282 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
. ee 
[Noy. 6, 1884. 
\ 
27 
Che Sportsman Canvigt. 
A NIGHT WITH THE NAVAJOS, 
BY ZAY ELINI. 
| ee the Moon of Gentle Breezes the rattlesnakes go to sleep, 
Then at night, by the fire of his low hut, the Navajo 
may safely relate his mythic lore; then he may safely build 
his great brush corral and celebrate his most sacred rites, 
without fear of death from thunderbolt or yenomed fang, 
until, in the Moon of Falling Horns, the thunder is heard in 
the mountains and the serpents waken at the sound. 
It is, therefore, only in the cold months that the ceremon- 
ies | am about to deséribe take place. They are collect .vely 
called by the Navajas i-nus-tehin'-go ha-thal, or the Song of 
the Corral of Branches; but white men living in the Navajo 
country give to the whole night’s entertainment the name of 
‘Hoshkawn Dance,” from tlie one dance of the evening 
which seems most to excite the Caucasian interest. 
It was on the 5th of November, which fell in the Moon of 
Gentle Breezes in 1882, that 1 found myself at the trading 
post of Mr. Keam, in Keam Canyon, Arizona, whither J had 
come to witness an exhibition of the Hoshkawn Dance, 
which I was promised would be one of unusual interest and 
well performed. 
Soon after nightfall, our party of eight white men set out 
from Keam’s. A walk of about a mile took us out of the 
canyon, up the juniper-covered mesa, and to the locality 
where the dance was to beheld. Here we found a large 
corral, or inclosure, of an irregularly circular form, about 
forty paces in diameter. Its fence, about eight feet high, 
was coustructed of fresh juniper and pifion boughs. In the 
center was a conical pile of dry wood abouttwelve feet high, 
which was to make the great central fire. Around this, a 
few feet from the fence, a dozén smaller fires were burning 
for the comfort and convenience of the spectators, who num- 
bered about 500 men, women and children, gathered here 
from various parts of the Navajo country. The majority 
were from the neighboring camps in Arizona and New Mex- 
ico; but many came from the distant borders of Utah and 
Colorado. The corral had but one opening, and this was in 
the east, All who wished to witness the ceremonies were 
obliged to assemble within the inclosure; none might peep 
through the fence or over the top of it, for the spirits of the 
bears and other ancestral animal-gods were supposed to be 
there, looking on at the sports of their children. 
The eds outside of the corral were illuminated by fires, 
jn differen placcs, and we determined to visit some of these 
before the ceremonies beguu. Some seemed to be merely the 
camp fires of parties who came from a distance, others were 
the fires around which different bands of dancers were pre- 
paring themselves, We entered one lodge or hogan, which 
stood close to the corral on the south, this was the principal 
medicine lodge (a sort of ‘‘green room” or place of prepar- 
ation for the dancers). No objection was, at first, made to 
our presence; indeed, we were invited to enter by some of 
the liberal-minded Indians who stood at the door, but soon 
after we got inside an ill-natured conservative, sitling to the 
west of the fire which burned in the middle of the floor, made 
some srumbling remarks about the impropriety of admitting 
ihe “Bilikanos” (Spanish jargon for ‘“‘Americans”), Uis 
words were approved by another grumbler in the north. 
Thus encouraged the man in the west motioned us to leave, 
which we did, notwithstanding that there seemed to be no 
other objectors in the house, 
We vext wended our way to where a brilliant light gleamed 
through the dark junipers, about three hundred paces west 
of the corral, and found a party seated around a fire in the 
open air. Two of the number were engaged in sewing some 
radiating cagle feathers to two circular wooden disks, covered 
with buckskin—properties which I afterward recognized in 
the dance of the Sun and Moon. They allowed us to observe 
their labors for a few minutes, when the man who was 
making the Sun looked up, saying, ‘‘The great fire will be 
lit very soon, the dance of the Wand will begin and if you 
do not hurry away you will miss it.” Understanding this as 
a hint to leave, much more polite than the one given to us in 
the medicine lodge, we departed and visited some other camp 
fires where, as no preparations for the dance were being 
made, no objections were urged to our presence. 
