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down to the ground. A shower of sparks flew forth. The medicine 

 man left the ground, soared through the air, and ahghted on the 

 pinnacle of rock 40 feet away (the intervening chasm was over 300 

 feet deep). Then, in like manner, the doctor jumped back to the 

 mesa. 



Episode 2. Then the doctor told Juan that they were going to 

 descend the trail which is near this point. I have inspected these 

 points closely. The trail is very difficult to negotiate, even for the 

 Indians, and at this time it was covered with snow. The medicine 

 man told Juan that it would be too dangerous for him (Juan) to go 

 down by himself, so he told Juan to climb on his back. Juan jumped 

 on the doctor's back (the doctor was cjuite a small man). "Put your 

 arms aroimd my neck," the doctor told him, "and don't open your 

 eyes. If you open your eyes, we'll both fall." Juan did as he was 

 told. "I had no more than got myself fixed on his back and closed 

 my eyes," Juan said, "when the medicme man said, 'All right; open 

 your eyes.' I opened my eyes and we were down at the foot of the 

 mesa." 



Another informant told me that once he was attending a curing 

 ceremony. A medicine man had been curing a patient; he had been 

 sucking things from his body. When he tried to vomit them out ho 

 could not do it. He tried and tried. "You could see he was in great 

 pain. He broke out all over in a sweat, and he began to writhe in 

 agony." One of the other medicine men came over to help him. He 

 laid the sick doctor over on his back. Then he picked up a big flint 

 knife and cut him open (cutting a median line down his thorax and 

 abdomen). "When he cut him open you could see his heart and 

 stomach and everything." The doctor looked inside the body and 

 took out a big ball of cactus thorns, which he threw into the refuse 

 bowl. Then the doctor closed the great incision. He rubbed the flint 

 over it, clapped his hands, and blew on it, and it was just like it was 

 before; you would not know that he had been cut open. Finally the 

 doctor who had swallowed the thorns got up and staggered over to 

 the altar. 



The following story is also of interest: There was an epidemic of 

 whooping cough. At night they heard a man walking through the 

 village beating a drum; it sounded just Ulve a person coughing. It 

 was a witch who was making people sick. So the medicine societies 

 held a meeting. They set up their altar and laid out theii- parapher- 

 nalia. With the aid of their ma-caiyoyo (the rock ciystal which 

 gives second sight) they located the witch. So some medicine men 

 anned themselves with their bear paws and flint laiives and set out 

 to capture him, while aU the people waited. They went out west of 

 Acoma, about 3 miles. There they found a horse fuUy saddled and 



