parsons] 



PERSONAL LIFE 249 



the dead are placed clasped together, and between the middle fingers 

 is placed a small cross of perhu.^' The aunt covers the corpse with 

 a black blanlvct (manta) which is sewn together. Four men volunteer 

 to carry the body fii'st to the church, then to the cemetery. 



In the new cemetery outside of town, as in the ancient chiu'chyard, 

 the burial is head to the south, facing the chiu'ch, a position in which 

 people ai'e loath to sleep.''" Ai-ound the grave a circle is drawn with 

 an arrow point or blade, and on it a cross is marked — protection 

 against witches.^' If a person has been ^vitched to death, he is not 

 really dead, and after four days the witches may try to exhume him 

 and so "get a child"; i. e., another witch member.*^ 



The relatives remain in the house of the deceased four nights, 

 which are referred to as foiu- years. On the thu-d day everybody 

 washes his or her head. On the foiu-th day, before sunrise, every- 

 body in the funerary house has to go to the river to sprinkle meal 

 in the water and bathe. On their way going or returning, whatever 

 sound they may hear, they are not to look backward — the deceased 

 may be following.''^ From the river they retiu-n to their respective 

 houses, when the women prepare food for the ceremony that evening 

 wliich the Corn chief and his assistants are to conduct. About 9 in 

 the evening the Corn Fathers arrive at the house of the deceased and 

 lay down theh' meal altar on which are medicine bowl, arrow points, 

 and the prayer feathers made bj' the chief for the deceased. A Hne 

 of meal is sprinkled from the altar to the door, for the deceased to 

 come in by. On the meal road stands a bowl, to wliich each relative 

 and each Corn Father has contributed a bit of food, and any objects, 

 such as bow and arrow, used by the deceased. . . . The Corn assist- 

 ants stand in a row near the food offering. With a prayer feather 

 the chief sprinkles aU from the medicine bowl. All sing. The chief 

 sprinkles meal on the meal road, in his song calling to the deceased 

 to enter. Then the chief opens the house door, singing that the 

 deceased is coming. "You can not see him, but you hear footsteps 

 outside and fumbhng at the door." The chief bids the deceased to 

 come and eat. Then from the Mother "■* to the door the chief sprinkles 

 the road for him to leave by. Then the Fathers take out the bowl 

 of food and the prayer feathers and "chase him (the deceased) out 

 of the village." With them they also take pieces out from the de- 

 ceased's clothes and personal belongings. The Fathers return on a 

 run and close the door, making a cross on it with their arrow point 



w A high biish with a white bloom which grows in the mountain arroyos. 



<» Cp. Parsons, 9: 10S-16U. 



" See pp. 278, 438. 



" Sec p. 438. 



" A notion held also by the Tewa and at Zufli. 



** I do not understand this reference, as the Corn chiefs are not possessed of Mothers. 



6066°— 32 17 