He who comes among the Navajos with his notions of 
them formed by reading the reports of the explorations of 
thirty or forty years ago, the works of Pattee, Gregg, Hughes 
and Emory, or by the perusal of romances of the Mayne 
Reid school, can with difficulty realize that in these indus- 
trious, jolly, friendly groups around the fire, he beholds the 
former scourges of Northern Mexico, for these smooth-faced 
young men and laughing girls perhaps know of those days 
only from the tales they hear at night told by their elders in 
the smoky hogan, But see you gray-haired, fierce-eyed old 
man, who warms his handsin the flame, and rubs with them 
his wrinkled chest. Many a tale could he tell you of his 
own exploits in the Rio Grande Valley, and on the distant 
plains of Sonora and Chihuahua. A whole library of dime 
novels might be written from his dictation. 
Yet itis possibie that we may not seek among the gray- 
heads for all the bloody raiders. When their cousins, the 
Apaches, are at war on the southern frontier, occasionally 
a Navojo youth is missing fora time, and when the war is 
over he turns up again; he has just been off on 4 Visit to 
some friends of his. 
But he will not tell us of his adventures; 
he will find some other audience. 
In this great Indian festival there was no vast supply of 
game brought in to feed the assembled multitude, nor deer 
and turkey from the neighboring forests of the Sierra de 
Chusea, nor from the great peak of San Francisco, whose 
snowy summit is visible from the neighborhood of our ‘camp, 
but there isan inclosure of rocks and dead trees hard by, 
filled with fat, if prosaic, sheep. ‘These are the gift of a sick 
man to the assembled dancers, who help themselves as they 
need, 
When we returned to the corral we found an old man ad- 
dressing the assembly. He congratulated them on the 
absence of liquor from the camp, exhorted them to temper- 
ance, begged them not to steal from one another, and 
declared that the heavens looked favorable for a calm and 
pleasant night, 
At 8 o’clock a 
sat down beside one of the fires in the west, and commenced 
to make various noises, vocal and instrumental, which were 
to them music. There were singers, there were rattlers, and 
there were those who scraped on notched sticks, laid on 
inverted baskets that answered 
boards, From the moment it 
dances ended, this music ceased 
band of musicians—the orchestra, entered, | 
the purpose of sounding- 
pegan until dawn when the 
not for 3 minute to delight 
the audience and drive away the evil spirits. At the moment 
the music began the great central fire was lit, and the confla- 
eration spread so rapidly through the entire pile that in a 
few moments it was enveloped in great flames, throwing up 
astorm of sparks to a height of a hundred feet or more, and 
covered us with the descending ashes, which fell in the 
corral like a shower of snow. The heat was soon so intense 
that in the remotest part of the inclosure it was necessary 
for us to screen our faces when we looked in the direction 
of the fire. And now all was ready to test the endurance of 
wa dancers, who must expose their naked breasts to the torrid 
ow. 
When the fire gave forth its most intense heat, a warning 
whistle was heard in the outer darkness and a dozen forms, 
lithe and lean, dressed only in the narrow white cloth at the 
hips, and daubed with white earth until they looked like a 
group of marble statues into which the breath of life had 
suddenly been breathed, came bounding in at_ the entrance, 
yelping like wolves and slowly moving around the fire. As 
they advauced in single file they threw their bodies into 
diverse attitudes, some graceful, some strained and difficult, 
some menacing—attitudes that might have inspired the chisel 
of the sculptor, Now they faced the east, again the south, 
the west, the north, bearing aloft their slender wands, tipped 
with eagle down, holding and waving them with startling 
effect, Their course around the fire was to the left, 7. ¢., 
from the east to the west by way of the south and back to 
the east by way of the north; and this was the course taken 
by all the dancers of the night, the order never being re- 
versed. 
