{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_53532/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_53532","id":"gutenberg_53532","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/53532","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - American","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Sociology","Indians of North America"],"text":"[Transcriber\u2019s Note:\n\nItalicized text delimited by underscores.\n\nThis project uses utf-8 encoded characters. If some characters are not\nreadable, check your settings of your browser to ensure you have a\ndefault font installed that can display utf-8 characters.]\n\n\n\n\n  WHAT THE WHITE RACE MAY\n  LEARN FROM THE INDIAN\n\n\n  BOOKS BY GEORGE WHARTON JAMES\n\n\nWhat the White Race May Learn from the Indian.\nIn and Around the Grand Canyon.\nIndians of the Painted Desert Region.\nIn and Out of the Old Missions of California.\nThe Wonders of the Colorado Desert.\nThe Story of Scraggles.\nIndian Basketry.\nHow to Make Indian and Other Baskets.\nTravelers\u2019 Handbook to Southern California.\nThe Beacon Light.\n\n[Illustration: GROUP OF HOPI MAIDENS AND AN OLD MAN AT MASHONGANAVI.]\n\n\n\n\n  What the White Race May\n  Learn from the Indian\n\n\n  BY\n\n  GEORGE WHARTON JAMES\n\n  AUTHOR OF \u201cIN AND AROUND THE GRAND CANYON,\u201d \u201cINDIAN BASKETRY,\u201d \u201cHOW\n  TO MAKE INDIAN AND OTHER BASKETS,\u201d \u201cPRACTICAL BASKET MAKING,\u201d\n  \u201cTHE INDIANS OF THE PAINTED DESERT REGION,\u201d \u201cTRAVELERS\u2019 HANDBOOK\n  TO SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA,\u201d \u201cIN AND OUT OF THE OLD\n  MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA,\u201d \u201cTHE STORY OF SCRAGGLES,\u201d\n  \u201cTHE WONDERS OF THE COLORADO DESERT,\u201d \u201cTHROUGH\n  RAMONA\u2019S COUNTRY,\u201d \u201cLIVING THE RADIANT\n  LIFE,\u201d \u201cTHE BEACON LIGHT,\u201d ETC.\n\n  [Illustration]\n\n\n  CHICAGO\n  FORBES & COMPANY\n  1908\n\n  COPYRIGHT, 1908\n  BY\n  EDITH E. FARNSWORTH\n\n\n  The Lakeside Press\n  R. R. DONNELLEY & SONS COMPANY\n  CHICAGO\n\n[Illustration: WHAT THE WHITE RACE MAY LEARN FROM THE INDIAN]\n\n\n\n\nFOREWORD\n\n\nI would not have it thought that I commend indiscriminately everything\nthat the Indian does and is. There are scores of things about the\nIndian that are reprehensible and to be avoided. Most Indians smoke,\nand to me the habit is a vile and nauseating one. Indians often wear\nfilthy clothes. They are often coarse in their acts, words, and their\nhumor. Some of their habits are repulsive. I have seen Indian boys\nand men maltreat helpless animals until my blood has boiled with an\nindignation I could not suppress, and I have taken the animals away\nfrom them. They are generally vindictive and relentless in pursuit of\ntheir enemies. They often content themselves with impure and filthy\nwater when a little careful labor would give them a supply of fairly\ngood water.\n\nIndeed, in numerous things and ways I have personally seen the Indian\nis not to be commended, but condemned, and his methods of life avoided.\nBut because of this, I do not close my eyes to the many good things\nof his life. My reason is useless to me unless it teaches me what to\naccept and what to reject, and he is kin to fool who refuses to accept\ngood from a man or a race unless in everything that man or race is\nperfect. There is no perfection, in man at least, on earth, and all the\ngood I have ever received from human beings has been from imperfect men\nand women. So I fully recognize the imperfections of the Indian while\ntaking lessons from him in those things that go to make life fuller,\nricher, better.\n\nNeither must it be thought that everything here said of the Indians\nwith whom I have come in contact can be said of all Indians. Indians\nare not all alike any more than white men and women are all alike. One\ncan find filthy, disgusting slovens among white women, yet we do not\ncondemn all white women on the strength of this indisputable fact. So\nwith Indians. Some are good, some indifferent, some bad. In dealing\nwith them as a race, a people, therefore, I do as I would with my own\nrace, I take what to me seem to be racial characteristics, or in other\nwords, the things that are manifested in the lives of the best men and\nwomen, and which seem to represent their habitual aims, ambitions, and\ndesires.\n\nThis book lays no claim to completeness or thoroughness. It is merely\nsuggestive. The field is much larger than I have gleaned over. The\nchapters of which the book is composed were written when away from\nworks of reference, and merely as transcripts of the remembrances\nthat flashed through my mind at the time of writing. Yet I believe in\neverything I have said I have kept strictly within the bounds of truth,\nand have written only that which I personally know to be fact.\n\nThe original articles from which these pages have been made were\nwritten in various desultory places,--on the cars, while traveling\nbetween the Pacific and the Atlantic, on the elevated railways of the\nmetropolis, standing at the desk of my New York friend in his office on\nBroadway, even in the woods of Michigan and in the depths of the Grand\nCanyon. Two of the new chapters were written at the home of my friend\nBass, at Bass Camp, Grand Canyon, but the main enlargement and revision\nhas occurred at Santa Clara College, the site of the Eighth Mission\nin the Alta California chain of Franciscan Missions. The bells of the\nMission Church have hourly rung in my ears, and the Angelus and other\ncalls to prayer have given me sweet memories of the good old padres\nwho founded this and the other missions, as well as shown me pictures\nof the devoted priests of to-day engaged in their solemn services. I\nhave heard the merry shouts of the boys of this college at their play,\nfor the Jesuits are the educators of the boys of the Catholic Church.\nHere from the precincts of this old mission, I call upon the white race\nto incorporate into its civilization the good things of the Indian\ncivilization; to forsake the injurious things of its pseudo-civilized,\nartificial, and over-refined life, and to return to the simple,\nhealthful, and natural life which the Indians largely lived before and\nafter they came under the dominion of the Spanish padres.\n\nIf all or anything of that which is here presented leads any of my\nreaders to a kinder and more honest attitude of mind towards the\nIndians, then I shall be thankful, and the book will have amply\naccomplished its mission.\n\n  GEORGE WHARTON JAMES.\n\n  SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA, November 27, 1907.\n\n\n\n\n  CONTENTS\n\n\n  CHAPTER                                                  PAGE\n\n  FOREWORD                                                    9\n\n  I. THE WHITE RACE AND ITS TREATMENT OF THE INDIAN          15\n\n  II. THE WHITE RACE AND ITS CIVILIZATION                    28\n\n  III. THE INDIAN AND NASAL AND DEEP BREATHING               39\n\n  IV. THE INDIAN AND OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE                        49\n\n  V. THE INDIAN AND SLEEPING OUT OF DOORS                    70\n\n  VI. THE INDIAN AS A WALKER, RIDER, AND CLIMBER             79\n\n  VII. THE INDIAN IN THE RAIN AND THE DIRT                   93\n\n  VIII. THE INDIAN AND PHYSICAL LABOR                       105\n\n  IX. THE INDIAN AND PHYSICAL LABOR FOR GIRLS AND WOMEN     111\n\n  X. THE INDIAN AND DIET                                    119\n\n  XI. THE INDIAN AND EDUCATION                              130\n\n  XII. THE INDIAN AND HOSPITALITY                           143\n\n  XIII. THE INDIAN AND CERTAIN SOCIAL TRAITS AND CUSTOMS    156\n\n  XIV. THE INDIAN AND SOME LUXURIES                         162\n\n  XV. THE INDIAN AND THE SEX QUESTION                       175\n\n  XVI. THE INDIAN AND HER BABY                              183\n\n  XVII. THE INDIAN AND THE SANCTITY OF NUDITY               197\n\n  XVIII. THE INDIAN AND FRANKNESS                           204\n\n  XIX. THE INDIAN AND REPINING                              207\n\n  XX. THE INDIAN AND THE SUPERFLUITIES OF LIFE              210\n\n  XXI. THE INDIAN AND MENTAL POISE                          217\n\n  XXII. THE INDIAN AND SELF-RESTRAINT                       229\n\n  XXIII. THE INDIAN AND AFFECTATION                         235\n\n  XXIV. THE INDIAN AND ART WORK                             240\n\n  XXV. THE INDIAN AND RELIGIOUS WORSHIP                     250\n\n  XXVI. THE INDIAN AND IMMORTALITY                          259\n\n  XXVII. VISITING THE INDIANS                               265\n\n  XXVIII. CONCLUSION                                        268\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nTHE WHITE RACE AND ITS TREATMENT OF THE INDIAN\n\n\nEver since the white race has been in power on the American continent\nit has regarded the Indian race--and by this I mean all the aboriginal\npeople found here--as its inferiors in every regard. And little by\nlittle upon this hypothesis have grown up various sentiments and\naphorisms which have so controlled the actions of men who never see\nbelow the surface of things, and who have no thought power of their\nown, that our national literature has become impregnated with the\nfiendish conception that \u201cthe only good Indian is the dead Indian.\u201d\nThe exploits of a certain class of scouts and Indian-hunters have been\nlauded in books without number, so that even schoolboys are found each\nyear running away west, each with a belt of cartridges around his waist\nand a revolver in his hip pocket, for the purpose of _hunting Indians_.\nGood men and women, people of the highest character, are found to be\npossessed of an antipathy towards the Indian that is neither moral nor\nchristian. Men of the highest integrity in ordinary affairs will argue\nforcefully and with an apparent confidence in the justice of their plea\nthat the Indian has no rights in this country that we are bound to\nrespect. They are here merely on sufferance, and whatever the United\nStates government does for them is pure and disinterested philanthropy,\nfor which the Indian should be only grateful and humble.\n\nTo me this is a damnable state of affairs. If prior possession entitles\none to any right in land, then the Indian owns the land of the United\nStates by prior right. The so-called argument that because the Indian\nis not wisely _using_ the land, and that therefore he stands in the\nway of progress and must be removed, and further, that we, the people\nof the United States, are the providentially appointed instruments for\nthat removal, is to me so sophistical, so manifestly insincere, so\nhorribly cruel, that I have little patience either to listen or reply\nto it.\n\nIf this be true, what about the vast holders of land whom our laws\ncherish and protect? Are they holding the land for useful and good\npurposes? Are they \u201chelping on the cause of civilization\u201d by their\nmerciless and grasping control of the millions of acres they have\ngenerally so unlawfully and immorally secured? Thousands, nay millions,\nof acres are held by comparatively few men, without one thought for the\ncommon good. The only idea in the minds of these men is the selfish\none: \u201cWhat can I make out of it?\u201d\n\nLet us be honest with ourselves and call things by their proper names\nin our treatment of the weaker race. If the Indian is in the way and\nwe are determined to take his land from him, let us at least be manly\nenough to recognize ourselves as thieves and robbers, and do the act as\nthe old barons of Europe used to do it, by force of arms, fairly and\ncheerfully: \u201cYou have these broad acres: I want them. I challenge you\nto hold them: to the victor belongs the spoils.\u201d Then the joust began.\nAnd he who was the stronger gained the acres and the castle.\n\nLet us go to the Indian and say: \u201cI want your lands, your\nhunting-grounds, your forests, your water-holes, your springs, your\nrivers, your corn-fields, your mountains, your canyons. I need them for\nmy own use. I am stronger than you; there are more of us than there are\nof you. I\u2019ve got to have them. You will have to do with less. I\u2019m going\nto take them;\u201d and then proceed to the robbery. But let us be above the\ncontemptible meanness of calling our theft \u201cbenevolent assimilation,\u201d\nor \u201cmanifest destiny,\u201d or \u201cseeking the higher good of the Indian.\u201d A\nnation as well as a race may do scoundrel acts, but let it not add\nto its other evil the contemptible crime of conscious hypocrisy. The\nunconscious hypocrite is to be pitied as well as shaken out of his\nhypocrisy, but the conscious hypocrite is a stench in the nostrils of\nall honest men and women. The major part of the common people of the\nUnited States have been unconscious of the hypocritical treatment that\nhas been accorded the Indians by their leaders, whether these leaders\nwere elected or appointed officials or self-elected philanthropists and\nreformers. Hence, while I would \u201cshake them up\u201d and make them conscious\nof their share in the nation\u2019s hypocrisy, I have no feeling of\ncondemnation for them. On the other hand, I feel towards the conscious\nhumbugs and hypocrites, who use the Indian as a cloak for their own\nselfish aggrandizement and advancement, as the Lord is said to have\nfelt toward the lukewarm churches when He exclaimed: \u201cI will spew thee\nout of my mouth.\u201d\n\nIn our treatment of the Indian we have been liars, thieves, corrupters\nof the morals of their women, debauchers of their maidens, degraders\nof their young manhood, perjurers, and murderers. We have lied to\nthem about our good, pacific, and honorable intentions; we have made\npromises to them that we never intended to keep--made them simply to\ngain our own selfish and mercenary ends in the easiest possible way,\nand then have repudiated our promises without conscience and without\nremorse. We have stolen from them nearly all they had of lands and\nworldly possessions. Only two or three years ago I was present when a\nHavasupai Indian was arrested for having shot a deer out of season,\ntaken before the courts and heavily fined, when his own father had\nroamed over the region hunting, as his ancestors had done for centuries\nbefore, ere there were any white men\u2019s laws or courts forbidding them\nto do what was as natural for them to do as it was to drink of the\nwater they found, eat of the fruits and berries they passed, or breathe\nthe air as they rode along. The law of the white man in reference to\ndeer and antelope hunting is based upon the selfishness of the white\nman, who in a few generations has slain every buffalo, most of the\nmountain sheep, elk, moose, and left but a comparative remnant of deer\nand antelope. The Indian has never needed such laws. He has always been\nunselfish enough to leave a sufficient number of this wild game for\nbreeding purposes, or, if it was not unselfishness that commanded his\nrestraint, his own self-interest in piling up meat was sacrificed to\nthe general good of his people who required meat also, and must be able\nto secure it each year. Hence, to-day we shut off by law the normal and\nnatural source of meat supply of the Indian, without any consultation\nwith him, and absolutely without recourse or redress, because we\nourselves--the white race--are so unmitigatedly selfish, so mercenary,\nso indifferent to the future needs of the race, that without such law\nwe would kill off all the wild game in a few short years.\n\n[Illustration: A WALLAPAI BASKET WEAVER.]