396 THE MOUNTAIN CHANT. 
tice the walk and the motions of the animal. All this occupied eleven 
days. 
29. On the twelfth day the Ute went out to hunt, leaving few men 
in camp. ‘There was a small! inclosure of brushwood close to the tent; 
in it were two high poles on which skins were dressed. His master 
left him, that day, two skins to prepare, and he set to work at them 
and labored hard scraping and rubbing them until about noon, when 
he felt hungry and went into the tent to see if he could find anything 
to eat. He opened a bag and found it to contain dried meat; he put 
some of this on the coals and sat down to wait tillit was done. Ashe 
watched the meat cooking he heard a noise at the deer skin door of the 
tent and, looking up, he beheld an old woman crawling in on her hands 
and knees. She passed once around the fire and went out at the door 
again, but before she disappeared she turned her head and addressed 
him, saying: “ My grandchild, do something for yourself.” He paused 
«a moment in wonder at the strange vision he had seen and the strange 
words he had heard, and then he rushed out of the tent to follow his 
visitor and see who she might be. He went around the tent four times; 
he gazed in every direction; but no one was to be seen. During the 
rest of the day he worked but little. Occasionally he took up a stone 
and rubbed the hides; but most of the time be walked and loitered 
around, busy with his thoughts. 
30. After sunrise the hunters returned with an abundance of meat. . 
They came to the great lodge where the master of the Navajo dwelt; 
they extended its circumference by removing the pegs at the bottom; 
they stored the goods of the owner away at the outer edge, so as to 
leave a clear space in the center, and made everything ready for the 
reception of a large number of guests. After dark a great number 
gathered in the tent and the captive was ordered by his master to bring 
some water. He took two wicker bottles to a neighboring spring, filled 
them, and laid them on the ground beside the spring, while he went to 
gather some plauts to stick into the mouths of the bottles as stopples. 
As he went he heard a voice saying *“* Hist!” and looking in the direction 
whence it came he sawaform sitting in the water; it wore a mask like 
the head of a great owl and it was smoking a pipe. When he turned 
towards it, it said, ‘‘ You walk around like one without sense or knowl- 
edge. Why don’t you do something for yourself? When next you hear 
my voice it will be well for you if you walk towards it.” 
31. The voice ceased and the form of the owl-man vanished. Then the 
Navajo put the stopples into the vessels and carried them back. When 
he returned he observed that two large dogs were tied to the door, one 
on each side, and that three doors had been added to the lodge during 
his absence, so that now there were four doors covering the doorway. 
When he entered he found the lodge filled with Ute and he saw four 
bags of tobacco and four pipes lying near the fire, one at each ear- 
dinal point of the compass. He observed a very old man and a very 
i 
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