When they had encircled the fire twice they began to 
thrust their wands toward it, and we soon saw that their 
object was to burn off the tips of eagle down; but owing to 
the intensity of the heat it seemed difficult to get near enough 
to the flame to accomplish this, One would dash wildly 
toward the fire and retreat; another would lie prone, as close 
to the ground as a frightened lizard, and endeavor to wriggle 
himself up to the fire; others sought to catch on their wands 
the sparks flying in the air. One approached the flaming 
mass, suddenly threw himself on his back, with bis head to 
the fire, and swiftly thrust his wand into the flames. Many 
were the unsuccessful attempts, but at length one by one 
they all succeeded in burning the downy balls from the ends 
of their wands. As each accomplished this feat it became 
his next duty to restore, by a slight-of-hand trick (the 
mechanism of which I have since discovered), the ball of 
down to the end of the wand. He apparently did this by 
waving his wand up and down as he continued torun around 
the fire. When he succeeded he held his wand up in 
triumph, yelped and rushed out of the corral. The last man 
feigned great difficulty in restoring the ball, When he at 
last gave his triumphant yell and departed my watch showed 
me that it was ten minutes to 9, The dance had lasted 
twenty minutes. 
After an interval of three-quarters of an hour, the dance 
of the Great Plumed Arrow, a potent healmg ceremony, 
began. There were but ‘two performers; they wore broad 
sashes around the hips, silver-studded belts, long blue 
woolen stockings of Navajo make, moccasins and an orna- 
ment of plumes on cach arm, otherwise they were nude, 
their skins painted white. Hach bore a stone-headed arrow 
of great size, to the stem of which was attached tufts of 
feathers, not only for ornament, but also to conceal the 
mechanism by which the arrow was shortened telescopically 
when the bearer pretended to swallow it. While they were 
making the usual circuit around the fire, «a sick man was 
placed sitting on a buffalojrobe in front of the orchestra. 
They halted in front of the patient; each dancer seized his 
arrow between his thumb and forefinger about eight inches 
from the tip, held the arrow up to view, giving at the same 
time a yelp Tike a coyote, as if to say “‘so far will I swallow 
it,’ and appeared to thrust the arrow slowly and painfully 
down his throat as far as indicated. I doubt not that many 
of the audience actually believed that he accomplished the 
feat he feigned to perform. While the arrows seemed still 
to be stuck in their throats, they danced a chassé right and 
left with short scufiling steps. Then they withdrew the 
arrows, held them up to view as before with triumphant 
yelps, as if to say “‘so far have I swallowed it,” and sympa- 
thizers around yelped in response. 
The next thing fo be done was to apply the arrows. One 
of the dancers advanced to the patient, and to the soles of 
the feet of the latter, he pressed the shaft of the magic weapon 
with the point to the right; reversed it and pressed it again 
with the point to the left; and in similar manuer he treated 
successively the knees, hands, abdomen, back, shoulders, 
crown and mouth, giving three coyote yelps after each ap- 
plication. 
When the first dancer had completed this work the other 
took his place and went through exactly the same perform- 
ance, This done, the sick man and the buffalo robe were 
removed; the bearers of the arrows danced once more around 
the fire and departed. All the rites of the night are to some 
extent, intended for the benefit of the sick man who sits on 
the buffalo robe; but in the dance of the Great Arrow is per- 
formed the special healing act. It is this patient who gives 
the sorcerers rich presents for their efforts, and supplies all 
the sheep devoured by the whole multitude of visitors. 