\n\nThen who is there who has studied the Indian and the white man\u2019s\nrelation to him, who does not know of the vile treatment the married\nwomen and maidens alike have received at the hands of the \u201csuperior\u201d\npeople. Let the story of the devilish debaucheries of young Indian\ngirls by Indian agents and teachers be fully written, and even the most\nviolent defamers of Indians would be compelled to hang their heads with\nshame. To those who know, the name of Perris--a southern California\nIndian school--brings up memories of this class of crime that make\none\u2019s blood hot against the white fiend who perpetrated them, and I am\nnow as I write near to the Havasupai reservation in northern Arizona,\nwhere one of the teachers had to leave surreptitiously because of his\ndiscovered immoralities with Indian women and girls. Only a decade ago\nthe name of the Wallapai woman was almost synonymous with immorality\nbecause of the degrading influences of white men, and one of the most\npathetic things I ever heard was the hopeless \u201cWhat can we do about\nit?\u201d of an Indian chief on the Colorado desert, when I spoke to him of\nthe demoralization of the women of his people. In effect his reply was:\n\u201cThe whites have so driven us to the wall that we are often hungry, and\nit is far easier to be immoral than to go hungry.\u201d\n\nThen, read the reports of the various Indian agents throughout the\ncountry who have sought to enforce the laws against whites selling\nliquor to Indians. Officials and courts alike have often been supine\nand indifferent to the Indian\u2019s welfare, and have generally shown\nfar more desire to protect the white man in his \u201cvested interests\u201d\nthan to protect the young men of the Indian tribes against the evil\ninfluences of liquor. Again and again I have been in Indian councils\nand heard the old men declaim against the white man\u2019s fire-water. The\nHavasupais declare it to be _han-a-to-op-o-gi_, \u201cvery bad,\u201d the Navahos\n_da-shon-de_, \u201cof the Evil One,\u201d while one and all insist that their\nyoung men shall be kept from its demoralizing influence. Yet there is\nseldom a _fiesta_ at which some vile white wretch is not willing to\nsell his own soul, and violate the laws of whites and Indians alike,\nin order to gain a little dirty pelf by providing some abominable\ndecoction which he sells as whisky to those whose moral stamina is not\nstrong enough to withstand the temptation.\n\n[Illustration: A SKILLED HOPI BASKET WEAVER.]\n\nAnd as for perjury in our dealings with Indians: read the records of\nbroken treaties, violated pledges, and disregarded vows noted by Helen\nHunt Jackson in her \u201cCentury of Dishonor,\u201d and then say whether the\ncharge is not sustained.\n\nYet, when the Indian has dared to resent the cruel and abominable\ntreatment accorded to him in so many instances and in such fearful\nvariety, he has been called \u201ctreacherous, vindictive, fiendish,\nmurderous,\u201d because, in his just and righteous indignation and wrath,\nhe has risen and determined to slay all he could find of the hated\nwhite race. No doubt his warfare has not always been civilized. Why\nshould it be? How could it be? He is not civilized. He knows nothing of\n\u201cchristian\u201d principles in a war which \u201cchristian\u201d people have forced\nupon him as an act of self-defense. He is a savage, battling with\nsavage ferocity, savage determination, to keep his home, that of his\nancestors, for himself, his children, and their children. Oom Paul\nKruger told the British that if they forced a war upon the Boers for\nthe possession of the Transvaal, they would win it at a price that\nwould \u201cstagger humanity.\u201d Yet thousands of good Americans honored Oom\nPaul for his \u201cbravery,\u201d his \u201cpatriotism,\u201d his \u201cgod-like determination\nto stand for the rights of his people.\u201d But if our Indian does the same\nthing in the defense of his home and slaughters a lot of soldiers sent\nto drive him away, he is guilty of murderous treachery; his killings\nare \u201cmassacres,\u201d and he must be exterminated as speedily as possible.\n\nWho ever hears any other than the term \u201cmassacre\u201d applied to the death\nof Custer and his soldiers? The \u201cCuster massacre\u201d is as \u201cfamiliar\nas household words.\u201d Yet what is a massacre? Webster says: \u201c1. The\nkilling of a considerable number of human beings under circumstances\nof atrocity or cruelty, or contrary to the usages of civilized people.\n2. Murder.\u201d With such definitions in view, look at the facts of the\ncase. I would not have it understood in what I say that I am condemning\nCuster. He was a general under orders, and as a dutiful servant he\nwas endeavoring to carry them out. (The debatable question as to\nwhether he was obeying or disregarding orders I leave for military men\nthemselves to settle.) It is not Custer, or any other one individual,\nthat I am condemning, but the public, national policy. Custer\u2019s army\nwas ordered to proceed against these men, and forcibly remove them from\nthe place they had chosen as their home--and which had been theirs\nfor centuries before a white man ever trod this continent--and take\nthem to a reservation which they disliked, and in the choice of which\ntheir wishes, desires, or comfort had in no way been consulted. The\nwhite soldiers were armed, and it is well known that they intended to\nuse these arms. Could they have come upon the Indians by stealth, or\nby some stratagem, they would have done so without any compunctions\nof conscience, and no one would ever have thought of administering a\nrebuke to them, even though in the fight that would undoubtedly have\nensued every Indian had been slain. It would have been heralded as a\nglorious victory, and we should have thanked God for His goodness in\ndirecting our soldiers in their \u201chonorable\u201d warfare. But unfortunately,\nthe incident turned in another direction. The would-be captors were\nthe caught; the would-be surprisers were the surprised; the would-be\nslayers were the slain. Custer and his band of men, brave and gallant\nas United States soldiers generally are,--and I would resent with heat\nany slanderous remark to the contrary,--were surrounded, surprised, and\nslain to a man.\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK OF INTERESTING DESIGN.]\n\nWeep at the grave of Custer; weep at the graves of his men; weep\nwith the widows and orphans of those suddenly surprised and slain\nsoldiers. My own tears have fallen many a time as I have read and\nreread the details of that awful tragedy; but still, in the weeping\ndo not be dishonest and ungenerous to the victors,--Indians though\nthey were. Upon the testimony of no less an authority than General\nCharles King, who has known the Sioux personally and intimately for\nyears, they were ever the hospitable friends of the white race, until\na post commander,--whose name should be pilloried for the execration\nof the nation,--imbued with the idea that the only good Indian was the\ndead Indian, betrayed and slew in cold blood a number of them who had\ntrusted to his promises and placed themselves in his hands. The result\nwas, that the whole tribe took this slaughter to their own hearts, as\nany true patriots would have done, and from that day to this the major\npart of the Sioux have hated the white race with the undying, bitter\nhatred of the vindictive savage.\n\nAgain and again when I have visited Indian schools the thoughtful\nyouths and maidens have come to me with complaints about the American\nhistory they were compelled to study. In their simple, almost colorless\nway of expressing themselves, a bystander would never dream of the\nfierce anger that was raging within, but which I was too experienced\nin Indian character not to perceive. Listen to what some of them\nhave said: \u201cWhen we read in the United States history of white men\nfighting to defend their families, their homes, their corn-fields,\ntheir towns, and their hunting-grounds, they are always called\n\u2018patriots,\u2019 and the children are urged to follow the example of these\nbrave, noble, and gallant men. But when Indians--our ancestors, even\nour own parents--have fought to defend us and our homes, corn-fields,\nand hunting-grounds they are called vindictive and merciless savages,\nbloody murderers, and everything else that is vile. You are the\nIndians\u2019 friend: will you not some time please write for us a United\nStates history that will not teach us such wicked and cruel falsehoods\nabout our forefathers because they loved their homes enough to fight\nfor them--even against such powerful foes as you have been.\u201d And I have\nvowed that if ever I have time and strength and feel competent to do\nit, I will write such a history.\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK.]\n\nYet this is by no means all the charge I have to make against my\nown race in its treatment of the Indian. Not content with depriving\nhim of his worldly possessions, we have added insult to injury, and\nadministered a far deeper and more cutting wound to him by denying to\nhim and his wives and daughters the moral, poetical, and spiritual\nqualities they possess. To many of the superior (!) race this is\nutter nonsense. The idea that an Indian has any feelings to be hurt!\nHow ridiculous! Yet I make the assertion, fearless of successful\ncontradiction, that many Indians feel more keenly this ignoring of the\ngood, the poetic, the \u00e6sthetic, the religious or spiritual qualities\nthey possess than they do the physical wrongs that have been inflicted\nupon them. As a race, we are prejudiced, bigoted, and \u201cbig-headed\u201d when\nlooking upon any other race. We come by our prejudices naturally. The\nEnglishman looks down upon the \u201cfrog-eating Frenchman,\u201d and used to say\nhe could lick ten or a dozen such. The Frenchman and Englishman both\nscoff at the beer-drinking German and the stolid Dutchman, yet France\nhas to remember Sedan, and England still smarts at the name of Van\nTromp. The fact is that no nation can afford to look down upon another,\nany more than any civilization can afford to crow over another. Each\nhas its own virtues, its own \u201cgoods,\u201d its own advantages. France,\nEngland, Germany, America, have never equaled, much less surpassed,\nthe architecture of Greece, Egypt, and Rome. The United States, with\nall its brag and boast, has never had a poet equal to old blind Homer\nor the Italian Dante. Germany\u2019s Goethe is worthy to stand side by\nside with England\u2019s Shakspere, and the architecture of the rude and\nvulgar \u201cGoths\u201d is the supremest crown of all building in the proud and\nconceited English-speaking \u201cMother Country.\u201d\n\nAnd so have I learned to look at the Indian. He has many things that\nwe can take to our advantage and profit, and some of these have been\npresented in the following pages. In the next chapter I have a few\nnecessary reservations and observations to make which I trust the\npatience of the reader will permit him carefully to consider.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nTHE WHITE RACE AND ITS CIVILIZATION\n\n\nI am by no means a blind worshiper of our so-called \u201chigher\u201d and\n\u201cadvanced\u201d civilization. I do not think we have advanced yet as far as\nthe Greeks in some things. Our civilization, in many respects, is sham,\nshoddy, gingerbread, tinsel, false, showy, meretricious, deceptive. If\nI were making this book an arraignment of our civilization there would\nbe no lack of counts in the indictment, and a plethora of evidence\ncould be found to justify each charge.\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK OF RATTLESNAKE DESIGN].\n\nAs a nation, we do not know how to eat rationally; few people sleep as\nthey should; our drinking habits could not be much worse; our clothing\nis stiff, formal, conventional, hideous, and unhealthful; our headgear\nthe delirium tremens of silliness. Much of our architecture is weakly\nimitative, flimsy, without dignity, character, or stability; much of\nour religion a profession rather than a life; our scholastic system\nturns out an\u00e6mic and half-trained pupils who are forceful demonstrators\nof the truth that \u201ca little knowledge is a dangerous thing.\u201d And as for\nour legal system, if a body of lunatics from the nearest asylum could\nnot concoct for us a better hash of jurisprudence than now curses our\ncitizenship I should be surprised. No honest person, whether of the\nlaw or out of it, denies that \u201claw\u201d--which Browning so forcefully\nsatirizes as \u201cthe patent truth-extracting process,\u201d--has become a\nsystem of formalism, of precedent, of convention, of technicality. A\ncase may be tried, and cost the city, county, or state thousands of\ndollars; a decision rendered, and yet, _upon a mere technicality that\ndoes not affect the real merits of the case one iota_, the decision\nwill be reversed, and either the culprit--whose guilt no one denies--is\ndischarged, or a new trial, with its attendant expense, is ordered.\nThe folly of such a system! The sheer idiocy of _men_ wasting time and\nstrength and energy upon such puerile foolishness. I verily believe the\nworld would be bettered if the whole legal system, from supreme court\nof the United States down to pettiest justice court, could be abolished\nat one blow, and a reversion made to the decisions of the old men of\neach community known for their good common sense, fearlessness, and\nintegrity.\n\n[Illustration: RAMONA AND HER STAR BASKET.]\n\nIt may be possible that some who read these words will deem me an\nincontinent and general railer against our civilization. Such a\nconclusion would be an egregious error. I rail against nothing in it\nbut that which I deem bad,--bad in its effect upon the bodies, minds,\nor souls of its citizens. I do not rail against the wireless telegraph,\nthe ocean cables, the railway, the telephone, the phonograph, the\npianoforte, the automobile, the ice machine, refrigerating machine,\ngas light, gas for heating and cooking, the electric light and heater,\nelectric railways, newspapers, magazines, books, and the thousand and\none things for which this age and civilization of ours is noted. But\nI do rail against the abuse and perversion of these things. I do rail\nagainst the system that permits gamblers to swindle the common people\nby watering the stock of wireless telegraphy, cable, railway, or other\ncompanies. I enjoy some phonographs amazingly, but I rail against\nmy neighbor\u2019s running his phonograph all night. I think coal-oil a\ngood thing, but I rail against the civilization that allows a few\nmen to so control this God-given natural product that they can amass\nin a few short years fortunes that so far transcend the fortunes of\nthe kings of ancient times that they make the wealth of Cr\u0153sus look\nlike \u201cthirty cents.\u201d I believe thoroughly in education; but I rail\nearnestly, sincerely, and constantly against that so-called education\n(with which nearly all our present systems are more or less allied)\nof valuing the embalmed knowledge of books more than the personal,\npractical, experimental knowledge of the things themselves. I enjoy\nbooks, and would have a library as large as that of the British Museum\nif I could afford it; but I rail persistently against the civilization\nthat leads its members to accept things they find in books more than\nthe things they think out for themselves. Joaquin Miller seemed to say\na rude and foolish thing when he answered Elbert Hubbard\u2019s question,\n\u201cWhere are your books?