SHRINES OF THE SACRED PLACES
When new things cast shadows across the Indian mind, every cloud
touching the moon is watched at its birth and at its first hours of
the circle, also the stars. And for those other worlds,--the
planets--is it their brotherhood to the earth that is sealed by a
living sacrifice as they come and as they pass again from the visible
path in the sky?
The Reader of the Stars lives often above the mists of the earth dews.
The door of the high priest Po-Ahtun-ho faces the way of the South
that the shadows of the moon and the shadows also of the sun, make
reckonings for him of that which must be noted. So it has been since
ancient days.
But for the Reader of the Stars there is a door not like another door;
even to the stranger who runs as in a race, the house of the stars is
seen and noted, and known as the sacred place for high prayer, and the
record of the God things.
In Pu-yé the Ancient--and the deserted through centuries, the
dwellings of high priests are marked beyond shadow of doubt, and each
Te-hua man knows as well the dwelling of the Ruler of five centuries
ago in Pu-yé, as he knows the door of his own brother across the court
of the village. And the door of the stars is still beautiful there in
Pu-yé.
Day time or night time the lines of ancient dwellings look ghost-like
in their whiteness. Only medicine men with prayer rites ever sit
alone in the deserted rooms. The men from the river villages on the
way for the pine of the hills used in their sacred dances, do halt to
scatter prayer meal at sacred places where the water once ran:--there
is ever the hope that if prayers enough are thought, the springs in
the Mother Mountain may make fertile again the fields of the high
levels,--for in the days of the carving of Pu-yé from the white cliffs
there were certainly many streams and wide harvests in the land that
is called now the desert lands.
And to the west is Tse-c[=o]me-u-piñ, the sacred mountain where the
lightning plays, and westward also, but not so far, is the Cave of the
Hunters where prayers are made to the Trues--the guardian spirits of
the Sacred Ways, and the wild things of the forest, symbolizing sacred
ways and sacred colors. These places of prayer and of sacrifices are
here to-day--and the way to them is marked by the symbols of stars and
of planets--many eyes see them--but the readers of them are not so
many to-day. A Te-hua man will tell you they are the forgotten records
of the Lost Others--and will sprinkle prayer meal craftily to make
amends for the truth which is half a lie. The unspoken pagan gods of
the Lost Others have endless life, and eternal youth, in the land.
All is as it was in the ancient day, except that the dwellings have
changed from the ancient places, and the priests go over more ground
to reach the high places of prayer.
In the valley of the P[=o]-s[=o]n-gé many vigils were kept through the
nights of the Springtime, as messages from the south brought word of
the steady, and thus far, harmless advance of the white strangers. The
treachery at Tiguex in the day of Coronado was a keen memory. It
would take much wisdom to avoid war with the iron men of the white
god, yet keep their own wives and daughters for their own tribe.
Many arrows were made--also spears and shields. Men went hunting and
women dried the meat, pounding it into shreds for the war trail if
need be. From earliest dawn were heard the grinding songs as the
corn of yellow and blue and red and white was ground by the maidens
keeping time to the ancient carols--and ever above the head of the
worker was hung the sacred and unhusked ear, which, when resting,
she contemplated, kneeling, and the thought in her heart must be
the sacredness of the life-giving grain, and the prayer of thanks
that it was given by the gods to the people.
Tahn-té, going from the river bath of the dawn, crossed the terrace of
Yahn Tsyn-deh, and caught brief glance of her face thus lifted above
the grinding stone. The steadiness of the quiet prayer was contrast
decided, compared with the last wild prayer she had come to make at
his feet:--begging for magic of any nature since the laws of the clans
forbade that she be wife to her cousin to whom she had given love.
Almost he halted, moved in his mind to speak to the girl who had
been more of comrade than had any other woman. But he remembered the
evil prayer she had spoken that day, and this was not a time to
give to thought of her anger. It was bad to have the evil wish of a
woman, but to the other man must go the cares of the village loves and
hates. All things had worked together to make him the wearer of the
white robe--to place him outside the lines of village joys or
sorrows,--his every demand was for vision of the strongly felt, yet
unseen powers. Was he the son of a god?--as in the heart of him he
still thought:--then to him belonged the fasting and the prayer of
tribal penance, and the loves and the hates of the children of
Te-hua were luxuries not for him. He was enemy to no man--and he
could be lover to no woman!
