454 ISLETA, NEW MEXICO [kth. ann. 47 



townsmen after five years of the free pass (and of flighty womanhood) 

 put an end to the practice. 



49. Two Celibates 



My wife's sister would not marry anybody. So they found a man 

 for her and she was going to have to marry him. The boys who had 

 wanted to marry her were jealous and they bewitched her and she 

 died. But the medicine man said she was not really dead and if her 

 family would give him four strands of coral beads and one strand of 

 white beads and a pair of turcpioise earrings he would bring her back 

 to life. They would not pay that much. In the bluff over the river, 

 before the bridge was built, there used to be a cave (pakek, water cave) 

 and here, they say, that gu'l used to sit at dawn and at twilight and 

 she woidd also swim in the river. People saw her. . . . 



This girl had a brother who would not marry any one. One day 

 he was passing by a house where there were four girls. They asked 

 him to come in and aU that day they played with him (with his bird 

 and eggs), so at night he could hardly walk and in two days he was 

 dead. The medicine man said he, too, was not really dead and he 

 would bring hun to life again if they paid him, but they would not. 

 They did not want to call either of them back from the dead. 



50. How My Brother Wrestled with the Navaho 



In 1903 they were building the railway to Williams. I was asked 

 to gather together 30 or more Isletans for a work camp. There was 

 a Navaho camp, too. The Navaho worked with pick and spade, 

 the Isletans with machines. I used to drive the dinner wagon to the 

 camp. One day as I was driving past the Navaho camp, their boss, 

 who was a Mormon (ours was a white man), said a Navaho wanted to 

 wrestle with me. I said I did not know how to wrestle. I was 

 afraid. The boss insisted. I got down and wrestled and threw the 

 Navaho. His head was cut. Later the Navaho sent word they 

 wanted to wrestle with us again. We were afraid, Isletans are always 

 afraid Navaho will do something [magical] to them. But we bad 

 to agree to wrestle. We had some trials and my brother was chosen 

 to wrestle with the Navaho. 



The Navaho don't do anything without making a ceremony; so 

 my brother said he ^' and our uncle ""^ who were both Laguna Fathers 

 and another Laguna Father who was in camp would hold a ceremony, 

 too. We were not to be afraid to bet, to bet anything we hked. We 

 bet the money we had earned; the Navaho bet buckskins, blankets, 

 gims. The Monnons bet on the Navaho; the white men on us. We 



" He was Rattlesnake Father. " See pp. 455-456. 