\u201d with a curt, \u201cTo hell with books. When I want\na book I write one;\u201d and yet he really expressed a deep and profound\nthought. He wanted to show his absolute contempt for the idea that we\nread books in order to help thought. The fact is, the reading too much\nin books, and of too many books, is a definite hindrance to thought--a\npositive preventive of thought. I do not believe in predigested food\nfor either body, mind, or soul; hence I am opposed to those features of\nour civilization that give us food that needs only to be swallowed (not\nmasticated and enjoyed) to supply nutriment; that give us thought all\nready prepared for us that we must accept or be regarded as uneducated;\nthose crumbs of social customs that a frivolous four hundred condescend\nto allow to fall from their tables to us, and that we must observe\nor be ostracized as \u201cboors\u201d and \u201cvulgar\u201d; and those features of our\ntheological system that give us predigested spiritual food that we must\naccept and follow or be damned. I am willing to go and feed with the\nScotch and the horses (_vide_ Johnson\u2019s foolish remark about oatmeal),\nand be regarded as uneducated and be ostracized both as a boor and a\nvulgarian, and even be damned in words, which, thank God, is quite\nas far as He allows any one human being to \u201cdamn\u201d another. For I am\nopposed to these things one and all.\n\nI am not a pessimist about our civilization: I am an optimist. Yet I\noften find my optimism strongly tinged with pessimistic color. And how\ncan it be otherwise?\n\nCan any thinking man have much respect--any, in fact--for that phase\nof his civilization which permits the building of colossal fortunes by\nthe monopolization of the sale of _necessities_, when the poor who are\ncompelled to buy these necessities are growing poorer and poorer each\nyear?\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK OF GREEK FRET DESIGN.]\n\nCan I respect any civilization that for the 125 years of its existence\nhas refused to pass laws for the preservation of the purity of the food\nof its poor? The rich can buy what and where they choose, but for the\nwhole period of our existence we have been so bound, hand and foot,\nby the money-makers who have vitiated our food supply that they might\nadd a few more millions to their dirty hoard of ungodly dollars that\nwe have closed our eyes to the physical and spiritual demoralization\nthat has come to the poor by the poisoned concoctions handed out to\nthem--under protection of United States laws--as foods.\n\nCan I respect an educational institution that educates the minds of\nits children at the expense of their bodies? That has so little common\nsense and good judgment as to be putting its children through fierce\ncompetitive examinations when they should be strengthening their bodies\nat the critical age of adolescence?\n\nCan I bow down before the civilization whose highest educational\nestablishments--Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell, New York,\nColumbia, Johns Hopkins, followed by hosts of others of lesser\ninstitutions--every year send out from five to thirty per cent of\ntheir students broken down in health? What is the good of all the\nbook-learning that all the ages have amassed unless one has physical\nhealth to enjoy it? Only this last year a Harvard graduate came to\nme who had taken high degree in the study of law and was adjudged\neminently prepared to begin to practice his profession. But his health\nwas gone. He was a nervous and physical wreck. His physicians commanded\ncomplete rest for a year, and suggested that five years would be none\ntoo long for him to spend in recuperation. When this young man asked\nme to give him my candid expressions upon the matter, I asked him if\nhe thought imbeciles could have made a worse mess of his \u201ceducation\u201d\nthan had the present system, which had cultivated his intellect, but so\ndisregarded the needs of his body that his intellect was powerless to\nact.\n\nLet the wails of agony of the uncounted dead who have been hurried\nto their graves by this idolatrous worship of a senseless, godless,\nheartless Moloch called \u201ceducation\u201d answer for me when people ask me\nto respect this feature of our higher civilization, and to these wails\nlet there be added those of awakened parents who have seen, when too\nlate, into what acts akin to murder their blind worship of this idol\nhad led them. Add to these the cries of pain from ten thousand beds\nof affliction occupied by those still living, but whose bodies have\n\u201cbroken down\u201d as the result of \u201cover-study.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: A SABOBA INDIAN WITH BASKET IN WHICH IS SYMBOLIZED THE\nHISTORY OF HIS TRIBE.]\n\nThen add to the vast pyramid of woe the heartaches of hopes banished,\nof ambitions thwarted, of desires and aims completely lost, and one\ncan well understand why I am not a worshiper at this shrine. If I were\nto choose--as every parent must for his young children who are not\nyet capable of thought--between a happy, because physically healthy,\nlife, though uneducated by the schools, and an educated and unhappy,\nbecause unhealthy, life for children, I would say: Give me ignorance\n(of books and schools) and health, rather than education (of books and\nschools) and a broken down, nervous, irritable body. But it is by no\nmeans necessary to have uneducated children, even though they should\nnever see a school. While I now write (I am enjoying a few days on the\n\u201crim\u201d of the Grand Canyon) I am meeting daily a remarkable family. The\nman is far above the average in _scholastic_ and book _education_. He\nis a distinguished physician, known not only within the bounds of his\nown large state, but throughout the whole United States and Europe;\nhis methods are largely approved by men at the head of the profession,\nand his lucrative and enormous practice demonstrates the success of\nhis system, with the complete approval of the most conservative of\nhis rigidly conservative profession. He was until quite recently a\nprofessor in one of the largest universities of the United States, and\nwas therefore competent from inside knowledge to pass judgment upon\nthe methods of the highest educational establishments. He has money\nenough to place his two daughters wherever he chooses, and to spend\nmost of his time near them. Yet he has deliberately (and I think most\nwisely) kept them out of school, and made the strength and vigor of\ntheir bodies his first consideration. Both ride horseback (astride, of\ncourse) with the poise and confidence of skilled vaqueros; both can\nundertake long journeys, horseback or afoot, that would exhaust most\nyoung men students; and now at 15 and 17 years of age they are models\nof physical health and beauty, and at the same time the elder sister\nis _better_ educated in the practical, sane, useful, living affairs of\nmen and women than any girl of her age I have ever met. I take this\nobject-lesson, therefore, as another demonstration of the truth of my\nposition, and again I refuse to bow down before the great fetich of\nour modern civilization--\u201cscholastic education.\u201d\n\nThere have been wonderful civilizations in the past,--Persia, Asia\nMinor, Etruria, Greece, Rome, Egypt, the Moors,--and yet they are gone.\nA few remnants are left to us in desert temples, sand-buried propyl\u00e6,\ndug-up vases and carvings, glorious architecture, sublime marbles,\nand soul-stirring literature. Where are the peoples who created these\nthings? Why could they not propagate their kind sufficiently well to\nat least keep their races intact, and hold what they had gained? We\nknow they did not do it. Why? Call it moral or physical deterioration,\nor both, it is an undeniable fact that physical weakness rendered\nthe descendants of these peoples incapable of living upon their\nancestors\u2019 high planes, or made them an easy prey to a stronger and\nmore vigorous race. I am fully inclined to the belief that it was their\nmoral declensions that led to their physical deterioration; yet I also\nfirmly believe that a better and truer morality can be sustained upon a\nhealthy and vigorous body than upon one which is diseased and enervated.\n\nHence I plead, with intense earnestness, for a better physical life for\nour growing boys and girls, our young men and women, and especially\nfor our prospective parents. Healthy progeny cannot be expected\nfrom diseased stock. The fathers and mothers of the race must be\nstrengthened physically. Every child should be healthily, happily, and\ncheerfully _born_, as well as _borne_. The sunshine of love should\nsmile down from the faces of both parents into the child\u2019s eyes the\nfirst moment of its life. Thus the elixir of joy enters its heart, and\njoy is as essential to the proper development of a child as sunshine\nis to that of a flower. This is a physical world, even though it be\nonly passing phenomena, and upon its recognition much of our happiness\ndepends. Our Christian Science friends see in physical inharmony only\nan error of mortal mind, to be demonstrated over by divine mind. That\ndemonstration, however, produces the effect we call physical health.\nThis is what I long for, seek after, strive for, both for myself, my\nfamily, my children, my race. Any and all means that can successfully\nbe used to promote that end I believe in and heartily commend. Let us\ncall it what we will, and attain it as how we may, the desirable thing\nin our national and individual life to-day is health,--health of the\nwhole man, body, mind, soul. Because I firmly believe the Indians have\nideas that, if carried out, will aid us to attain this glorious object,\nI have dared to suggest that this proud and haughty white race may sit\nat their feet and learn of them.\n\n[Illustration: DAT-SO-LA-LE, THE WASHOE BASKET WEAVER, SOME OF WHOSE\nBASKETS HAVE SOLD FOR FABULOUS PRICES.]\n\nI myself began life handicapped with serious ill health, and for\ntwenty-two years was seldom free from pain. Nervous irritability\nrequired constant battling. But when I began to realize the benefit\nof life spent in God\u2019s great out-of-doors, and devoted much of my\ntime to climbing up and down steep canyon walls, riding over the\nplains and mountains of Nevada and California, wandering through the\naseptic wastes of the deserts of the Southwest, rowing and swimming\nin the waters of the great Colorado River, sleeping nightly in the\nopen air, and in addition, coming in intimate contact with many tribes\nof Indians, and learning from them how to live a simple, natural,\nand therefore healthy life,--these things not only gave to me almost\nperfect health, but have suggested the material of which this book is\nmade.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE INDIAN AND NASAL AND DEEP BREATHING\n\n\nThe Indian believes absolutely in nasal breathing. Again and again I\nhave seen the Indian mother, as soon as her child was born, watch it\nto see if it breathed properly. If not, she would at once pinch the\nchild\u2019s lips together and keep them pinched until the breath was taken\nin and exhaled easily and naturally through the nostrils. If this did\nnot answer, I have watched her as she took a strip of buckskin and tied\nit as a bandage below the chin and over the crown of the head, forcing\nthe jaws together, and then with another bandage of buckskin she\ncovered the lips of the little one. Thus the habit of nasal breathing\nwas formed immediately the child saw the light, and it knew no other\nmethod.\n\nAs one walks through the streets of every large city, he sees the\ndull and vacant eye, the inert face, of the mouth-breather; for, as\nevery physician well knows, the mouth-breather suffers from lack of\nmemory and a general dullness of the intellect. Not only that, but\nhe habitually submits himself to unnecessary risks of disease. In\nbreathing through the nose, the disease germs, which abound in our\ncity streets and are sent floating through the air by every passing\nwind, are caught by the gluey mucus or the capillaries of the mucous\nmembranes. The wavy air passages of the nose lead one to assume that\nthey are so constructed expressly for this purpose, as the germs, if\nthey escape being caught at one angle, are pretty sure to be trapped\nin turning another. When this mucus is expelled in the act of \u201cblowing\nthe nose,\u201d the germs go with it, and disease is prevented. But when\nthese germs are taken in through the mouth, they go directly into\nthe throat, the bronchial tubes, and the lungs, and if they are\nlively and strong, they lodge there and take root and propagate with\nsuch fearful rapidity that in a very short time a new patient with\ntuberculosis, diphtheria, typhoid, or some other disease, is created.\nHence, emulate the Indian. Breathe through your nose; do not use it as\nan organ of speech. At the same time that you care for yourself, watch\nyour children, and even if you have to bandage them up while they are\nasleep, as the Indians do, compel them to form early this useful and\nhealthful habit of nasal breathing.\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN SHOWING EFFECT OF DEEP BREATHING IN WONDERFUL\nLUNG DEVELOPMENT].\n\nBut not only do the Indians breathe through the nose: they are also\nexperts in the art of deep breathing. The exercises that are given in\nopen-air deep breathing at the Battle Creek sanitarium each morning\nshow that we are learning this useful and beneficial habit from them.\nWhen I first began to visit the Hopis, in northern Arizona, I was\nawakened every morning in the wee sma\u2019 hours, as I slept in my blankets\nin the open at the foot of the mesa upon which the towns are located,\nby cow-bells, as if a number of cows were being driven out to pasture.\nBut in the daytime I could see no cows nor any evidence of their\nexistence. When I asked where they were, my questions brought forth\nnothing but a wondering stare. Cows? They had no cows. What did I mean?\nThen I explained about the bells, and as I explained, a merry laugh\nburst upon my ears. \u201cCows? Those are not cows. To-morrow morning when\nyou hear them, you jump up and watch.\u201d I did so, and to my amazement I\nsaw fleeing through the early morning dusk a score (more or less) of\nnaked youths, on each one of whom a cow-bell was dangling from a rope\nor strap around his waist. Later I learned this running was done as a\nmatter of religion. Every young man was required to run ten, fifteen,\ntwenty miles, and even double this distance, upon certain allotted\nmornings, as a matter of religion. This develops a lung capacity that\nis nothing short of marvelous.\n\nThis great lung capacity is in itself a great source of health, vim,\nenergy, and power. It means the power to take in a larger supply of\noxygen to purify and vivify the blood. Half the people of our cities\ndo not know what real true life is, because their blood is not well\nenough oxygenated. The people who are full of life and exuberance and\npower--the men and women who accomplish things--generally have large\nlung capacity, or else have the faculty of using all they have to the\nbest advantage.\n\nTo a public speaker, a singer, a lawyer, a preacher, or a teacher, this\nlarge lung capacity is invaluable; for, all things else being equal,\nthe voice itself will possess a clearer, more resonant quality if the\nlungs, the abdomen, and the diaphragm are full of, or stretched out by,\nplenty of air. These act as a resonant sounding-chamber which increases\nthe carrying quality of the voice to a wonderful extent.\n\nFor years I have watched with keenest observation all our greatest\noperatic singers, actors, orators, and public speakers, and those who\npossess the sweet and resonant voices are the ones who breathe deep\nand own and control these capacious lungs. Only a few weeks ago I went\nto hear Sarah Bernhardt, the world\u2019s most wonderful actress, who at\nsixty-three years of age still entrances thousands, not only by the\nwonder of her art, but by the marvelous quality of her voice. What did\nI find? A woman who has learned this lesson of deep breathing as the\nIndians breathe. She breathes well down, filling the lungs so that they\nthrust out the ribs. She has no waist-line, her body descending (as\ndoes that of the Venus) in an almost straight line from armpit to hips.