[Illustration: YAHN AT THE GRINDING STONE _Page 112_]
The old men of his own orders had taught him much of the strength of
magic which comes only to the priest who seeks no earthly mate. But
the ten years of study of the white man's magic as spoken in their
books of their gods, had taught him more. He had been witness that
their gods were strong for war, and for worldly power. His people had
need of all that power if the strangers came again and again like this
into the country of the P[=o]-s[=o]n-gé.
The picture of Yahn, kneeling by the fireplace on the terrace, her
eyes lifted to the sacred corn, brought quickly to him the memory of a
more childish Yahn who was not unhappy even in her wars.
And now--through the madness, which he was warned came to all men--now
she was a woman through that madness:--and a forsaken woman whom all
Te-hua watched for the revenge she would take.
They knew Ka-yemo could not marry with the daughter of his uncle, but
they knew also that he could not be driven into taking the daughter of
another man as wife,--and Yahn knew this also. Many robes, and blue
jewels had weighed down the love of a boyhood!
Tahn-té thought of this, and of the girl, as he passed through the
village to his own dwelling. Other maids greeted him, and followed him
with kindly eyes. By all women Tahn-té was told in many ways that the
wearer of the white robe need not live in a lonely house!
Yet he was not lonely, and when the marvels of the inviting eyes
turned towards him, he was always conscious of an ideal presence as if
the god-maid of the mesa had stepped between, and made harmless the
sorcery of the village daughters by which he might otherwise have been
enveloped.
Once, when he had confessed as much to the ancient Ruler who had been
his guide and guardian, the old man had voiced approval and
interpreted clearly for him the dream presence which was as a gift of
the gods, and clearly marked him for other loves than that of an earth
maid.
"But--if the dreams came like a maid also--but a maid so fine that it
was as a star--or a flower--or a prayer made human--then--"
"It is like that?" asked the old man, and the boy answered:
"Sometimes it seems like that--but not when I awake. Only in my sleep
does she come close, yet that dream has kept guard for me many days
until the others laugh and say I have no eyes to see a woman, I do
see--but--"
"That is well--it is best of all!" said K[=a]-ye-fah, the Ruler. "If
my own child had come back to me I might not have said it is well. My
heart would have wanted to see your children and the children of
K[=a]-ye-povi--I dreamed of that through many harvests--but it is over
now. She did not live. The trader of robes from the Yutah brought that
word, and it is better that way. I was dying because my daughter would
be slave to Navahu men--and when word comes that she died as a little
child, then the sun is shining for me again, and I live again. But
always when I think that the little child could be a woman, then it is
good to think that your children could be her children. Since it is
so--so let it be! The dream maid of the spirit flower, and of the
star, can be my K[=a]-ye-povi, and you will have the mate no other
earth eyes can ever see, and your nights and your days will not be
lonely. Also it will be that your prayers be double strong."
From that day of talk, the dream maid of Tahn-té had been a more
tangible presence--never a woman--never quite that, but in the smile
of certain children he caught swift glimpse of her face and then music
rang in the rustle of the corn or the rush of the river. When the
dream vision was beyond all measure sweet, he was certain of the
wisdom of the Ancient--for the dream and the thoughts of prayer were
double strong.
They were double strong that morning as he came from the river bath,
and the face of Yahn--and the thought of her love--brought strangely
that dream face to him in which there was no madness such as the
Apache had shown him when at his feet in prayer.
The tombé sounded softly from a far terrace where special prayer was
being made for the growing things, gray doves fluttered home with food
to their young, and little brown children--not so much clothed as the
birds!--climbed ladders to look in the dove cotes on his roof, and see
the nurslings there lift clamoring mouths for worms or other
treasure.
A woman weaving a blanket of twisted skins of rabbits worked in the
open with her primitive loom in an arbor before her door, beside her a
man whirled a distaff and spun the coarse hemp of which the warp was
made. Maids and mothers with water jars on their heads walked in
stately file from a spring near the river's edge--and above all the
serene accustomed life of that Indian village, could be heard the
drone of the grinding songs--in the valley of P[=o]-s[=o]n-gé there
was ever corn for the grinding, and the time of hunger had come not
often to Povi-whah.
