The life of the Indian is one vast and glittering mosaic of rite and
ritual. His warfare, his dress, his medicine, his ceremonies, his wooing,
and his dying are all of them expressive of a dominant idea that pervades
his life and controls his purpose. He lives constantly and absorbingly in
a mystic land. He is beckoned by unseen hands and is lured into the
realms of mystery by the challenge of voices silent to all other ears.
His dress is studded with resplendent colours significant of the green
earth, the blue sky, and the cry of his soul for a place in the great
beyond. Like the high priest of old, he wears on his breast the fiery
filaments of his faith.
The Indian sits in the tabernacle of the mighty forest or on the heights
of some deserted and wind-swept mesa, beats his tomtom or drones song upon
song, prays to the Great Mystery, pleads with the fires of the sun to give
him strength and life and health, and calls the sun his father. The
whispering winds tell his tale to the clouds. He peers into the depths of
the stars, watches the aurora as the death dance of the spirits, answers
the high call of the thunder as the voice of the Great Mystery, utters the
cry of his soul to the lightnings—the arrows of taowity—communes with the
rivers and the lakes, the moon, and the legion of wild beasts, and all of
it with a pitiful longing that his days of fasting and his vicarious
devotion may bring upon his life and his tribe the favour of the gods.
These primitive men hold time and money and ambition as nothing. But a
dream, or a cloud in the sky, or a bird flying across the trail from the
wrong direction, or a change of the wind will challenge their deepest
thoughts. To the Indian mind all signs are symbolic. Their ceremonies
are as complicated as any of ancient Hebrew or Greek tradition. The
Indian aspires to be a great hunter, he seeks fame as a noble warrior; he
struggles for the eagle feathers of distinction, but his greatest longing
is to become a Medicine Man and know the Great Mystery. All medicine
people of the tribes carry on their necks, or in a pouch at the belt, some
sacred thing used in their magic practices—the claw of a bear, the rattle
of a snake, a bird’s wing, the tooth of an elk, a bit of tobacco. Every
Indian carries his individual medicine, and his medicine is good or bad
according to his success. If he finds a feather at wrong angle in his
path, his medicine is bad for that day. The Indian fasts and dances and
chants, using his mind, his spirit, and his body as pliable instruments in
the making of his prayer. He finds in the veritable exhaustion of his
body the spirit path made clear for his dreams, until the very stars seem
as the eyes of the gods, and the sighing of the pines comes to him as the
rustle of eagle wings to bear his spirit to loftier realms. Instead of
the common acceptation that the Indian has no religion whatever, every
single act of his life carries with it some ceremonial function, and his
whole being is surrounded by a shining host of ceremonial spirits. The
Indian goes with prayer thoughts to the water. His bath is a sacrament.
He cuts the long supple willow withes that grow on the banks of the
stream, enters the sharpened end into the soil, bends and ties the
feathery tops into an arch; over the arches thus made he throws his
blankets; meanwhile, gathered stones have been heated in the burning fire.
These stones glowing white with heat are placed in a tiny pit underneath
the covering of this booth, now to be called his sweat bath. First one
stone until four have been counted are placed by the attendant in the pit,
and then the fiery pile is thrown in promiscuous fashion on the heap. The
Indians enter the closed covering, the ceremonial pipe is smoked, a gourd
of cold water is handed to each; they then disrobe, the attending priest
lowering the blanket over the entrance. Cold water is then poured over
the heated stones, filling the enclosure with steam. In silence they
commune with the Great Mystery until one of their number is blessed with a
vision; then a call is made and the attendant lifts the blanket, almost
immediately lowering it again. This action is repeated until the vision
has been vouchsafed four times, when they all come forth and plunge into
the river. These sweat baths are always located on the banks of a flowing
stream. The Indian sees in every ripple of the flashing water that comes
to meet him a shining token of the medicine he has seen in his vision.
They then repair to the wigwam and listen in solemn silence to the
chanting cadences of the Indian who has been favoured.
[The Voice of the Water Spirits]