THE CAMP DWELLERS. 179 
The dead are supposed to go to the lower world 
through the opening by means of which the people 
originally came forth. 
The Indians of the Southwest have many myths and 
tales, which they relate particularly during the winter. 
Very many of these myths explain the origin of the 
world. While these vary in details, according to the 
tribe and the individual who tells them, they agree as 
to the general facts. The Athapascan-speaking people 
tell of a time before the world existed when Spider, 
Mirage, Whirlwind, and Black Obsidian lived suspended 
in space. Obsidian rubbed his side and from the re- 
moved cuticle produced the earth. They then lifted 
up the sky and supported it at each of the four corners 
with a core of obsidian insidea whirlwind. People and 
animals came to exist within the world in an unexplained 
manner. They were threatened with a flood and 
escaped by means of reeds or a ladder through an 
opening in the sky of the lower world, the crust of this. 
They were all destroyed by monsters except a girl 
Esdzanadlehi. The water pitying her lonely condi- 
tion became the father of a daughter who in turn by 
the rays of the rising sun became the mother of Naiye- 
nezgani. This boy visited the sun, his father, withstood 
severe tests as to his sonship, and secured weapons 
and the promise of aid. With these weapons he killed a 
giant, a monster elk or antelope, a great eagle, and many 
other evil things. When this work was completed 
and the world was repeopled by the creation of men 
and women from ears of corn, Esdzanadlehi went to 
the western o¢ean, where she is now living in a floating 
palace of shell. According to the Navajo, Naiyenez- 
gani lives with his brother near the mouth of the San 
Juan River. 
