowledge about" were practically 

 coextensive and congruous. TVith the advent of the white man, the 

 Mohave's horizon expanded immeasurably. The world with which 

 he was actually acquainted became a small dot, surrounded by a much 

 larger area — the United States — which he had some "knowledge 

 about," and this area was, in turn, surrounded by an immeasurably 

 larger "outer world," of which he simply knew that it existed, and 

 whose unknown dangers bewildered and frightened him. 



This point is sufficiently important to justify additional comment. 

 The first Mohave who reached this "outer world," by serving in France 

 during World War I, adjusted to its strangeness by identifying the 

 gallantry of the French infantryman with the traditional courage of 

 IMohave braves, who also fought on foot. Similarly, the well edu- 

 cated Hama: Utce: spontaneously compared Mohave warriors to 

 "Spartans" (pt. 7, pp. 426-431). Areas not visited by any Mohave 

 continued, however, to be defined as dangerous and exotic. Thus, 

 when the Mohave learned that I was planning to go to Indochina to 

 study headhunters, they expressed a great deal of concern, and after I 

 reached Indochina, Hivsu: Tuponua actually asked Hama: Utce: to 

 write to me that he was "praying to his Holy (sic ! ) Pahotcatc" for my 

 safety. Similarly, Hama: Utce:, who, like most INIohave, disliked 

 unkempt hair a great deal, habitually described such hair as resem- 

 bling that of "South Sea Islanders," who, never having been visited by 



"* A coinparaljle phenomenon was observable anions the mountain jungle trilies of Indo- 

 china In 1933, when the repercussions of the 1929 economic collapse of the Western World 

 just 1;ej?an to undermine tlieir economy. They were frightened and puzzled by the realiza- 

 tion that, for some utterly Incomprehensible reason, money and trade goods had suddenly 

 become far more "expensive" than they had been ; and that a given quantity of rice or 

 rattan had to be sold for less than ever before (Devereus, MS., 1933-34). 