\nThe result is, that, with such a resonant air cavity, she scarcely\nraises her voice above the conversational pitch, and yet it is easily\nheard by two or three thousand people.\n\nIt is needless to add that every Indian woman is intelligent enough to\nvalue health, lung capacity, and the power to speak with force, vigor,\nand energy more than she values \u201cfashionable appearance\u201d; hence none\nof them can be found in their native condition foolish enough to wear\ncorsets.\n\nI never knew an Indian woman who \u201cneeded a corset, don\u2019t you know, to\nbrace her up, to sustain her weak back.\u201d Of course, if a white woman\nis large and fleshy, and values appearance more than health, I suppose\nshe will have her own way anyhow, but this other reason that women\ngive for the use of the corset I never heard fall from the lips of an\nIndian woman. She is strong and well, and needs no artificial support.\nI regret very much to see that while sensible women are giving up the\ncorset, or at least materially loosening its strings, men are beginning\nto wear belts in place of suspenders. It is just as injurious to a\nman to encircle his waist and squeeze together the vital organs as it\nis to a woman. It is bad, absolutely, completely, thoroughly bad, at\nall times, in all circumstances, for all people. The wasp-like waist,\nwhether in men or women, is a sign either of recklessness, gross\nignorance, or deliberate preference for a false figure over a normal\none and health. The hips are a most important part of a human being\u2019s\nanatomy. As Dr. Kellogg has well said:\n\n\u201cNo physical endowment is of more importance for a long and a\nvigorous life than capacious lungs. The intensity and efficiency of\nan individual\u2019s life depend very largely upon the amount of air he\nhabitually passes in and out of his lungs, just as the intensity of\na fire, granting plenty of fuel, depends upon the rate at which the\nair is brought in contact with the fuel. It has been found that lung\ncapacity depends very largely upon the height; thus, the taller a\nperson the greater his lung capacity, other things being equal. The\nfollowing table shows the lung capacity, or rather the amount of air\nwhich can be forced out of the lungs, the so-called vital capacity, for\nmen of different heights:\n\n  Height      Weight      Vital Capacity\n  Inches      Pounds      Cubic Inches\n\n   64          115            205\n   65          126            228\n   66          126            230\n   67          133            244\n   68          134            248\n   69          140            254\n   70          141            256\n   71          150            272\n   72          151            287\n\n\u201cThe proper time for the development of the chest is in childhood and\nin youth. The best of all means for increasing the chest capacity is\nrunning and active sports of all sorts. Mountain climbing, going up and\ndown stairs, and all kinds of exercises which produce strong breathing\nmovements are effective means of chest development. Exercises of this\nnature are far superior to breathing exercises, so-called, of whatever\nsort. Breathing exercises in which the lungs are forcibly compelled to\ntake in more than the ordinary amount of air very soon become tiresome.\nThe effort is wholly voluntary, and the muscles soon weary. When,\nhowever, a thirst for air is created by some active exercise which\nfills the blood with carbonic-acid gas, so that deeper and more rapid\nbreathing is necessary to rid the body of this poisonous gas and to\ntake in a supply of oxygen in its place, the act of breathing is no\nlonger difficult, embarrassing, or tiresome, but is, on the other hand,\na pleasure and a gratification. The impulse which comes from within,\nfrom the so-called respiratory centers, so excites the respiratory\nmuscles that they cause the chest to execute the strongest breathing\nmovements with the greatest ease, ventilating every portion of the\nlungs, filling every air-cell to its utmost capacity.\n\n[Illustration: ONE OF THE TRAILS UP WHICH THE HOPIS CLIMB AT FULL\nSPEED.]\n\n\u201cRunners always have large and active chests, whereas sedentary persons\nhave chests of limited capacity and rigid walls. When a chest is not\nstretched to its utmost capacity many times daily, it rapidly loses\nits flexibility. This is especially true after the age of thirty. In\npersons who have passed middle life, the rigidity of the chest is so\ngreat that there can be no very considerable increase in size. By\ndevelopment of the respiratory muscles the chest capacity may be to\nsome degree increased, but the proper time for chest development is in\nchildhood and youth. At this period, also, the integrity of the heart\nrenders possible without injury those vigorous exercises which are\nessential to secure the highest degree of chest development.\n\n\u201cProbably the best of all exercises for the development of the chest\nand breathing powers is swimming. The position of the body, the head\nheld well back and the chest well forward, and the active movements of\nthe arms and limbs render swimming a most efficient breathing exercise.\nThe contact of cold water with the skin also actively stimulates the\nmovement of the chest, while at the same time it renders possible\nprolonged and vigorous muscular movements by increasing the energy and\nactivity of the muscles.\n\n\u201cSpecial breathing exercises, as well as those active muscular\nmovements which induce a thirst for air, are beneficial to the lungs by\nmaintaining the flexibility of the chest, strengthening the respiratory\nmuscles, and ventilating the lungs. These movements also exercise a\nmost extraordinary beneficial effect upon the stomach, liver, and\nother organs which lie below the diaphragm. Each time the diaphragm\ncontracts, it gives the liver, stomach, and adjacent organs a hearty\nsqueeze, so to speak, emptying out the blood contained in these parts\nas one may by compression empty a moist sponge. All movements which\nincrease the strength of the abdominal muscles are an important means\nof aiding and improving the breathing function.\u201d\n\nFrom this it will be seen, therefore, that everything that prevents the\nfull and free exercise of the lungs, especially in the lower portions,\nis of direct injury to the body. Men need all the lung capacity and\npower they can gain in order to sustain their energy in the battle of\nlife; and women, especially young women, who are to become the future\nmothers of the race, should be taught that the art of healthy, deep\nbreathing is one of the fine arts, and the most important one that they\ncan learn.\n\n[Illustration: NAVAHO BLANKET WEAVER IN HER OPEN AIR WORK-SHOP.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE INDIAN AND OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE\n\n\nThe Indian is an absolute believer in the virtue of the outdoor life,\nnot as an occasional thing, but as his regular, set, uniform habit.\nHe _lives_ out of doors; not only does his body remain in the open,\nbut his mind, his soul, are ever also there. Except in the very cold\nweather his house is free to every breeze that blows. He laughs at\n\u201cdrafts.\u201d \u201cCatching cold\u201d is a something of which he knows absolutely\nnothing. When he learns of white people shutting themselves up in\nhouses into which the fresh, pure, free air of the plains and deserts,\noften laden with the healthful odors of the pines, firs, balsams of the\nforest, cannot come, he shakes his head at the folly, and feels as one\nwould if he saw a man slamming his door in the face of his best friend.\nVirtually he sleeps out of doors, eats out of doors, works out of\ndoors. When the women make their baskets and pottery, it is always out\nof doors, and their best beadwork is always done in the open. The men\nmake their bows and arrows, dress their buckskin, make their moccasins\nand buckskin clothes, and perform nearly all their ceremonials out of\ndoors.\n\nOur greatest scientific fighters against tuberculosis are emulating the\nIndian in the fact that even in the winter of the East they advocate\nthat their patients sleep out of doors. Pure air, and abundance of it,\nis their cry.\n\n\u201cTaking cold\u201d comes, not from breathing \u201cnight air,\u201d but generally from\ninflammation of the mucous membranes caused by impure air,--the air of\na heated room from which all the pure air has been exhausted by being\nbreathed again and again into the lungs of its deluded occupants, each\nexhalation sending with it a fresh amount of poison to vitiate the\nlittle good that remains.\n\nMen often go to gymnasiums in the city to get exercise. The air is\nvitiated by the presence of others, and as respiration is increased\nby the exercise, impure air is taken into the lungs, and the prime\nobject of the exercise is defeated. For it is not so much to develop\nmuscles as it is to stimulate the general action of the whole body\nthat gymnastics should be indulged in. Vigorous exercise demands deep\nbreathing; if the air breathed is pure, the blood thereby becomes\nmore oxygenated or vivified. As this vitalized blood circulates, it\ncarries its life-giving new strength and energy to every part of the\nbody, so that the whole man feels the increased vigor. But let the air\nbe impure, death instead of life is given to the blood. Hence, where\npossible, all vigorous exercise should be taken out of doors in the\npure air and sunlight, and if this is not possible, every door, window,\nand avenue through which outside air can be brought inside should\nbe placed wide open, and _kept open_ during the whole time of the\nexercises. If spectators come, and on their account windows and doors\nare closed, a positive injury is being done to the exercisers. Far\nbetter turn out the spectators than shut out God\u2019s pure air.\n\nWhat a pitiable thing it is that our civilization can do no better\nfor us than to make us slaves to indoor life, so that we have to go\nand take artificial exercise in order to preserve our health. Think\nof the vigor and strength, the robustness and power, the joy and the\nhealth, that are the possession of men and women of outdoor life. Let\nany one who wishes to know what this means read John Muir\u2019s _Mountains\nof California_. In it he tells of his years of experiences climbing the\nterribly difficult peaks of the Sierras, the exploring of glaciers, the\nsleeping out at night during snow-storms in the depth of winter without\neither an overcoat or a single blanket. One of the most thrilling of\nexperiences is told as simply as the narrative of a child. He was out\nduring a terrific wind-storm. Says he: \u201cWhen the storm began to sound\nI lost no time in pushing out into the woods to enjoy it. For on such\noccasions Nature has always something rare to show us, and the danger\nto life and limb is hardly greater than one would experience crouching\ndeprecatingly beneath a roof.\u201d\n\nThink of a city-bred man, a society man, deliberately walking out into\na storm to _enjoy_ it.\n\n\u201cIt was still early morning when I found myself fairly adrift.\nDelicious sunshine came pouring over the hills.... I heard trees\nfalling for hours at the rate of one every two or three minutes; some\nuprooted, partly on account of the loose, water-soaked condition of\nthe ground; others broken straight across, where some weakness caused\nby fire had determined the spot. The gestures of the various trees\nmade a delightful study. Young sugar-pines, light and feathery as\nsquirrel-tails, were bowing almost to the ground; while the grand old\npatriarchs, whose massive boles had been tried in a hundred storms,\nwaved solemnly above them, their long, arching branches streaming\nfluently on the gale, and every needle thrilling and singing and\nshedding off keen lances of light like a diamond.\n\n\u201cI drifted on through the midst of this passionate music and motion,\nacross many a glen from ridge to ridge; often halting in the lee of a\nrock for shelter, or to gaze and listen. Even when the grand anthem had\nswelled to its highest pitch, I could distinctly hear the varying tones\nof individual trees,--spruce and fir and pine and leafless oak,--and\neven the infinitely gentle rustle of the withered grasses at my feet.\nEach was expressing itself in its own way,--singing its own song and\nmaking its own peculiar gestures,--manifesting a richness of variety to\nbe found in no other forest I have yet seen.\n\n\u201cToward midday, after a long, tingling scramble through copses of\nhazel and ceanothus, I gained the summit of the highest ridge in the\nneighborhood; and then it occurred to me that it would be a fine\nthing to climb one of the trees to obtain a wider outlook and get my\near close to the \u00c6olian music of the topmost needles. But under the\ncircumstances the choice of a tree was a serious matter. One whose\ninstep was not very strong seemed in danger of being blown down, or of\nbeing struck by others in case they should fall; another was branchless\nto a considerable height above the ground, and at the same time too\nlarge to be grasped with arms and legs in climbing; while others were\nnot favorably situated for clear views. After cautiously casting about,\nI made choice of the tallest of a group of Douglas spruces that were\ngrowing close together like a tuft of grass, no one of which seemed\nlikely to fall unless all the rest fell with it. Though comparatively\nyoung, they were about 100 feet high, and their lithe, brushy tops\nwere rocking and swirling in wild ecstasy. Being accustomed to climb\ntrees in making botanical studies, I experienced no difficulty in\nreaching the top of this one, and never before did I enjoy so noble an\nexhilaration of motion. The slender tops fairly flapped and swished\nin the passionate torrent, bending and swirling backward and forward,\nround and round, tracing indescribable combinations of vertical and\nhorizontal curves, while I clung with muscles firm braced, like a\nbobolink on a reed.\n\n[Illustration: HAVASUPAI DRESSING BUCKSKIN.]\n\n\u201cIn its wildest sweeps my treetop described an arc of from twenty to\nthirty degrees, but I felt sure of its elastic temper, having seen\nothers of the same species still more severely tried--bent almost to\nthe ground, indeed, in heavy snows--without breaking a fiber. I was\ntherefore safe, and free to take the wind into my pulses and enjoy the\nexcited forest from my superb outlook....\n\n\u201cI kept my lofty perch for hours, frequently closing my eyes to enjoy\nthe music by itself, or to feast quietly on the delicious fragrance\nthat was streaming past.\u201d\n\nWhat an experience, and what a joy to feel one\u2019s self able to enjoy it!\nI know what it is. Years before I had read this, I had had a similar\nexperience when driving over the high Sierras from the borders of\nOregon, Nevada, and California down into southern California. Imagine\nthe ordinary business man, or clerk, or banker, or preacher, or lawyer,\nor doctor, daring to climb so high a tree, and especially during such\na storm. Yet such a day so spent is worth more than a year of any\nordinary man\u2019s life.