mooney] SACKED REGARD FOR THE CEDAR 809 



(lance was concerned. By this time it was dark, and the Indians 

 invited the interpreter and myself to come over to a tipi about half a 

 mile away, where we could meet all the old men. We started, and had 

 -niie but a short distance when we heard from a neighboring hill the 

 familiar measured cadence of the ghost songs. On turning witli a 

 questioning look to my interpreter — who was himself a half-blood — he 

 quietly said: '-Yes; they are dancing the Ghost dance. That's some 

 thing 1 have never reported, and I never will. It is their religion and 

 they have a right to it." Not wishing to be an accomplice in crime, I 

 did not go oxer to the dance; but it is needless to state that the old 

 men in the tipi that night, and for several successive nights thereafter, 

 knew all about the songs and ceremonies of the new religion. As 

 already stated, the Shoshoni had really lost faith and abandoned the 

 dance. 



Among the Shoshoni the dance was performed around a small cedar 

 tree, planted in the ground for that purpose. Unlike the Sioux, they 

 hung nothing on this tree. The men did not clasp each other's hands, 

 bat held on to their blankets instead; but a woman standing between 

 two men took hold of their hands. There was no preliminary medicine 

 ceremony. The dance took place usually in the morning, and at its 

 close the performers shook their blankets in the air, as among the 

 Paiute and other tribes, before dispersing. However novel may have 

 been the doctrine, the Shoshoni claim that the Ghost dance itself as 

 performed by them was a revival of an old dance which they had had 

 fully lift) years before. 



The selection of the cedar in this connection is in agreement with the 

 general Indian idea, which has always ascribed a mystic sacredness to 

 that tree, from its never dying green, which renders it so conspicuous 

 a feature of the desert landscape; from the aromatic fragrance of its 

 twigs, which are burned as incense in sacred ceremonies; from the 

 durability and tine texture of its wood, which makes it peculiarly 

 appropriate for tipi poles and lance shafts; and from the dark-red color 

 of its heart, which seems as though dyed in blood. In Cherokee myth 

 the cedar was originally a pole, to the top of which they fastened the 

 fresh scalps of their enemies, and the wood was thus stained by the 

 blood that trickled slowly down along it to the ground. The Kiowa 

 also selected a cedar for the center of their Ghost-dance circle. 



We go back now to the southern tribes west of the mountains. 

 Some time in the winter of 1S89-90 Paiute runners brought to the 

 powerful tribe of the Navaho, living in northern New Mexico and Ari- 

 zona, the news of the near advent of the messiah and the resurrection 

 of the dead. They preached and prophesied for a considerable time, 

 but the Navaho were skeptical, laughed at the prophets, and paid but 

 little attention to the prophesies. (Matthews, 1.) According to the 

 official report for 1892, these Indians, numbering somewhat over 16,000 

 souls, have, in round numbers, 9,000 cattle, 119,000 horses, and L.600.000 