At 10 o’clock the sound of the whistle again called the 
spectators to attention, and a line of twenty-three dancers 
came in sight. The one who led the procession bore in his 
hand a whizzer—such as our schoolboys use—a little stick 
tied to the end of a string; this he constantly whirled, pro- 
ducing a sound like that of a rain storm. Atter him came 
one who enacted the Yebdtehai of Navajo mythology; he 
wore a mask designed to represent an owl’s face, and further 
to mock the doleful bird of night he hooted from time to 
time. Then there were eight wand-bearers, dressed, or 
rather decked, like the arrow-bearers in a previous dance; 
but instead of arrows having wands or grass, cactus, and. 
eagle plumes. The rest of the band were men in ordinary 
dress, who were merely choristers or supernumeraries. When 
they had all gone around the fire a cou 
halted in the west, the choristers sat, and the wand-bearers 
formed a double row of four. Then while the owl hooted, 
the orchestra played, the choristers sang, and the whizzer 
made his mimic storm, the eight wand-bearers, keeping time 
with their feet, went through a series of figures not unlike 
those of a modern quadrille. The country fiddler would 
probably have Called the dance in these terms: “Forward 
and back, chassez twice, face partners, forward and back, 
forward and bow, forward and embrace, forward and wave 
wands at partners,” ete. When several of these evolutions 
had been performed in a graceful and orderly manner, the 
choristers rose and all went singing out at the east, h 
Three times more the same band returned. In’ the third 
and fourth acts, the wand-bearers bore great piiion poles, 
hour, which passed slowly to those in the corral; some 
smoked and gossiped; some listened to the never-ceasing din 
of the orchestra or joined in the chant; some brought in 
wood and replenished the waning fires; some, wrapped in 
their serapes, stretched themselves on the ground to catch 
short naps. 
horn announced the approach of the group who were to per- 
form in the fifth dance. 
dancers in the party and these represented the sun and moon, 
who in Navajo mythology are not. male and female, as other 
nations have conceived them to be, but mex and brothers. 
Like nearly all the character dancers so far seen they weze 
arrayed in that cool and scant costume of which white paint 
formed the principal part. 
adorned with the plumes of the war eagle, their necks with 
rich necklaces of genuine coral, their waists with valuable 
silver-covered belts, and their loins with bright sashes of 
crimson silk. The Sun bore upon his backaround disk — 
nine inches in diameter, decorated with radiating eagle — 
plumes, to represent the orb of day; his companion carried 
a disk of six and a half inches diameter, similarly orna- 
mented, as an image of the nocturnal luminary. While the 
whole party, including twenty-two choristers and a rattler, 
were passing around the fire in the usual manner, they fre- | 
quently bowed and waved their wands toward the flames, 
When they stopped in the west the choristers sat and sang, 
the rattler stood and rattled, and the Sun and Moon danced 
at a lively rate for just three minutes, when the choristerg 
rose and all sang and danced themselves out of sight. 
picturesque and ingenious. 
eight in number, as usual with scant clothing; their hair fell — 
loose and long over backs and shoulders; and each bore in © 
front of him, held by both hands, a wooden arc, ornamented | 
with eagle plumes, 
semicircle, showed tufts of pinon twigs, and were evidently — 
joined together by a delicate string which was invisible to | 
the audience. 
whizzer and a chorus. 
the fourth circuit of the fire, frequent shouts of Tho-he/ | 
Tho-he! (stand! stand!) were heard, the significance of which . 
goon became apparent. 
eight character dancers, haying first gone through various \ 
quadrille-like figures, knelt in two rows, facing one another. | 
At a word from the rattler, the man nearest to him, or No.1, | 
arose, advanced to the man who knelt opposite, No. 2, with . 
rapid shuffling steps and, amid a chorus of tho-he! tho-hel 
put his are with caution on the head of the Jatter, where : 
with its radiating plumes, lit by the flickering firelight and | 
contrasting with the dark shadows behind, it looked like the ; 
halo ‘around some saintly head on a medisval canvas. | 
Although it was held in position by the friction of the pinon — 
tufts at each ear, and by the pressure of the ends of the are, , 
now drawn closer by the subtending string, it had the ap- - 
pearance of standing on the head without material support; ; 
and it is probable that some of the uninitiated believed that 
only the magic influence of the oft-repeated word tho he kept | 
it in position. 
