- SINGING AND DANCING. on 
makings. Whenever the harvest of field, forest, or waters is abundant, the 
heralds are kept running lively and the dance goes right merrily, first in 
one village, then in another. When a chief decides on holding one he dis- 
patches the fleetest-footed man in his camp, who runs with all his might to 
the next, where a fresh man takes up the message and bears it forward. 
The news of a death is carried in the same manner and spreads with won- 
derful rapidity. When I was on the extreme upper Sacramento an Indian 
died on Cow Creek, fifty miles below, toward midnight, and the next morn- 
ing at sunrise it was known to the Indians that I talked with. As soon as 
the appointed day for a dance arrives, every man, woman, and child sets out; 
even the decrepit are carried along; the squaws load their deep, conical 
baskets full of acorn panada; and they stay as long as it lasts at the usual 
rate of consumption, for feasting is nothing, but the dance is everything. 
And the number of choruses they have is wonderfvl—all stored away in 
the memory. I can give only two more, which sounded very pretty when 
sung in a low soft voice by an Indian girl and her sister. The first is a 
Nummok dance-song : . 
“ Mi-i-hen-ne, 
Mi-o-hen-ne, 
Hu-ai-ker-hu-ne-he, 
Hu-ai-ker-hu-ne-he, 
Hu-ai-ker-hu-ne-he, 
Mi-i-i.” 
The other is a Noam-lak-ki social song: 
“ Hil-li-shu-min-ah, 
Hil-li-i-vi-wik-o-yeh, 
Hai-ho-ho, 
Hai-ho-ho, 
Hai-ho-ho.” 
These songs are truly sweet and charming at first, but when they are 
repeated fifty or sixty times they become somewhat wearisome. 
Among the numerous dances they observe is the pine-nut dance, cele- 
brated when the pine-nuts (Pinus edulis) are fit to gather, and the clover 
dance in the spring, which is an occasion of much good feeling and rejoicing. 
Then there is the war dance, which is not much observed by this peaceful 
race. The Nuimok, however, have a magnificent costume for this dance, 