\n\nEdward Robeson Taylor, the poet-mayor of San Francisco, once expressed\nhis keen appreciation of what Nature gives to the man who loves her\nenough to test her. And he has made the test many a time, in the\nSierras, in the forests, in the deserts, in the Grand Canyon, as well\nas on the Bay of San Francisco. He wrote:\n\n    \u201cIn him that on the rugged breast of mountain\n      Finds his joy and his repose,\n    Who makes the pine his fellow, and with zest\n      Treads the great glaciers and their kindred snows,\n    A strength is planted that in direst test\n      Dares all the devils of Danger to oppose.\u201d\n\nThen, too, there are marvelous healing powers in God\u2019s great\nout-of-doors. The _vis medicatrix Natur\u00e6_ is no fiction of the\nimagination. If sick people knew enough, were wise enough, to go\nout into the open and discard all civilized modes of life, climbing\nmountains, sleeping on pine boughs, swimming in the streams, working in\nthe soil, dabbling in the hot or cold springs, eating the ripe fruits\nand nuts, and bathing the whole body daily in bright sunshine, they\nwould be brought to a health and vigor they had never before known.\n\nI have often wondered why thoughtful white people have not observed\nthat insanity is practically unknown amongst the Indians. Why? Our own\ngreat Emerson once wrote a clear answer.\n\n\u201cIt was,\u201d said he, \u201cthe practice of the Orientals, especially of the\nPersians, to let insane persons wander at their own will out of the\ntowns, into the desert, and, if they liked, to associate with wild\nanimals. In their belief, wild beasts, especially gazelles, collect\naround an insane person, and live with him on a friendly footing. The\npatient found something curative in that intercourse, by which he was\nquieted and sometimes restored. But there are more insane persons than\nare called so, or are under treatment in hospitals. The crowd in the\ncities, at the hotels, theaters, card-tables, the speculators who rush\nfor investment at ten per cent, twenty per cent, cent per cent, are all\nmore or less mad--these point the moral, and persuade us to seek in the\nfields the health of the mind.\u201d\n\nBut not only does healing come to the _mind_ in Nature: the diseased\n_soul_ there finds medicine and health.\n\nThe well-beloved Robert Louis Stevenson was well aware of this\nout-of-door joy. Among many other fine things on the subject he once\nwrote the following which fully expresses my idea:\n\n    \u201cTo wash in one of God\u2019s rivers in the open air seems to me a sort\n    of cheerful solemnity or semi-pagan act of worship. To dabble\n    among dishes in a bedroom may perhaps make clean the body; but the\n    imagination takes no share in such a cleansing.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: AN APACHE GRANDMOTHER AND SOME BASKETS OF HER OWN DESIGN\nAND WEAVE. ALL MADE IN THE OPEN AIR.]\n\nOne of our great artists and writers, whose life went out a few years\nago in sad eclipse, wrote with a clarity of vision that his awful\nexperiences had taught him: \u201cI have a strange longing for the great\nsimple primeval things, such as the sea, to me no less of a mother than\nthe earth. It seems to me that we all look at Nature too much, and\nlive with her too little. I discern great sanity in the Greek attitude.\nThey never chattered about sunsets, or discussed whether the shadows on\nthe grass were really mauve or not. But they saw that the sea was for\nthe swimmer, and the land for the feet of the runner. They loved the\ntrees for the shadow that they cast, and the forest for its silence at\nnoon. The vineyard-dresser wreathed his hair with ivy, that he might\nkeep off the rays of the sun as he stooped over the young shoots; and\nfor the artist and the athlete, the two types that Greece gave us, they\nplaited with garlands the leaves of the bitter laurel and of the wild\nparsley, which else had been of no service to men. ... I feel sure\nthat in elemental forces there is purification, and I want to go back\nto them and live in their presence.\u201d\n\nHow literally true to fact is this assurance of purification out in\nthe great elemental forces and places of Nature, and how the Indian\ndaily demonstrates it. Thousands can testify to it. Here one becomes\nsoothed. The grinning faces of hate do not pursue him here. Nature is\npassionless to the hunted man. She is willing to be wooed and won,\nand then opens up her rich treasures to the guiltiest and vilest of\nmen, until they regain the right angle of vision, then the desire for\npurification, then repentance, then assurance of forgiveness, and\nfinally their self-respect. Then they are able to return (if necessity\ncompels) to civilization and bear any punishment that may be awarded,\nfor in the rugged arms of Nature they have absorbed strength and\npower,--strength of will and power of soul to dare and do that which\nthe highest within them compels.\n\nWho that has read the _De Profundis_ of that erratic and brilliant\ngenius, Oscar Wilde, has not felt the sad pathos and yet intense truth\nof his concluding words? They are Indian-like in their direct truth and\nnative strength.\n\n\u201cAll trials are trials for one\u2019s life, just as all sentences are\nsentences of death; and three times I have been tried. The first time\nI left the box to be arrested, the second time to be led back to the\nhouse of detention, the third time to pass into a prison for two years.\nSociety, as we have constituted it, will have no place for me, has none\nto offer; but Nature, whose sweet rains fall on unjust and just alike,\nwill have clefts in the rocks where I may hide, and secret valleys in\nwhose silence I may weep undisturbed. She will hang the night with\nstars so that I may walk abroad in the darkness without stumbling, and\nsend the wind over my footprints so that none may track me to my hurt.\nShe will cleanse me in great waters, and with bitter herbs make me\nwhole.\u201d\n\nThis is one of the great wonders of the out-of-door life that the weary\nand sinful of the white race would do well to learn.\n\nBut not only does health of mind and soul return to the sinful in God\u2019s\ngreat out-of-doors: the most vigorous and pure, healthy and perfect,\nminds and souls are expanded and strengthened with such contact.\nBuddha, Mahomet, Moses, David, Elijah, Christ, were all lovers of\nout-of-doors. Washington, Lincoln, and Garfield were all out-of-door\nmen. One learns in the solitude and primitive frankness of the free\nlife of the out doors to do his own thinking, untrammeled by convention\nor prejudice. He sees things as they are. His soul is unclothed, and\nthere can no longer be any deception or pretense. So he becomes an\nindividual; not a mere rote thinker of other\u2019s thoughts, and not a mere\nparrot of other men\u2019s ideas. Edwin Markham could never have written\n_The Man with the Hoe_ had he lived only in the city. He would never\nhave seen deeply enough, and he would never have dared brave the\nconventional prejudices of the civilized (?) world as he did in his\npoem, had he been city-bred. But because he thought nakedly before God\nand his own soul he was compelled to see the monstrousness of making\na man--a son of God, created in His image--a mere clod of clay. The\nidea that this poem is a reflection upon labor is utter nonsense. It\nis merely a protest, strong, vigorous, forceful as a thunder-storm,\nagainst compelling some men to labor so hard that they have neither\ntime nor opportunity for mental and spiritual occupation, and have thus\neven lost the desire for or hope of gaining it. Labor is ennobling, but\nman is made for more than mere physical labor. The unequal distribution\nof affairs in this life causes some men to have no physical labor,\nto their vast disadvantage, while others have nothing but physical\nlabor, equally to their disadvantage. The finding of a just equilibrium\nbetween these two extremes, and then aiding the men of both extremes to\nsee the need of each helping the other, or of taking some of the burden\nof the other, would result in the immediate benefiting of the race to\nan incalculable extent, both in body, mind, and soul. And it is this\nfor which I plead, earnestly calling upon my fellows to so adjust their\nown lives that they will strike the happy mean, thus _living_ (not\nmerely talking about) the dignity of labor as well as the joy of mental\nand spiritual occupation.\n\nAnother important thing must not be overlooked. As a result of this\nout-of-door life the Indian is an early riser and an early retirer\nto bed. The civilized habit of turning night into day, living in the\nglare of gas and electric light, is, on the face of it, artificial,\nunnatural, and unhealthful. It is indefensible from every standpoint.\nThere is not one word of good can be said of it. The day is made\nfor work, the night for rest and sleep. The use of artificial light\nto the extent we indulge it in civilization is gradually rendering\nnormal eyesight a rarity. Children are born with myoptic and other\neye-diseased tendencies. Sometimes it seems as if more people, of all\nages, wear glasses than use their natural eyesight, and this is but one\nof many sad consequences accruing in part from our reversal of the\nnatural use of the day and night times.\n\n[Illustration: HAPPY AND HEALTHY HOPI CHILDREN, ASKING THE AUTHOR FOR\nCANDY.]\n\nMany men, literary and others, wait until the quiet of evening to do\ntheir work. They often stimulate themselves with coffee, and even\nstronger beverages, and then work until the \u201cwee sma\u2019 hours,\u201d by\nartificial light, _after they have already done a fair day\u2019s work_. We\nused to hear a great many words of commendation of the youths in school\nand college who \u201cburned the midnight oil.\u201d If I had my way I would\n\u201cuse the leather strap\u201d upon all these burners-up of their physical\nand mental forces at the time God intended they should be abed and\nasleep. The time for mental work is in the early morning after a\nhearty, healthy, good night\u2019s sleep. The body is strengthened, the mind\nrefreshed, and thought flows easily and readily, because all weariness\nhas disappeared under the influence of \u201ctired nature\u2019s sweet restorer.\u201d\nMental work done at such time is not only a pleasure, but is well done,\nproperly done, because the conditions are right for its doing.\n\nNor is this all. There is a mental and spiritual pleasure given to the\nearly riser that the late sleeper knows nothing of. One of the most\nbeautiful baskets in my historic collection of Indian baskets is one\nmade by a Coahuila woman who depicted thereon the white light of the\nmorning shining through the dark silhouettes of the sharp points of the\ngiant cactus. Her \u00e6sthetic enjoyment was thus made the inspiration of a\nreal work of art.\n\nHow much white people lose by not seeing and knowing the beauty of the\nearly morning hours,--the hours just preceding dawn, and during the\nfirst outburst of the sun! A friend and I stood out the other morning\nbefore sunrise, looking at the exquisite delicate lights over the\nmountain peaks, and she gave expression to the above thought, and only\na few days before I had said it to a friend as we had wended our way\nfrom _El Tovar_ Hotel at the Grand Canyon out to O\u2019Neill Point to see\nthe sunrise. Elisha Safford eloquently speaks as follows of this:\n\n\nBEAUTY OF THE MORNING\n\n    Oh, the beauty of the morning! It showers its splendors down\n    From the crimson robes of sunrise, the azure mountain\u2019s crown;\n    It smiles amid the waving fields, it dapples in the streams,\n    It breathes its sparkling music through the rapture of our dreams.\n\n    It floats upon the limpid air in rainbow clouds of mist,\n    It ripples through the glowing skies in pearl and amethyst,\n    It gleams in every burnished pool, it riots through the grass,\n    It splashes waves of glory on the shadows as they pass.\n\n    It steals among the nodding trees and to the forest croons,\n    In airy note and gentle voice, \u2019neath waning plenilunes;\n    It calls, and lo! the wooded brakes, the hills and tangled fens--\n    A world of life and mystery--swarm with its denizens.\n\n    It trembles in the perfumed breeze, and where its ardor runs,\n    A thousand light-winged choristers pant forth their orisons;\n    A thousand echoes clap their hands, and from their dewy beds,\n    A million scarlet-throated flowers peer forth with startled heads.\n\n    Oh, the beauty of the morning! It rains upon our ears:\n    The music of the universe, the chiming of the spheres;\n    From cloistered wood and leafy vale, its tuneful medleys throng,\n    Till all the earth is drenched in light and all the world in song!\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN BASKET, SHOWING INFLUENCE OF NATURE IN THE\nDESIGN.]\n\nAll children, and especially city children, need out-of-door life.\nMen and women need it too, sadly, but if the elders cannot have it,\nowing to our perverted social conditions, our law-givers should see to\nit that the children do better. It is a well-known fact that cities\nwould soon die out if their vast populations were not constantly being\nreplenished by the sons and daughters of the country. So instead of\nletting our city children grow up to imperfect manhood, let us find\nsome way to get them out of doors and out into the country more and\nmore. Exercise in the open, where pure air penetrates to the full\ndepths of the lungs, personal contact with the soil, and physical\nwork upon it, as well as personal contact with the trees and flowers\nand all growing things, the animals of the farm and field, the rocks\nand mountains, the hills and valleys, the waterfalls and streams, the\ndeserts and canyons; all these are to be desired. Who does not wish to\nsing with Edwin Markham:\n\n    \u201cI ride on the mountain tops, I ride,\n    I have found my life and am satisfied!\u201d\n\nOf course this out-in-the-country life for city children can only be\ngained if their parents and our educators and politicians combine to\nprovide it. And in some way it ought to be done. What a joy it would be\nto many a city boy to be allowed to go and do some work in the country\nduring certain times in the year! Those who have seen the city children\nwho are taken yearly into the country by Fresh Air Funds, or out by\nvessel into the Bay of New York or Boston Harbor, by philanthropic\npeople, know what delight, joy, and health they receive from the\nouting. These things all point to the great, the dire, the awful need\nthere is for some way of giving to our city children and men and women\nmore out-door life.\n\nJust after the San Francisco earthquake, Dr. J. H. Kellogg, editor of\n_Good Health_, wrote in his forceful way of some lessons the people\nmight learn from that disaster. Here is one of them bearing upon this\nvery question:\n\n[Illustration: MONO INDIAN COOKING CORN MUSH IN A BASKET BY A CAMP\nFIRE.]\n\n\u201cThree hundred thousand people have found out that they can live out of\ndoors, and that out of doors is a safer place than indoors.\n\n\u201cPeople who have all their lives slept on beds of down, protected by\nthick walls of brick or stone, barricaded against the dangerous (?)\nair of night, have found that it is possible to spend a night upon an\nunsheltered hillside without risk to life, and it is more than likely\nthat, as in the case of the Charleston earthquake, not a few modern\ntroglodytes, who scarcely ever saw the light of day before, have been\nactually benefited by being forced out into the fresh air and the\nsunshine.