retreated wit 
on his knees again, while No, 2.advanced and placed the are « 
which he held in his hands on the head of No. 1. Thus each - 
in turn placed his arc on the head of the one opposite until — 
all were crowned, 
lest their crowns should fall, the eight kneeling figures began © 
a splendid, well-timed chant, which was accentuated by the | 
clapping of hands and joined in by the chorus. 
formers in ordinary Navajo dress. 
whizzer who led the procession; anotier, who came about 
the center of the line, carried a hewn plank (puncheon) some 
twelve feet long and four inches broad, painted with spots 
le of times, they 
about twelve feet long, portions of which they pretended to ¢ 
swallow, as their predecessors had done with the arrows, 
The simple and devoted Indian of the unconverted pueblos, 
it is said, does actually, in dances of this character, thrust a 
stick far down his gullet, to the great danger of health and 
eyen of life. But the wily Navajo attempts no such prodi- ; 
gies of deglutition, A careful observation of their move-— 
pie convinced me that the sticks never passed below their 
onsils. 
In the fourth dance there were three interesting character 
dancers, all in fancy masks, who danced a lively and grace- 
ful jig, in perfect time to the music, with many bows, waving — 
of wands, and other pretty motions which would not have 
looked ill in the spectacular drama of a metropolitan theater, 
but which, with the wild surroundings of an Indian camp, 
were doubly attractive. 
After the fourth dance there was an interval of nearly an 
— eS See ee oe 
It was after midnight when the blowing of a hoarse buffalo 
There were but two character 
Their heads and arms were 
The sixth dance, that of the standing arcs, was both | 
The principal performers were 
The ends of the are, which was a full 
| 
Besides these eight there was a rattler, a | 
While the whole band was making ° 
| 
When it stopped im the west, the : 
| 
When the arc was secured in its place No. 1 | 
h shuffling steps to his former position and fell - 
Then, holding their heads rigidly erect, 
When the 
chant was done, the rattler addressed the arc bearers, warn-_ 
ing them to be careful, so they cautiously rose from their 
knees and shufiled with stiffened spines, out of the corral 
preceded by the choristers. This dance was repeated after a 
second performance of the fifth dance. / 
The seventh dance presented nothing worthy of special 
note, but its shortcomings were more than atoned for by the 
In this there were sixteen per- 
interest of the eighth dance. 
One of these was a 
and decorated with tufts of pifion, branchlets and eagle 
plumes, Immediately behind the bearer of the plank walked 
4 man who had in a basket an effigy of the sun, formed of a 
small round mirror and a number of radiating scarlet 
plumes. Having walked around the fire as usual, the whole 
party gathered in the west in a close cirele, which completely 
excluded from the sight of the audience the operations of 
the medicine man. Singing, rattling, and ertes of Thohe! 
were heard. In afew minutes the circle opened and dis- 
closed the plank standing upright on a small Navajo blanket 
without any apparent means of support, and at its base was 
the basket containing the figure of thesun, Singing was 
continued, and so were the uproarious cries of Thohe!— 
eries anxious, cries appealing, cries commanding, while the 
bearer of the rattle stood facing the pole and rattling vigor- 
ously abit. At, length, seemingly in obedience to all this 
clamor, the “sun” left the basket, and slowly, falteringly, 
tolteringly ascended the plank to within a few inches of 
the top, stopped a moment, and descended in the same man- 
ner that itrose. Once more was it made to rise and set, 
when the circle of dancers again closed; the pole, sun and. 
basket were taken in custody and the dancers departed. Tak- 
ing into consideration the limited knowledge and rude im- 
plements of the originators, this was a good piece of leger- 
demain, The man who pulled the sun up and down could 
not be detected, The dancers formed a semi-circle nearly 
ten feet distant from the pole, and the light of the great cen- 
tral fire shone brightly upon all. p. 
Tt was in the ‘“wee sma’ hours” when the real dance of the 
Hésh-kawn' (yucca baceata) began. ‘The ceremony was cous 
ducted in the first part by twenty-one persons in ordinary 
