Devereux] MOHAVE ETHNOPSYCHIATRY AND SUICIDE 367 



Hivsu: Tupo-.ma's statement (1936). — In aboriginal times, before the Mohave 

 had horses, if someone lost an eye the maimed person's family would harvest 

 everything and store the crops. Then they called in the people and told them 

 to help themeselves to their crops. After the Mohave acquired horses, the 

 liilling of a horse at a feast was substituted for the distribution of crops. 

 Suppose that a young woman, while gathering mesquite beans, was hit by a 

 twig and lost an eye. When that happened, her father went and announced 

 that a horse would be killed and eaten. Then they (apparently the guests, cf. 

 below) foregathered and killed the horse, as though the girl had died.* 

 This horse then waited for the girl in the land of the dead. People who attended 

 such a feast were supposed to get accustomed to the girl's changed appearance. 



CASE 88 (informants: Hivsu : Tupo : ma and Hama:Utce:.) : 



I myself (Hivsu: Tupo:ma) once ate a horse killed at a feast given by 

 Mashatcem Anya : ye,^' whose nephew Nyail Kwaiki: yo (Case 123) — the father 

 of M. S. and a relative of Sumuramura — lost an eye when a stick poked him in 

 the eye. His uncle called in the people and the guests killed the horse and 

 saw the man whose eye had been poked out. [Hama: Utce: then said that 

 this man now has a glass eye and that makes him look all right.] (This 

 accident may have been self-punitive, since he so neglected his mother that 

 she killed herself.) (Case 123.) 



Sometimes, in giving such a feast, the Mohave combined the killing of a horse 

 was a kind of special harvest feast : If a person loses an eye, he waits until 

 harvest time and then makes a big feast with all his crops, also killing a horse. 

 People come to such feasts to get accustomed to the maimed man's appearance. 

 The horse killed at this rite waited for the maimed person in the land of 

 ghosts."* 



The fact that such an issue was made of a relatively limited kind 

 of accident was explained by the informant as follows : 



Hivsu: Tupo:ma's statement (1936) : If a young person loses an eye, it 

 is almost as bad as being dead. As a matter of fact, it is a little like being 



dead. 



Precisely why the loss of one eye should be such a calamity, when 

 complete blindness, due, e.g., to trachoma, does not call for a similar 

 ceremony and does not seem to be compared to being almost dead, is 

 problematic. The only clue is the specification that the loss of an eye 

 is especially calamitous when the person is still young, presumably 

 because he is likely to be handicapped in amorous pursuits by his 

 uninviting appearance.^^ 



^''Kroeber (1925 a) mentions that old women Bometlmes keep a horse, so that there 

 would be something to kill at their funeral or "cry" (wake). 



" This man's name was usually abbreviated to Hatcem Anya :ye or even to Tcemenya :ye. 

 His picture was published by Kroeber (1925 a). 



28 This last remark may point to a hitherto unexplored aspect of Mohave eschatology, 

 since it is the only known example of a creature waiting for its owner In the land of 

 ghosts. (The souls of a witch's victims wait for him In a "special place" and do not 

 enter the land of the dead until the witch also dies.) (Pt. 7, pp. 383-426.) 



» It is, conceivably, not without Interest to note that the only known Mohave puritan 

 was the half Cocopa old Hi :dho (=eyes), so called because he became Mind in his old 

 age. Significantly, he spoke of sexual relationships as acts which "smell up the bed- 

 cloths" — a remark which suggests that he became a puritan when, after losing his eyesight, 

 he became more keenly aware of odors. 