\n\n\u201cThe great tent colonies, improvised by the military authorities with\nsuch promptness under the efficient management of the able General\nFunston, may become the permanent homes for some of the thousands\nwho are now for the first time in their lives tasting the sweets of\nan out-of-door life. Man is an out-of-door creature, meant to live\namid umbrageous freshness, his skin bathed clean by morning dews or\nevening showers, browned and disinfected by the sun, fed by tropic\nfruits, and cheered by tropic birds and flowers. It is only through\nlong generations of living under artificial conditions that civilized\nman has become accustomed to the unhealthful and disease-producing\ninfluences of the modern house to such a degree that they can be even\nin a small measure tolerated. But this immunity is only apparent. An\natmosphere that will kill a Hottentot or a baboon in six months will\nalso kill a bank president or a trust magnate--_sometime_. And if these\ntent-dwellers get such a taste of the substantial advantages of the\nout-of-door life that they refuse to return to the old unwholesome\nconditions of anti-earthquake days, they will profit substantially by\ntheir experience, terrible though it has been. It takes earthquakes\nand cyclones and tidal waves to jostle us out of the unnatural and\ndegenerative ruts into which conventionality is always driving us.\n\n\u201cWhat advantages has the man in the brown-stone front over the man in\nthe tent? Only these: A pale face instead of the brown skin which is\nnatural to his species; a coated tongue, no appetite, and no digestion,\ninstead of the keen zest for food and splendid digestive vigor of\nthe tent-dweller; an aching head and confused mind and depressed\nspirits, instead of the vim and snap and energy, mental and physical,\nand the freedom from pain and pessimism of out-of-door dwellers;\nearly consumption or apoplexy or paresis or cancer of the stomach or\narteriosclerosis,--the dry rot of the body which stealthily weakens the\nprops and crumbles the foundations of the citadel of life.\u201d\n\nWhy is it that in our cities in summer, and in Florida and the South\ngenerally, and in the West, we do not follow the French custom of\neating out of doors?\n\nAmerican visitors to Paris in the summer time have always been\nimpressed by the prevalent custom there of dining out of doors. The\nsidewalks in front of caf\u00e9s and restaurants are always so occupied with\nchairs and tables that pedestrians often have to step into the street\nto get by. This has long been the summer custom in Paris, but with\nthe arrival of cold weather tables and chairs disappeared every year,\nand the diners returned to the close nicotine-laden air of the stuffy\nlittle dining-rooms inside. But last year, according to the London\ncorrespondent of the _Outlook_, an enterprising Frenchman, finding his\npatrons much attached to his open-air dining-room, and being short of\nroom inside, undertook to make his guests comfortable out of doors by\nmeans of a large brazier placed upon the sidewalk. Others followed\nhis example, and in a short time the streets were lined with braziers\nfrom the Madeline to the Bastile, much to the satisfaction of the\ncab-drivers and newsboys. One ingenious proprietor made his table-legs\nhollow, filled with hot water, and thus utilized them as foot-warmers.\nAnd so one may now enjoy a fashionable Parisian caf\u00e9 _au plein air_ any\nday in the year.\n\nEverybody is always hungry at a picnic, not simply because of the\nunusual exercise, but as the result of the tonic appetite-stimulating\ninfluence of the out-of-doors. The same plan may be introduced into\nany private home by utilizing a back porch, or, when this is lacking, a\ntent-cloth awning may be provided at the expense of a few dollars.\n\nThe old Spanish _patio_, or inner court, provided the seclusion that\nmany desire, with the possibility of a larger out-of-door life. Mr.\nGustav Stickley, the far-seeing editor of _The Craftsman_, which so\neffectually pleads for a simpler and more democratic life for the\npeople, has planned a number of _Craftsman_ houses in which these open\nporches for eating, and sleeping as well, are introduced. This is a\ngreat step in the right direction, and is strongly to be commended.\n\nBut the outdoor life is larger than houses and porches. One must get\naway from all houses to really feel and know the joy of the great\nout-of-doors. Every teacher and orator should know the birds and trees,\nthe flowers and grasses, the rocks and stars, the clouds and odors,\n_at first hand_. He should not depend upon books at all for any of\nthis knowledge, save as guides to obtain it. Instead of reading books\nhe should read Nature. See how powerful is the simple oratory of the\nIndian, whose figures and similes and illustrations and metaphors are\nof those things in Nature with which he is perfectly familiar.\n\nAnother effect upon the mind and soul as the result of this outdoor\nlife is remarkable to those who have never given it a thought. One\nof our poets once said, \u201cThe undevout astronomer is mad.\u201d And every\nIndian will tell you that the undevout Indian is either mad or \u201cgetting\ncivilized.\u201d One of our California historians once wrote something to\nthe effect that the California Indian had no religion, no mythology,\nno reverence, no belief in anything outside of and beyond himself.\nJeremiah Curtin, a careful and close student of the California Indian\nfor many years, in his wonderfully interesting book, \u201cCreation Myths\nof Primitive America,\u201d shows the utter fallacy of this idea. He says:\n\u201cPrimitive man in America stood at every step face to face with\ndivinity as he knew or understood it. He could never escape from\nthe presence of those powers which had constituted the first world,\nand which composed all that there was in the present one. ... The\nmost important question of all in Indian life was communication with\ndivinity, intercourse with the spirits of divine personages.\u201d Indeed,\nthe Indian sees the divine power in everything. His God speaks in the\nstorm, the howling wind, the tornado, the hurricane, the roaring rapids\nand dashing cataracts of the rivers, the never-ending rise and fall of\nthe ocean, the towering mountains and the tiny hills, the trees, the\nbees, the buds and blossoms. It is God in the flower that makes it grow\nand gives it its odor; that makes the tree from the acorn; that makes\nthe sun to shine; that sends the rain and dew and the gentle zephyrs.\nThe thunder is His voice, and everything in Nature is an expression of\nHis thought.\n\nThis belief compels the Indian to a close study of Nature. Hence the\nkeenness of his powers of observation. He knows every plant, and when\nand where it best grows. He knows the track of every bird, insect,\nreptile, and animal. He knows all the signs of the weather. He is a\npast-master in woodcraft, and knows more of the habits of plants and\nanimal life than all of our trained naturalists put together. He is a\npoet, too, withal, and an orator, using the knowledge he has of nature\nin his thought and speech. No writer that ever lived knew the real\nIndian so well as Fenimore Cooper, and we all know the dignified and\npoetical speech of his Indian characters. I know scores and hundreds of\ndusky-skinned Henry D. Thoreaus and John Burroughses, John Muirs and\nElizabeth Grinnells and Olive Thorne Millers. Indeed, to get an Indian\nonce started upon his lore of plant, tree, insect, bird, or animal, is\nto open up a flood-gate which will deluge any but the one who knows\nwhat to expect.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nTHE INDIAN AND SLEEPING OUT OF DOORS\n\n\n[Illustration: TERRACED HOUSES OF THE HOPIS, ALLOWING SLEEPING OUT OF\nDOORS.]\n\nAs I have already intimated, the Indian is practically an out-of-door\nsleeper. I say \u201cpractically,\u201d for there are exceptions to the general\nrule. The Hopis of northern Arizona have houses. In the cold winter\nmonths they sleep indoors whenever they can. The Navahos, Apaches,\nHavasupais, and other tribes have their \u201chogans\u201d and \u201chawas\u201d in which\nthey sleep in the very cold weather. But in the summer the invariable\nrule is for all to sleep out of doors. And even in the winter, if duty\ncalls them away from home and they have to camp out, they sleep in the\ncold, on the snow, in the rain, as unconcerned for their health as if\nthey were well protected indoors. It is this latter feature that so\nmuch commends itself to me. It is just as _natural_ to them to have to\nsleep out of doors as it is to sleep indoors. They think no more of\nit, do not regard it as an unusual and dangerous experience, or one to\nbe dreaded. They accept it without a murmur or complaint, and without\nfear. This is an attitude of mind that I would the white race would\nlearn from the Indian. I once had a friend, a city-bred man, born and\nbrought up in New York, sent west to me by his physician because he had\nhad two or three hemorrhages, whom I took out into Arizona. The first\nnight we had to sleep out was very cold, for it was early in the year,\nand at that high altitude the thermometer sank very rapidly after the\nsun went down. Yet I deliberately called camp by the side of a great\nsnowbank. The fearful invalid wanted to know what I was stopping there\nfor. I told him it was to afford him a good sleeping place on the snow.\nHe expressed his dread, and assured me that such an experience would\nkill him at once. I told him that if it did I would see that he was\ndecently buried, but that did not seem to dissipate his fears. After a\ngood camp-fire was built, and he had had a warm and comforting supper,\nand his blankets were stretched out on the snow, and he was undressed\nand well wrapped up, with a hot rock at his feet and the cheery blaze\nlighting up the scene, he felt less alarmed. I talked him to sleep, and\nwhen he awoke in the morning it was to confess that his throat and\nlungs felt more comfortable than they had done for many long months. A\nmonth of this open-air sleeping gave him new ideas on the subject, and\nsent him back east to fit up a camp in the Adirondacks, where he could\nget a great deal of outdoor life, and sleeping with doors and windows\nwide open.\n\n[Illustration: BOSTON MILLIONAIRES SLEEPING OUT OF DOORS ON THE SANDS\nOF THE COLORADO RIVER.]\n\nThe outdoor treatment for tuberculosis is now almost universal. Here is\nwhat one eminent authority says on the subject:\n\n\u201cTuberculosis is a direct result of over-work, either mental or\nphysical, and rest is largely its cure. This life in the open air is\nbest carried out in a sitting or semi-reclining posture. Every hour of\nthe day in all seasons of the year and in all kinds of weather should\nthus be spent, together with sleeping in a tent, protected veranda, or\nin a house with windows wide open. It will be found that the colder\nthe weather, the more marked and permanent the results. One does not\nneed to be uncomfortable; one can be well wrapped with heavy blankets.\nIt is the inhalation of cold air that is so effectual in stimulating\nappetite, as a general tonic and fever reducer. A consumptive should\nhave for his motto: \u2018Every hour in the closed house is an hour lost.\u2019\nThere is no excuse for losing time.\u201d\n\nBut it is not for those who are in ill health alone that I would\ncommend out-of-door sleeping. Those who are healthy need to be kept in\nhealth, and there is a vim, a vigor, a physical joy, comes from this\nhabit that I would that every child, young man and woman, and adult in\nthe land might enjoy. Here is what one intelligent writer, Mary Heath,\nhas recently said upon this subject, and her words I most heartily\nindorse:\n\n\u201cThe success of any scheme for human betterment, morally, mentally,\nor physically, depends upon securing human co-operation by convincing\nthe intellect of the truth or falsity of any widespread belief. The\nalmost universal notion that night air is dangerous has predisposed,\nmore than any other one cause, to the shutting of every door and window\nat sunset to keep out malaria. Notwithstanding the fact that all air\nanalyses show that outdoor night air is much purer than day air, the\nold fear of night air still remains, and is responsible for much\ninfection from foul air, because outdoor and indoor workers in summer\nand winter--all alike--spend their sleeping hours in ill-ventilated\nbedrooms. After false ideas about the harmfulness of fresh air are\neradicated, plans should be devised and utilized for arranging outdoor\nsleeping apartments; plans should also be devised for keeping the body\nwarm in cold weather without an over-amount of bedclothing; and for\nthe health and convenience of the millions of middle class and more\nor less humble domestic home workers, provisions should be made for\ndoing the housework as much as possible out of doors, away from the\nkitchen heat and odors of cooking food. Out-of-door recreation for the\nfamily should also be provided for. Could all sedentary workers spend\nthe seven to nine hours of sleep in a clean, outdoor atmosphere, many\nof the evil effects of indoor sedentary work would be neutralized. The\nshop, office, or factory employe, after sleeping in the pure night air,\nwould awake invigorated for the day\u2019s demands and duties. Beginning the\nday aright, with a keen normal appetite for healthful food, he would be\nable to utilize his working energies without either structural damage\nto the tissues, or intellectual or moral degradation.\u201d\n\nElbert Hubbard, of Roycroft fame, has converted all the sleeping-rooms\nof his phalanstery into outdoor rooms, where fresh, pure air is\nbreathed. Dr. Kellogg, editor of _Good Health_, sleeps out of doors all\nthe time, and all his large family of adopted children have rooms which\npractically contain no doors or windows, so that they sleep as near the\nopen air as civilization will allow.\n\nFor years, as far as was possible, I have slept out of doors. When\nat home my bed is on an open porch, my face turned to the stars, the\nwaving of plum, peach, and fig trees making music while I sleep, the\nbeautiful lights of earliest dawn cheering my eyes before I arise,\nand the twittering and singing of the birds putting melodies into my\nsoul as I dress. When I am in the wilds exploring, I sleep out of doors\nalways, when and where I can. Those who have read my various books know\nof my experiences of sleeping in storms, during heavy rains, without\nbedding in rocky washes, in leaky boats and the rain pouring upon\nus, in the heat of the desert, and the cold of the snowy plateaus of\nArizona. Yet I do not remember that I ever once \u201ctook cold,\u201d though I\nhave been wet through many a night. On the other hand, I never visit\ncivilization, especially the proud, haughty, conceited civilization of\nthe East, where houses are steam-heated, and street and railway cars\nare superheated, without taking severe colds and suffering much misery.\n\nThose who have heard Nansen and Peary and other arctic explorers\nwill remember that they had the same experience. Is it not apparent,\ntherefore, that the outdoor life is the normal, the healthful, the\nrational, the _natural_ life, while that of the steam-heated house is\nabnormal, unhealthful, irrational, and unnatural?\n\nPeople often say: But I see that my house is well ventilated, and\ntherefore the air is as pure and good as it is out of doors. In reply,\npermit me to say that no house can ever be well ventilated. Air to be\npure and wholesome must be _alive_. It can only live when free and\nuncontained, and in contact with the direct rays of the sun during the\nday. Every thoughtful person has noticed the great difference there is\nbetween outdoor air and indoor air, on stepping from outside inside,\neven through all the doors and windows of the room were wide open.\nThere is a vast difference between indoor and outdoor air, even under\nthe best of conditions; so get into the open all you can, day or\nnight, winter or summer, wet or dry.