Tahn-té felt a certain consciousness of the great content to which the
grinding songs and the steady beat of the prayer drum made music. He
knew better than the others, the worth of that peace, and quiet
plenty, for to the south he had seen hunger stalk in the trail of the
white conquerors, and no woman weaving a robe could be sure that it
would ever keep her children from the cold. The men of iron had
entered doors as they chose and carried thence all manner of things
pleasing to their fancy.
But the life of Povi-whah was a different life, and Tahn-té was glad
often to know that it was his land. The great medicine Mesa of the
Hearts stood like a guardian straight to the east and at morning its
shadow touched the terraces.
Strange mystic rites belonged to that place where the Ancient Others
had made high sacrifice. Great medicine was there for the healing of
all the nations--and the secret of it was with the gods. He was glad
as he looked at it that it was so close to his own people--if a day of
need should come they would have the sacred place more close than any
other people.
As he breathed a prayer and walked to his own door he met Po-tzah who
was the Feeder of the Wind that fanned the Wheat. He was the first boy
friend of Tahn-té in the valley and always their regard had been
kind.
"This is a time of much striving and I am glad to see you, and see
you here at my door," said Tahn-té the Ruler. "You come from the
ceremonial bath after a night of prayer. I go from the bath for the
making of many days and many nights of prayer. If my mother should
return before I come down from the mountains--"
"She will be in the house of my wife, and she will be as our mother,"
said Po-tzah his friend and clansman.
"Thanks that it is so in your heart," and Tahn-té took the hand of his
friend and breathed upon it. "My mother must not hear much talk of any
trouble to come. If she thought there was danger she would not go from
me, and in council it is decided that when the men of iron come into
the valley, the young wives and the little maids must live for a
season in the ruins of the wide fields of old, and my mother--the
'Woman of the Twilight' is to be the keeper of them there, and they
must not be seen of the strangers."
"They take many wives--if they find them--and are strongest?" asked
Po-tzah thinking of his own wife of a year, and the little brown babe
in its cradle of willow wands swung from the ceiling of their home.
Tahn-té smiled mockingly.
"Their priest will tell you they take but one. But their book where
their god speaks, gives to all his favorites many wives, and helps his
favorites to get them with fighting and much cunning, and in the days
when I was with the christian men who said prayers to that god, I saw
them always live as the book said--and not as Padre Luis said. That
man was a good man--a better man than his book--He was good enough to
be Indian--for that is what the Castilians call us--and all our
brother tribes."
"They call us the same as the Apache or the Hopi people?" asked
Po-tzah in wonder. "Why do they that?"
"The Ancient Father in the Sky has not wished them to know who we are.
He has darkened their minds when they tried to see. They are very
proud--that people! All they saw that was good in the villages, they
argued long about. They are sure that some of their tribe in some
older day did find our fathers and teach our people,--in what other
way could we know to spin and weave, and live in good houses!"
The Priest of the prayers to the mighty Wind of the Four Ways laughed
at the very curious ideas of the white strangers.
"Perhaps they taught our fathers also to eat when they were hungered
and take wives when the time came!" he scoffed.
While they spoke, Ka-yemo crossed a terrace and halted to look at
them, and Po-tzah commented on the fine beads now worn by Ka-yemo
since he had taken a wife--but Po-tzah thought the wife very ugly and
very stupid, and he would rather see his own wife even if her father
had been a cripple and a poor man,--and the girl have never a garment
but a poor one of her own making.
"Ka-yemo is the most beautiful man in the village," said Tahn-té,--"He
has fine looks plenty for one house."
"Tahn-té"--and his friend came more close and spoke softly, "you are
Po-Ahtun-ho, and you know wise things and many things. Do you know
enough to care nothing that Ka-yemo and his friends are not your
friends?"
[Illustration: KA-YEMO _Page 118_]
"Why is it that you think in such a way?" asked Tahn-té quietly.
