308 THE ZUNI INDIANS [eth. ann. 23 



survivor, accoiiipanied by the father or brother, goes the morning- 

 following the death over the southern road to an ant-hill, and stand- 

 ing before it facing west, sprinkles prayer meal. The mourner then 

 steps over the ant-hill, putting the left foot first, and starts for his 

 home, and a relative obliterates the ant-hill with his feet. The spirit 

 is fed each day with food thrown into the fire, and on the morning of 

 the fifth day, when the spirit starts on its journev to Ko'thluwala'wa, 

 a large bowl of difl^erent kinds of food is cast into the fire for its use 

 during the journey of two da3's and nights. Upon reaching the lake, 

 in the depths of which is Ko'thluwala'wa, the spirit descends the mystic 

 ladder to meet the Council of the Gods, and thence passes on to the 

 undermost world, the place of Zuni nativity. There are mediums 

 who have seen the deceased Zuni dancing in Ko'thluwala'wa. The 

 exhibition of grief of a parent over a child or of a husband or wife 

 over the deceased partner is touching in the extreme. One scene 

 observed by the writer was particularly afi'ecting. A girl wife had 

 just died. The body lay wrapped in a blanket on the floor, the head 

 to the east, a piece of white cotton cloth spread over the face. The 

 3^oung husband sat by the head, on the right side of the corpse; the 

 mother sat on the opposite side, and the father by the side of his wife. 

 The nearer friends were silenth" weeping, while others crowded the 

 room keeping up a continuous howl. The young husband raised the 

 covering from the head, placed his cheek against that of his dead wife, 

 and throwing his arms over the bod}' murmured lamentations. Every 

 little while the sobbing mother caressed the cheek of her dead child, 

 and the father's bent form completed the picture of aliject despair. 



The body of a woman of one of the poorer families was l)rought 

 from Nutria, a farming district 25 miles distant, wrapped in a blanket 

 secured here and there with ^nicca strings. In less than an hour after 

 the bod}' reached the house, the son and grandson of the deceased pro- 

 ceeded with hoe and spade to dig the grave. Previously, however, 

 the daughter-in-law of the deceased had made a fire of chips in the tire- 

 place of the room in which the remains lay and had brought from an 

 inner room a basket containing four large cakes of bread, a large fold 

 of wafer ])n'ad, f(nir ears of corn, a c|uantity of dried peaches, and 

 some unground wheat. The cakes were first laid on the pyre, and the 

 wafer bread added, then the ears of corn were stuck about, and the 

 peaches and wheat were thrown over all. The daughter-in-law then 

 made yucca suds in a large bowl near the head of the corpse, and the 

 husband of the deceased untied the yucca knots in the blanket. When 

 the blanket was opened a fresh outburst of grief was heard. Such 

 relatives and friends as were present remained while the body was 

 being prepared for burial. The daughtor-in-law covered the head 

 and face with 3'ucca suds." Then the hair was loosed and washed 



(I The root of yucca glauea is employed to make the stids. 