\n\nOne of the finest and strongest poems in the language is the following,\nby Richard Burton:\n\n\nGOD\u2019S GIFT, THE AIR\n\n    Now, is there anything that freer seems\n      Than air, the fresh, the vital, that a man\n    Draws in with breathings bountiful, nor dreams\n      Of any better bliss, because he can\n    Make over all his blood thereby, and feel\n    Once more his youth return, his muscles steel,\n      And life grow buoyant, part of God\u2019s good plan!\n\n    Oh, how on plain and mountain, and by streams\n      That shine along their path; o\u2019er many a field\n    Proud with pied flowers, or where sunrise gleams\n      In spangled splendors, does the rich air yield\n    Its balsam; yea, how hunter, pioneer,\n    Lover, and bard have felt that heaven was near\n      Because the air their spirit touched and healed!\n\n    And yet--God of the open!--look and see\n      The millions of thy creatures pent within\n    Close places that are foul for one clean breath,\n    Thrilling with health, and hope, and purity;\n      Nature\u2019s vast antidote for stain and sin,\n    Life\u2019s sweetest medicine this side of death!\n    How comes it that this largess of the sky\n    Thy children lack of, till they droop and die?\n\nMany white people go out tenting in the summer and think they are\nsleeping out of doors. What a foolish error. Here is what a scientific\nauthority says upon the subject:\n\n\u201cAre you tenting? If so, you should know:\n\n\u201cThat a well-closed tent is nearly air-tight, and consequently,--\n\n\u201cThat in an ordinary-sized tent, one occupant will so pollute the\nair as to render it unfit to breathe in less than twenty minutes; two\noccupants, in less than ten minutes.\n\n[Illustration: A CHEMEHUEVI INDIAN AND HIS OUT-OF-DOOR SHELTER FROM THE\nSUN.]\n\n\u201cThat if you are tenting for your health, an opening at each end of the\ntent must be provided for ventilation at night. The openings should be\nat least a foot square for each occupant.\n\n\u201cBreathing impure air lowers the vitality, and consequently renders one\nsusceptible to colds and other diseased conditions.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: CLIMBING ONE OF THE TRAILS IN HAVASU CANYON, ARIZONA.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE INDIAN AS A WALKER, RIDER, AND CLIMBER\n\n\nAs a part of his out-of-door life the Indian is a great walker and\nrunner, having horses he is a great rider, and living in a mountainous\nor canyon region he is a great climber. The Indian walks through\nnecessity, and also through delight and joy. He knows to the full \u201cthe\njoy of mere living.\u201d A few miles\u2019 walk, more or less, is nothing to\nhim, and he does it so easily that one can see he enjoys it. In one of\nmy books[1] I tell the story of the running powers of the Hopi Indians\nof northern Arizona. It is worth quoting here:\n\n[1] The Indians of the Painted Desert Region. Little, Brown & Co.,\nBoston, illustrated, $2.00 net, 20c postage.\n\n\u201cIt is no uncommon thing for an Oraibi or Mashonganavi to run from his\nhome to Moenkopi, a distance of forty miles, over the hot blazing sands\nof a real American Sahara, there hoe his corn-field, and return to his\nhome, within twenty-four hours. I once photographed, the morning after\nhis return, an old man who had made this eighty-mile run, and he showed\nnot the slightest trace of fatigue.\n\n\u201cFor a dollar I have several times engaged a young man to take a\nmessage from Oraibi to Keam\u2019s Canyon, a distance of seventy-two miles,\nand he has run on foot the whole distance, delivered his message, and\nbrought me an answer within thirty-six hours.\n\n\u201cOne Oraibi, Ku-wa-wen-ti-wa, ran from Oraibi to Moenkopi, thence to\nWalpi, and back to Oraibi, a distance of over ninety miles, in one day.\u201d\n\nI doubt not that most of my readers suppose that these experiences are\nrare and unusual, and come after special training. Not at all! They are\nregular occurrences, made without any thought that the white man was\neither watching or recording. When asked for the facts, the Indians\ngave them as simply and as unconcernedly as we might tell of a friend\nmet or a dinner eaten. And it is not with one tribe alone. I have found\nthe same endurance with Yumas, Pimas, Apaches, Navahos, Havasupais,\nWallapais, Chemehuevis, Utes, Paiutis, and Mohaves. Indeed, on the\ntrackless wastes of the Colorado desert the Mohaves and Yumas perhaps\nshow a greater endurance than any people I have ever seen.\n\nAs a horseback-rider the Indian can teach many things to the white\nrace. Among the Navahos and Hopis, the Havasupais and Wallapais,\nthe Pimas and Apaches, most of the children are taught to ride at\nan early age. They can catch, bridle, and saddle their own horses\nwhile they are still \u201clittle tots,\u201d and the way they ride is almost\na marvel. There need be no wonder at this, for their mothers are as\nused to horseback-riding as they are. Many an Indian child has come\nnear to being born on horseback. They ride up and down trails, over\nthe plains and up the mountains. They go with their parents gathering\nthe seeds and pinion nuts, and are also taught to handle their horses\nin the chase. They study \u201chorse-nature,\u201d and early become expert\nhorse-breakers. While their animals are broncos and wild, and therefore\nare never as well \u201cbroken\u201d as are ours, they compel them to every duty,\nand ride them fearlessly and constantly.\n\nThe girls and women, too, ride almost as much as the boys and men, and\n_always astride_. If anything were needed to demonstrate to an Indian\nwoman the inferiority of a white woman it would be that she sits on a\nside-saddle. The utter unnaturalness and folly of such a posture is so\nincomprehensible to the Indian mind that she \u201cthrows up her hands,\u201d\nfiguratively speaking, and gives up the problem of solving the peculiar\nmentality of her white sister. And I don\u2019t wonder! Thank God the day\nis passing when women are ashamed of having legs, or of placing one of\nthem on one side and the other on the other side of a horse. Common\nsense and comfort will ultimately prevail, and place the most modest,\nrefined, cultured, and womenly women upon the backs of their horses\ncavalier fashion, dressed in trousers. The idea that men should dictate\nto women what they should do to be womanly is so absurd as to make even\nfools laugh. What does a man know as to what is womanly? Women alone\ncan determine that question, just as men alone must determine what is\nmanly. So I am satisfied that I shall live to see womenly women--the\nbest the world has--reasonably _natural_ in their dress on horseback,\nand riding as the Creator evidently intended them to do.\n\nIf girls as well as boys of the white race were to ride horseback more,\nmuch disease would flee away. Liver and stomach troubles are shaken\nout of existence on horseback; the blue devils and constipation are\nalmost an impossibility, and the exhilaration of the swift motion and\nthe vivifying influence of the deeper breathing, the shaking up of the\nmuscles and nerves, the quickening effect of the accelerated heart\naction, and the readier circulation of well-oxygenated blood make the\nwhole body a-tingle with a newness of life that is glorious. If I were\nwell to do and had a score of children their chief education should be\nout of doors, and rain or shine, storm or calm, snow or sleet, winter\nor summer, boys and girls alike should ride horseback ten to twenty\nmiles or more each day.\n\n[Illustration: A ZUNI INDIAN WITH A JAR OF WATER UPON HER HEAD.]\n\nNor should this do away with daily walking. Walking is a fine offset\nto riding. One needs to walk a good deal to enjoy riding a good deal.\nOne is a necessary complement to the other. One exercise uses muscles\nthat are little called upon by the other. So I would make good walkers,\nin all weathers, of all boys, girls, men, and women of the white race,\neven as are those of the Indian race. In order to be good walkers the\nIndians have naturally found the most perfect and natural attitude for\nwalking. Every Indian walks upright, his abdomen in, chest up, chin\ndown, and spinal column easily carrying his body and arms. The white\nrace may well learn from the Indian how to keep the spinal column\nupright, how to have a graceful carriage in walking, and how to cure\nstooped shoulders. With all younger women and men of all ages among\nthe Indians a curved spine, ungraceful walk, and stooped shoulders are\npractically unknown. The women produce this result by carrying burdens\nupon their heads.\n\nYes, and the boys and men as well carry burdens also upon the head,\nthough not as much as the women. Burden carrying upon the head is a\ngood thing. As one writer has well said:\n\n\u201cMost of us are accustomed to regard the head as a mere thinking\nmachine, unconscious of the fact that this bony superstructure seems to\nhave been specially adapted by Nature to the carrying of heavy weights.\n\n\u201cThe arms are usually considered as the means intended for the bearing\nof burdens, but the effect of carrying heavy articles in the hands or\non the arms is very injurious, and altogether destructive of an erect\nor graceful carriage. The shoulders are dragged forward, the back\nloses its natural curve, the lungs are compressed, and internal organs\ndisplaced.\n\n\u201cWhen the head bears the weight of the burden, as it is made to do\namong the peasant women of Italy, Mexico, and Spain, and the people\nof the Far East, there is great gain in both health and beauty. The\nmuscles of the neck are strengthened, the spine held erect, the chest\nraised and expanded, so that breathing is full and deep, and the\nshoulders are held back in their natural position.\n\n[Illustration: A YOKUT INDIAN WITH A WHEELBARROW LOAD OF PEACHES\nAND FIGS. THE CARRYING BASKET IS SUSPENDED BY A BROAD BAND OVER THE\nFOREHEAD.]\n\n\u201cIt is a good thing for children to be early accustomed to the carrying\nof various articles, gradually increasing in weight, balanced upon the\nhead. In this way they may acquire an erect carriage, and free and\ngraceful walk.\u201d\n\nThe Indian man and woman will pick up an olla of water, containing a\ngallon or more, and swinging it easily to the top of the head will walk\nalong with hands by their sides, as unconcernedly as if they carried no\nfragile bowl balanced and ready to fall at the slightest provocation.\nAnd they will climb up steep and difficult trails, still balancing\nthe jar upon the head. The effect of this is to compel a natural and\ndignified carriage. I know Navaho, Hopi, and Havasupai women who\nwalk with a simple dignity that is not surpassed in drawing-room of\npresident or king.\n\nThen, too, another reason for this dignified, healthfully erect\ncarriage is found in the fact that neither men nor women wear\nhigh-heeled shoes. The moccasin is always flat, and therefore the foot\nof the Indian rests firmly and securely upon the floor. No doubt if the\nIndian woman wished to imitate the forward motion of the kangaroo, or\nany other frivolous creature, she could tilt herself in an unnatural\nand absurd position by high-heeled shoes, but in all my twenty-five\nyears of association with them I never found one foolish enough to do\nso.\n\nThe men, as well as the women, gain this upright attitude as the\nresult of \u201cholding up their vital organs\u201d when they go for their long\nhunting and other tramps. It seems to me that fully one-half the white\nmen (and women) we meet on the streets are suffering from prolapsus\nof the transverse colon. This is evidenced by the projection of the\nabdomen, which generally grows larger as they grow older; so that we\nhave \u201ctailors for fat men,\u201d and special implements of torture for\ncompressing into what we call a decent shape the _embonpoint_ of women.\nBut, I ask, as I see the Indians, _why do white people have this\npaunch?_\n\n[Illustration: APACHE MAIDEN CARRYING A BASKET WATER OLLA UPON HER\nHEAD. FULL OF WATER THIS WEIGHS MANY POUNDS.]\n\nAn Indian with a \u201cbay-window\u201d stomach, a paunch, is seldom, if ever\nseen. Why? He has long ago learned the art, the necessity, of keeping\nhis abdominal muscles stretched tight. His belly is always held in. The\nmuscles across his abdomen are like steel. The result is the transverse\ncolon is held securely in position. It has no prolapse, hence there\nis no paunch. If we taught ourselves, as the Indian does, to draw in\nthe abdomen and at the same time breathe long and deep, this prolapsus\nwould be practically impossible. Half the medicine that is sold to\nso-called \u201ckidney sufferers\u201d is sold to people whose kidneys are no\nmore diseased than are those of the man in the moon. It is the pulling\nand tugging of the falling colon that causes the wearisome backache;\nand the lying and scoundrelous wretches who prey upon the ignorant\nwrite out their catch-penny advertisements describing these feelings,\nso that when the sufferer picks up their literature he is as good as\nentrapped for \u201ca dozen or more bottles,\u201d or until his money gives out.\n\nO men and women of America, learn to walk upright, as God intended\nyou should. Do not become \u201cchesty\u201d by throwing out your chest, and\nthrowing your shoulders back at the expense of your spine, but pull\nin the muscles of your abdomen, fill your lungs with air, then pull\nyour chin down and in, and you will soon have three great, grand, and\nglorious blessings; viz., a dignified, upright carriage; freedom from\nand reasonable assurance that you will never have prolapsus of the\ntransverse colon and its attendant miseries and backache; and a lung\ncapacity that will help you withstand the approaches of disease should\nyou ever, in some other way, come under its malign influence.\n\nWhen I see white boys slouching and shambling along the streets I wish\nwith a great wish that I could have them put under the training of some\nof my wild Indian friends. They would soon brace up; heads would be\nheld erect, chins down, abdomen in, chest up, and with lips closed, and\nthe pure air of the mountain, canyon, plain, desert, or forest entering\ntheir lungs through the nostrils; the whole aspect of life would begin\nto change. For \u201cnothing lifts up the spirits so much as just to lift\nthe chest up. It takes a load off the head, off the mind, off the\nheart. Raise your chest so high that the abdominal organs perform their\nfunctions in a proper way. When one is all doubled over, the head and\nspine are deprived of blood that they are entitled to. When the chest\nis lifted up, the abdominal organs are compressed, and the blood that\nhas been retired from the circulation and accumulated in the liver\nand the stomach is forced back into the current where it belongs. The\nhead and spinal cord get their proper supply of blood, and one feels\nrefreshed and energized immediately.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: HAVASUPAI CHILD WITH WATER BOTTLE SUSPENDED FROM THE\nFOREHEAD.]\n\nBut in addition to their walking and riding the Indians are great\nclimbers of steep canyon and mountain trails. Men, women, and children\nalike pass up and down these trails with almost the ease and agility\nof the goat. I have seen a woman with a _kathak_ (carrying basket)\nsuspended from her forehead containing a load of fruit, of pine nuts,\nof grass seeds, weighing not less than from 50 to 100 lbs., her baby\nperched on top of the load, steadily and easily climb a trail that made\nme puff and blow like a grampus. Few exercises, properly taken, are\nof greater benefit to the lungs and heart, and indeed, all the vital\norgans, than is trail or mountain climbing. See that your clothing is\neasy, especially around the waist, for there must be room for every\neffort of lung expansion. This applies to men as well as to women, for\nthe wretched and injurious habit is growing among men of wearing a\nbelt instead of suspenders. If the prospective climber is a woman, let\nher wear a loose, light dress, and with as short a skirt as her common\nsense, judgment, and conscience will allow her to wear. If she is out\n\u201cin the wilds,\u201d let her wear trousers and discard skirts entirely as a\nsenseless and barbarous slavery to custom and convention. Shoes should\nbe easy and comfortable, with thick soles and broad, _low_ heels.