BOURKE. | AMULETS. 587 
AMULETS AND TALISMANS. 
THE ‘‘TZI-DALTAI.” 
The Apache, both menand women, wear amulets, called tzi-daltai, made 
of lightning-riven wood, generally pine or cedar or fir from the mountain 
tops, which are highly valued and are not to be sold. These are shaved 
very thin and rudely cut in the 
semblance of the human form. 
They are in fact the duplicates, on 
a small seale, of the rhombus, al- 
ready described. Like the rhom- 
bus, they are decorated with in- 
cised lines representing the light- 
ning. Very often these are to be Se Ce. \\ 
found attached to the necks of 
children or to their cradles. Gen- See ce TEI ECG) 
erally these amulets are of small size. Below will be found figures of 
those which I was permitted to examine and depict in their actual size. 
They are all unpainted. The amulet represented was obtained from a 
Chiricahua Apache captive. Deguele, an Apache of the Klukaydakaydn 
clan, consented to exhibit a kan, or god, which he carried about his 
person. He said I could have it for three ponies. It was made of a 
flat piece of lath, unpainted, of the size here given, having drawn upon 
it this figure in yellow, with a narrow black band, excepting the three 
snake heads, a, b, and c, which were black with white eyes; a was a 
yellow line and ¢ a black line; flat pearl buttons were fastened at m and 
k respectively and small eagle-down feathers at k on each side of the 
idol. The rear of the tablet, amulet, or idol, as one may be pleased to 
eall it, was almost an exact reproduction of the front. 
The owner of this inestimable treasure assured me that he prayed to 
it at alltimes when in trouble, that he could learn from it where his ponies 
were when stolen and which was the right direction to travel when lost, 
and that when drought had parched his crops this would never fail to 
bring rain in abundance to revive and strengthen them. The symbol- 
ism is the rain cloud and the serpent lightning, the rainbow, rain drops, 
and the cross of the four winds. 
These small amulets are also to be found inclosed in the phylacteries 
(Fig. 447) which the medicine-men wear suspended from their necks or 
waists. ° 
Sir Walter Scott, who was a very good witness in all that related to 
prehistoric customs and *‘survivals” among the Celtic Scots, may be 
introduced at this point: 
A heap of wither’d boughs was piled 
Of juniper and rowan wild, 
Mingled with shivers from the oak, 
Rent by the lightning’s recent stroke.! 
1 Lady of the Lake, canto 3, stanza 4, Sir Rhoderick Dhu, summoning Clan Alpine against the king. 