"He knows the white strangers will deal with one man of the tribe if
they come,--and that will be honor for that man. He knows the words of
the strangers. If you were not the most wise he would be chosen to
make all talks, and he would be a great man. Not much has he
said;--but his friends say things! Already they ask what magic touched
the old men when you were made ruler. They say the Po-Ahtun-ho for all
time was born in the place where he says prayers."
"And I was not born in this place," said Tahn-té, as he looked at the
river valley, and remembered the desert sands of Tusayan, and the
island of rock on which he had lived and been happy once. "It is true,
Po-tzah. But the people forget when they say no other Ruler was born
apart from his people. Po-se-yemo came from a cave in the cliff. He
came down from the mountain to the people. He taught them to listen to
mountain thoughts. I come from a rock in the desert, and the old men
say I brought the Sign that the god made my way. We are yet young,
Po-tzah, when we are older we will know whether the way of the gods is
the way for this people. I know the words of Ka-yemo--but they are not
to be talked of. Alone I go to face the Ancient Father--Sinde-hési. I
go to the mountain of the Stone Face--I go to dance the dance for
ancient wisdom. The old men know that the time has come for that."
"Alone? No one in our day has danced alone before the faces! No one
has danced in that place since the time of the fire across the sky,
and that dancer did not live. You can dance there--Tahn-té?"
"I can dance there--By the arrow I have said it."
His friend looked at him with a strange new regard. Each knew what it
meant to be chosen for that dance of the ancient days.
There are two things a man may not do and have breath to live. The
sacred arrow is held aloft when an oath is made. If the thing which he
has told is a false thing the Sun Father gives lightening to the
arrow, and the man of the oath speaks no more, and lives no more. He
dies there in that place. All Te-hua men can tell you that is how it
is. No one asks another to make an oath.
Also no one asks a medicine man to dance before the ancient picture of
the stone in the hills. Only the unmated can dance there. It is the
dance to the Supreme Father who is named not often. He is that One who
gives earth creatures to the world without earth matings. Thus
Po-se-yemo, the mountain god, was given to a maid as her child, and
only the eagles and the shadow of the piñon tree knew. He also gave
the two sons of wonder to the Apache goddess who slept on the mountain
alone under the shadow of a rock reaching out. Water dripped from that
rock and brought the birth dream, and the dream came true there in
Apache land. Those two sons became the divine warriors. You can see
to-day the giants who were demons and who were slain by those two sons
who worked together for good on earth. The blood of the giants flowed
through long valleys and turned to stone, and the heads of the giants
are also stone now, and lie where they were severed from their bodies
in the land of Navahu. Thus it has always been when the Ancient Father
has sent the God-Thought to the earth. Only the Wind, or the Sun, or
the Mist of the Cloud has been mate to the mother. Yet the sons have
been strong for magic and works of wonder.
Thus there has been through the ages, one sacred place where men may
go for highest medicine--if they go before it is not too late!
Not since these two men were born had a man danced there, and the last
man who did so had danced without the truth or the faith in his heart.
No one ever knew if he found great medicine dreams, for he died there.
After many days they went--and they found him dead.
"Yes:--it is so," said Tahn-té the Ruler as he met the eyes of his
friend. "All may know that I go to the fast, and the dance, and that I
dance for them. It will be told from the house tops to-night, but when
it is told I will have reached the hills."
"I may not dance, but I also will fast, and I will work with you,"
said Po-tzah. "Others will work with you when they know. Speak for our
children to the god!"
Then he breathed on the hand of Tahn-té who was to do high work and
high penance for the tribe, and Tahn-té felt glad music in his heart
because of the words of his friend, and when he laid aside his white
robe and left his house, he spoke to no other man, but went silent to
the shrine on the mesa where the Arrow-Stone clan build the signal
fire to the mountain god in the night time. There he said the prayers
which were long prayers, and the people who had noted him as he passed
(nude but for the girdle and the downy breath feathers of the eagle)
halted at their work among the corn and the melon vines and watched
him at the shrine. From the terraced roofs also the women turned from
their weaving, or the shaping of pottery, and looked after the tall
bronze figure girded, and white plumed. They could see his
wide-stretched hands scatter the sacred meal of prayer, and then they
saw only a brown runner on the mesa outlined against the western sky.
He had entered the ceremonial run in which there is no moment of rest
from the mesa of the river to the mountains of the pine.