Part 12 (1/2)
Another had a buffalo skull hung to the thong pa.s.sed through his back, and danced until the weight of the skull tore out the thong. From a pole hung eight thongs; one man took two of these and pa.s.sed them through his cuts and fastened them; he then hung back and looked upward at the sun. Other men, who did not take part in the dance itself, sat near the sun pole, and with new knives cut bits of flesh from their shoulders and held them up to the sun pole. Sometimes a man took his horse with him into the dancing lodge. His chest was pierced in two places and thongs from the pole were inserted; he was then tied to his horse, and the animal was whipped up.
The thongs were thus suddenly jerked and the flesh torn.
[Ill.u.s.tration.]
Tortures of the Mandan Sun Dance. (After Catlin.)
These are only a few of the dreadful things that have been told of sun-dance tortures. They are taken from a description given by an Indian named George Bushotter. He not only described the dance, but drew a curious lot of rude pictures showing it.
Years before, George Catlin saw the sun dance of the Mandans, and left four terrible pictures of it. The celebration at that time among the Mandans exceeded in the horror of its tortures that which we have described.
While these tortures were going on in the dancing lodge, all sorts of things were being done outside. The old women danced. Songs were sung in honor of the young men. Children were gathered together and their ears were pierced. Presents were given away. A double fence of poles connected the house of preparation and the dance house, and upon it objects of all kinds were hung. These were free gifts to any one who chose to take them.
From the time the sacred tree was set up until the dance was over, the young men taking part fasted and took no drink. While they suffered, and as they gazed at the sun or lifted up their hands toward it, they continually prayed, saying, ”Please pity me; bring to pa.s.s the things I desire.” When all was over, the young men were taken home, and each was given four sips of water and a bit of food. A little later they might eat all they liked. Then they went into the sweat lodge. They were now through, and ever after might boast of having danced to Wakantanka.
J. OWEN DORSEY.-Missionary, ethnologist. Was connected with the Bureau of Ethnology. Wrote many papers, one of which is _Siouan Cults_.
XXIV. THE PUEBLOS.
The most interesting Indians of the Southwest are the Pueblos, so called from their habit of living in towns. The word Pueblo is Spanish, and means a village or town. More than three hundred years ago the Spaniards, exploring northward from Mexico, found these cl.u.s.ters of industrious Indians living in their quaint towns. They conquered them and brought them missionaries. They taught them their beautiful language, and even to-day Spanish is spoken in all the pueblos in addition to the native Indian tongue. When the Spaniards entered New Mexico there were more than one hundred pueblos; to-day there are about twenty. Most of these are in New Mexico, but seven, the Moki towns, are in Arizona.
The home of the Pueblos is a wonderful land. It is a country of desert, of flat-topped _mesas_, of sharp-pinnacled crests, of broad valleys, and deep and narrow canons. It is a land where the sky is almost always blue, and where the air is clear. There are but few streams, and every spring is precious. The people always built near water, and selected some spot in a valley where there was room for the corn-fields.
The largest of the present pueblos is Zuni, in New Mexico. Some years ago a white man, Frank Cus.h.i.+ng, went to Zuni and lived for a long time there to learn about the life and customs of the Pueblo Indians. They were kind to him, at first taking him into their own houses, and later allowing him a little house by himself. Since Mr. Cus.h.i.+ng went to live at Zuni, a number of other persons have lived at other pueblos, so that we know a good deal about them now.
[Ill.u.s.tration.]
View of Pueblo: Taos, N. M. (From Photograph.)
In former times a pueblo consisted of one great house, or, at most, of a few great houses, each the home of a large number of people. Taos, in northern New Mexico, is, perhaps, as old-fas.h.i.+oned as any of the pueblos now occupied. Even to-day it consists almost entirely of two large houses, one on each side of the little Taos River. The houses are so built that the flat roofs of the different stories form a set of steps as one looks at them from in front. In a three-story building the lower floor would have three sets of rooms, one in front of another. The roof of the front line of rooms would form a flat platform in front of the front rooms of the second story, which consisted only of two lines of rooms. The roof of the front line of these, in turn, was a platform in front of the single line of third-story rooms. Formerly there were no doors in the lower rooms, but ladders were placed against the wall, and persons climbed up on the roof; then through a hole in the roof, by means of another ladder they climbed down into the room. By ladders from the roof of the first floor they climbed to the top of the second story; there were doors in the rooms of the second and third stories. Nowadays there are usually doors into the lower rooms, but they still use ladders for getting into the upper stories.
The people are fond of sitting on the house-tops as they work. There they spin, sh.e.l.l corn, cut and dry squashes, shape pottery vessels, etc. There they gather in crowds when there are dances in the pueblo, and when there are foot races or pony races.
The walls of these houses are built of stone covered over with adobe mud, or of sun-dried adobe bricks. They did not formerly have what we would call windows, but there were small openings in the walls for air, or for peepholes. In the pueblos of to-day we find true sashes with gla.s.s in a few of the houses. There are also some rather old rooms that have windows made of ”isingla.s.s” or gypsum, a mineral found in the mountains, which can be split into thin sheets, which are transparent. The chimneys in these houses are made of broken water-jars laid up, one on another, and the joints plastered with mud.
[Ill.u.s.tration.]
Pueblo Pottery. (From Originals in Peabody Museum.)
The Pueblo Indians are industrious. The men have to attend to their fields, their orchards of peaches and apricots, and their flocks and herds. The women tend the gardens, make pottery and baskets, and prepare the food. Men are also weavers of blankets and belts. The produce of the fields is chiefly corn, but some wheat is also raised. Considerable crops are made of watermelons, muskmelons, squashes, and gourds. The most important domestic animals are ponies, the little donkeys called _burros_, and goats. Near the pueblos are always several enclosures built of poles set in the ground, called _corrals_. These are for the animals, and one kind only is usually kept in one corral. The Indian boys have great fun at evening when the burros are brought home from pasture and put into the corral. They go in among them and play until dark with the patient little beasts. They climb up on to them and ride, push, pull, and tease them.
Early the next morning the whole herd is taken out to pasture by two or three boys, whose work it is to stay with them all day.
[Ill.u.s.tration.]
Estufa at Cochiti, N. M. (From Photograph.)
A visitor to a pueblo would be sure to notice the _estufas_. These differ with the pueblo, but the characteristic Rio Grande pueblo type is a large, round, single-roomed, flat-topped building. They are smoothly coated outside with adobe clay. A flight of steps leads to the roof, and a long ladder projecting through a hole in the roof leads down to the inside. The floor of the estufa is considerably lower than the ground outside. Years ago, before the Spanish priests taught the Indians our ideas of family life, all the men and large boys slept in the estufa at night, while the women and little children slept in the big houses. Nowadays the estufas are somewhat mysterious places where the dancers practice for the great dances, and where, on the day of celebration, they dress and ornament for the event.