30 
SURVEY OF THE COLORADO OF THE WEST. 
mental characteristic is observed in their deification of animals. The 
wolf of to-day is a howling pest, but the wolf of yesterday is a god. 
In addition to the animal gods, the sun and moon are recognized as 
deities, and they have gone but a step or two beyond this in creating 
for themselves purely imaginary gods. 
Some of the tribes have a god of thunder ; still it is an animal god. 
It is a monstrous bird perched on the clouds, and its cries are the rolling 
thunder, its wings are the cloudlets, and it soars to earth at times and 
carries away entire tribes on its back. 
Then there is still another god or goddess, of which mention should be 
made: Si-chom'-pa Ma'-so-its, the old woman of the sea. She it was who 
brought up the tribes of Utes from the depths of the ocean, and placed 
them on the land, and allotted to each its portion of the earth, and she 
taught them their arts. 
This mythology is their account of the origin of things and the expla- 
nation of the phenomena of nature. They accept as an original or pri- 
mary concept that there is a land and a sea, an abyss below and a night 
above. They have no term for, and seem to have no conception of, 
earth as composed of land and sea. The land is a vast surface bounded by 
lines of cliffs and by the sea; the cliffs are precipitous, and he who is so 
fool-hardy as to stand on the brink will lose all control of himself and 
be compelled to cast himself therefrom into the abyss below. The sea 
is also bounded by lines of cliffs in the same manner. 
Above is night, and between the land and sea below and the night 
above there is a great dome-shaped space. The firmament is the side, 
face, or surface of the night. To'-gwum is night — both the night of space 
and the night of time. (And just here let me remark that it would 
be very interesting indeed, to show how the Indian often confuses 
time and space.) Pai'-av means face, side, or vertical surface. So 
we have mu-kwa-ni-kunt pai'-av, the face of the cliff or wall, and we also 
have to'-gwum pai'-av, the face of the night, meaning the sky or appar- 
ent firmament. The edge of the sky rests upon the sea or brink of the 
cliffs ; but these are so irregular that there are many places where the 
people may fall through into the abyss below. This boundary of the 
land and sea — the lower edge of the sides of the night, the horizon — is 
called kung-war-ru. They give no account for the origin or making of 
the sun, but they have a host of mythological stories giving the reason 
why the sun, a god, and a great god, who should have a will of his 
own, is yet compelled to travel by a definite trail along the face of the 
night. Others give the origin of the moon. 
I was greatly puzzled for a time as to the true character of their be- 
lief concerning the stars, and it is not usually very well defined, but in 
general terms I will Sjay that the stars are translated personages, either 
gods or men, transferred from earth to the face of the night, where they 
are compelled to travel in appointed ways. They distinguish between 
individual stars themselves and groups of stars or constellations. 
