During my visit to the Southwest, in the summer of 1885, it was my good
fortune to arrive at the Navajo Reservation a few days before the
commencement of a Navajo healing ceremonial. Learning of the preparation
for this, I decided to remain and observe the ceremony, which was to
continue nine days and nights. The occasion drew to the place some 1,200
Navajos. The scene of the assemblage was an extensive plateau near the
margin of Keam's Canyon, Arizona.
A variety of singular and interesting occurrences attended this great
event--mythologic rites, gambling, horse and foot racing, general
merriment, and curing the sick, the latter being the prime cause of the
gathering. A man of distinction in the tribe was threatened with loss of
vision from inflammation of the eyes, having looked upon certain masks
with an irreligious heart. He was rich and had many wealthy relations,
hence the elaborateness of the ceremony of healing. A celebrated theurgist
was solicited to officiate, but much anxiety was felt when it was learned
that his wife was pregnant. A superstition prevails among the Navajo that
a man must not look upon a sand painting when his wife is in a state of
gestation, as it would result in the loss of the life of the child. This
medicine man, however, came, feeling that he possessed ample power within
himself to avert such calamity by administering to the child immediately
after its birth a mixture in water of all the sands used in the painting.
As I have given but little time to the study of Navajo mythology, I can
but briefly mention such events as I witnessed, and record the myths only
so far as I was able to collect them hastily. I will first describe the
ceremony of Yebitchai and give then the myths (some complete and others
incomplete) explanatory of the gods and genii figuring in the Hasjelti
Dailjis (dance of Hasjelti) and in the nine days' ceremonial, and then
others independent of these. The ceremony is familiarly called among the
tribe, "Yebitchai," the word meaning the giant's uncle. The name was
originally given to the ceremonial to awe the children who, on the eighth
day of the ceremony, are initiated into some of its mysteries and then for
the first time are informed that the characters appearing in the ceremony
are not real gods, but only their representatives. There is good reason
for believing that their ideas in regard to the sand paintings were
obtained from the Pueblo tribes, who in the past had elaborated sand
paintings and whose work at present in connection with most of their
medicine ceremonies is of no mean order. The Mission Indians of southern
California also regard sand paintings as among the important features in
their medicine practices. While the figures of the mythical beings
represented by the Navajo are no doubt of their own conception, yet I
discovered that all their medicine tubes and offerings were similar to
those in use by the Zuñi. Their presence among the Navajo can be readily
explained by the well known fact that it was the custom among Indians of
different tribes to barter and exchange medicine songs, ceremonies, and
the paraphernalia accompanying them. The Zuñi and Tusayan claim that the
Navajo obtained the secrets of the Pueblo medicine by intruding upon their
ceremonials or capturing a pueblo, and that they appropriated whatever
suited their fancy.
[Illustration: Figure 115]
FIG. 115. Exterior lodge.
My explanation of the ceremonial described is by authority of the priest
doctor who managed the whole affair and who remained with me five days
after the ceremonial for this special purpose. Much persuasion was
required to induce him to stay, though he was most anxious that we should
make no mistake. He said:
My wife may suffer and I should be near her; a father's eyes
should be the first to look upon his child; it is like sunshine in
the father's heart; the father also watches his little one to see
the first signs of understanding, and observes the first steps of
his child, that too is a bright light in the father's heart, but
when the little one falls, it strikes the father's heart hard.
The features of this ceremonial which most surprise the white spectator
are its great elaborateness, the number of its participants and its
prolongation through many days for the purpose of restoring health to a
single member of the tribe.