\n\n[Illustration: CLIMBING THE TRAILS IN THE CANYON OF THE HAVASU,\nARIZONA.]\n\nBegin to climb as early in the morning as possible. Don\u2019t try to do\ntoo much at first. Try a small hill. Conquer that by degrees. Get so\nthat you can finally go up and down without any great effort. Then\ntackle the higher hills, and finally try real mountains, eight, ten,\nfourteen thousand feet high. If you are delicate to begin with be more\ncareful still, and ask the advice of your physician, but don\u2019t be\nafraid so long as you do not get fatigued to exhaustion. For climbing\ndevelops the thighs and calves of the leg, the muscles of the back,\nenlarges the lungs, makes the heart pump more and purer (because better\noxygenated) blood throughout the whole body, brings about more rapid\nchanges in the material of the body, and thus exchanges old and useless\ntissue for new and healthy, dissolves and dissipates fat, induces\nperspiration and exhalations through the kidneys that are peculiarly\nbeneficial.\n\nIn breathing be sure to keep the mouth closed. Insist upon _nasal_\nbreathing, and the exercise will perforce make it _deep_ breathing. The\ndeeper you breathe the more good you will get from it. Let the posture\nbe correct or you will lose much good. This is in brief: pull the\nabdomen in, raise the chest, keep the chin down, and let the arms hang\neasily and naturally by the side.\n\nFor years I have compelled myself to seize every possible opportunity\nfor trail climbing or descending. Hundreds of miles of trails have I\ngone up and down in the Grand Canyon of Arizona, often with a thirty,\nforty, fifty pound camera and food supplies on my back. I have ascended\nscores of mountains throughout the Southwest, and the rich experiences\nof glowing health and vigor, vim, snap, tingle, that come from such\nexercises no one can know but those who have enjoyed them.\n\nA few weeks ago I came to the Grand Canyon (September, 1907), after\nnearly a year of rest from physical labor on an extended scale (my\ncivilized occupations had pre-empted all my time). I started out on\nthe trail, up and down Havasu Canyon, Bass Trail of the Grand Canyon,\nand the Grand View and Red Canyon trails. Again and again I walked up\nthe steepest portions for a mile at a time, setting the pace for the\nhorses and mules, and it was a source of mental as well as physical\ndelight that my lungs, heart, and body generally were in such good\ncondition that I could do this day after day for two weeks, not only\nwithout exhaustion, but with positive exhilaration and physical\ndelight.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE INDIAN IN THE RAIN AND THE DIRT\n\n\nHow these \u201cthings we may learn from the Indian\u201d grow upon us, as we\nstudy the \u201cnoble red man\u201d in his own haunts. Again and again I have\nnoticed that \u201c_he doesn\u2019t know enough to go in when it rains_.\u201d The\nwhite man who first coined that expression deemed it an evidence of\nsmartness, and reared his head more proudly than his fellows because he\nwas the author of so bright an idea. Yet when you come to consider it,\nwhat a foolish proposition it is! Go in when it rains? Why should you\ngo in? Do the birds go in? I have just been watching them from my study\nwindow,--larks, linnets, song-sparrows, and mocking-birds. Not one of\nthem seems to care a particle about the rain, and their songs are as\nsweet and as cheery and as full of melody as they are on the days of\nbrightest sunshine. How well I recall seeing a mocking-bird on a stand\non my lawn one day when the rain was pouring down fiercely. He stood\nwith bill up and tail down so that he had a very \u201cGothic-roof-like\u201d\nappearance, his mouth wide open, and as the rain poured from the end\nof his tail he sent out a flood of melody more rich and sweet than any\nbird-song I ever heard.\n\nAnd the horses! How they enjoy the rain! I have seen them loose in\na stable having double doors, the upper of which was open, and when\nit rained they would thrust their noses out into the rain and let\nthe drippings of the eaves fall upon them with evident pleasure and\nlonging that they might get out into it all over.\n\n[Illustration: HEALTHY NAVAHO CHILDREN USED TO THE RAIN AND THE OUT OF\nDOORS.]\n\nNothing alive in Nature save \u201ccivilized\u201d man dreads the rain. The\nIndian fairly revels in it. I was once at the Havasupai village for a\ncouple of weeks, the guest of my friend Wa-lu-tha-ma. His little girl,\nseven years old, was a perfect little witch. She was quick, nervy,\nlively, and healthy. When it rained and her clothes got wet I tried to\nprevail upon her to come into shelter. But no! She wanted to be out in\nthe rain, and off she sprang through the door, playing with the pools\nas they collected, and running with others of her playmates to where\nthe extemporized waterfalls dashed themselves into semi-spray as they\nfell from the heights above upon the shelving rocks. Here they stood,\nin the water and rain, like dusky fairies, laughing and shouting,\nromping and sporting, in perfect glee.\n\nThe older women, too, mind it but little, unless it is very cold or the\nwind is blowing. They no more mind being wet than they do that the wind\nshould blow or the sun shine, and as for any ill effect that either\nchildren or grown-ups suffer from the wet, I have yet to see it. Why?\nThe reasons are clear. In the first place, they have no fear of the\nrain. It is not constantly instilled into their minds from childhood\nthat \u201cthey mustn\u2019t get wet, or they\u2019ll take cold,\u201d and girls are not\ntaught to expect functional disarrangement if they \u201cget their feet\nwet.\u201d This has something to do with it, for the effect of the mind upon\nthe body is far more potent than we yet know.\n\nIn the second place, they move about with natural activity in the rain\nas at other times. This keeps the blood circulating and prevents any\nlowering of the temperature of the body.\n\nIn the third place, their general out-of-door life gives them such a\nrobustness that if there is any tax upon the system it is fully ready\nto meet it.\n\nBut I am asked, \u201cWould you advocate white people, especially girls\nand women, getting wet? Think of their skirts bedraggled in the rain,\nand how these wet skirts cling to the ankles and make their wearers\nuncomfortable.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN KISH IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA.]\n\nI have thought a great deal about this, and am not prepared to say\nthat with our present costume I would advocate women\u2019s going out much\nin the rain. But I do say that once in a while they can put on short\nskirts and stout shoes and such old clothes as cannot be injured by\ngetting wet, and then resolutely and boldly sally forth into the rain,\nand the harder it comes down the better, if it be warm weather. Then\nlet them learn to enjoy the pattering of the rain upon cheeks and ears.\nLet them hold out their hands and feel the soft and gentle caresses of\nthe \u201chigh-born, noble rain.\u201d Let them watch the drops as they spatter\non the leaves and trickle down the stems, gathering volume and speed\nas they reach the bole and fall to the ground, there to give life and\nnourishment to the whole plant. Everything in Nature loves to be out\nin the rain. How fresh and bright the trees look after a shower! How\nthe rocks are cleansed and made bright and shining! How their color\ncomes vividly out in the rain! And upon human beings the effect is\nthe same, provided they value health and vigor more than they mind a\nlittle discomfort in the bedragglement of their clothes. Years ago I\nlearned this lesson. I was riding from the line of the railway, over\nthe Painted Desert, with several Havasupai Indians. It was the rainy\nseason. Showers fell half a dozen times a day. At first I wished I had\nan umbrella. I got wet through, and so did the Indians. I thought I\nought to feel wretched and miserable, but somehow the Indians were as\nbright and cheerful as ever, so I plucked up heart and courage, and in\nhalf an hour my clothes were dry again. Four or five times that day and\nan equal number the next day, I got wet through and dry again. Riding\nhorseback kept me warm, and the quick and healthful circulation of the\nblood, the active deep breathing caused by the exercise, the absence of\nfear in the soul, all combined to make the wetting a benefit instead of\nan injury.\n\nMy friend W. W. Bass, of the Grand Canyon of Arizona, with whom I have\nmade many trips in that Wonderland region, tells with great gusto a\ntrue story of my riding over the desert on one occasion, clothed in one\nof the old-fashioned linen dusters that reached below my knees. It was\nwarm weather, and dusty on the railway, hence the duster, I suppose.\nBut when we got fairly out on the desert it began to rain, and how\nit did pour! It came down so rapidly that by and by my pockets were\nfull of water, and Bass says that when he overtook me, I was jogging\nalong, singing at the top of my voice (just as the mocking-bird did),\nthe water splashing out of my pockets as I bounced up and down in the\nsaddle. The linen duster clung to the sides and back of the horse, and\nwrapped itself around my legs so that the picture was comical in the\nextreme. But I was happy, and refused to feel any discomfort, and so\ngot joy out of the experience, as well as health and vigor. For let it\nbe remembered that when I came from England, twenty-five years ago, I\ncame as an invalid, broken down in health completely; so much so that I\nwas even forbidden to read a book for a whole year. Now few men are as\nhealthy as I. Years of association with the Indian, learning simplicity\nand naturalness of him, have aided materially in making the change. I\nhave learned the value of putting the primary things first. I used to\nbe so \u201cnice\u201d and \u201cfinnicky\u201d that the idea of having my clothes wet\nwould give me a small panic. \u201cThey would get out of shape and look\nbadly, and have to be pressed before I could wear them again.\u201d But when\nI came to the conclusion that I was worth more than clothes, that my\nhealth was of more importance than a crease in my trousers, I found I\nwas taking hold of a principle which, while it might at times seem to\nbe rough on my clothing, would have a decidedly beneficial influence on\nmyself.\n\nAnd this leads to another important lesson we may learn from the\nIndian. He is not as \u201cnice\u201d sometimes as I wish he were, but we are far\ntoo nice, often, for health and comfort. Many a woman ruins her health\nby wrecking her nerves, drives her husband distracted, worries and\nannoys her children, by being too nice in her house. I have found, in\nNew England and elsewhere,--aye, even in Old England,--women who valued\na clean house more than they valued their own lives, the happiness of\ntheir children, and the comfort of their husbands. Indeed, in one case\nI well remember a woman drove her husband into temporary insanity, and\nfinally into ignominious flight away from her, by her eternal washing\nof floors, shaking of carpets, polishing of furniture, and dusting\ndown. Every time the poor fellow went in from the workshop he must\nchange his clothes. If he came in from the outside he must take off his\nshoes before he entered the door. If he put his warm hand down on the\npolished table he was rebuked, for his wife at once got up, fetched\nher chamois leather and rubbed off the offending marks. Poor, wretched\nwoman, and equally poor, wretched man! No wonder he went crazy, and\nfinally lost his manhood and ran away.\n\nI know this is an extreme case. But I vouch for its strict truth.\nAnd there are thousands of women (and men too, for that matter) who\nare afflicted in a serious measure with the same disease. In that\nhome where niceness is valued more than health and comfort and work\nin life, there lurks serious danger. Go to the Indian, and while I do\nnot suggest that you lose all niceness by any means, seek to learn\nsome of his philosophy and place primary things first. First, health,\nhappiness, comfort, peace, contentment, love; _then_ these other things.\n\n[Illustration: HOPI CHILDREN ENJOYING THEIR DAILY SPORT ON THE BACK OF\nA BURRO.]\n\nI\u2019m going to make a confession that I am afraid will bring me into\nsad repute with some of my readers. When my first boy was born,\nwe were naturally very proud of him. As he grew out of his baby\nclothes we liked to see him look nice and neat and clean. He must be\na pretty little cherub, dressed in white and have the manners of a\nLittle Lord Fauntleroy. Then I came to the conclusion that we were\nvaluing \u201cniceness\u201d more than the healthy development of the child.\nI remonstrated and urged a change but to no effect, so I resolved\non a _coup d\u2019\u00e9tat_. One morning after the youngster was dressed up\nin his white bib and tucker, and as uncomfortable and unhappy as\nany and all healthy children feel at such treatment, I took him by\nthe hand and led him out of doors and out of sight of all watchful\neyes, where there was plenty of mud and plenty of water. In half an\nhour his changed appearance was a marvel. We started a little stream\nof water, which we then dammed. We made mud pies, and I helped him\nmix the \u201cdough\u201d in his apron. We reveled in mud from top to toe. I\nrolled him in it, so that back was as vividly marked as front. Not a\nremnant of niceness was left in him. We went home happy and contented,\nlaughing and merry, but bedaubed and beplastered everywhere. We had had\nsuch a good time. And it was such fun going out with father. We were\ngoing again to-morrow and the next day and the next. And so we did.\nIt needed no words, no argument. It did not take long to get two or\nthree suits of brown canvas or blue denim, and the youngster grew up\nhealthy, happy, vigorous, strong, tough, and often dirty, rather than\nan\u00e6mic, miserable, dyspeptic, weak and ailing, and _nice_. There would\nbe far less demand for children\u2019s tombstones, surmounted with marble\nangels and inscribed with wretched doggerel, if mothers valued health\nrather than niceness, vigor before primness, and strength immaculate\nrather than bibs and aprons. So I say, let us not be over-nice. And\nespecially let us not train our children to value clean hands and\nclothes more than the rugged health that comes from contact with the\nsoil in out-of-door employments. I find one can enjoy Homer, and\nBrowning, Dante, and Shakspere, all the better because his body is\nvigorous and strong, his brain clear, and his mind active as the result\nof rough-and-tumble mountain climbing, desert tramping or riding, and\nwalking on canyon trails.\n\nAnother result of this frank and fearless acceptance of out-of-door\nconditions is manifested in a readiness to meet difficulties that\nover-niceness is disinclined to touch. Let me illustrate. Two or three\nmonths ago I made a journey with two Yuma Indians and four white men\ndown the overflow of the Colorado River to the Salton Sea. We were\nwarned beforehand that it would be \u201can awfully hard trip.\u201d We were told\nthat it was \u201chell boiled down\u201d to try to go through certain places. The\nriver for ten or twelve miles left its bed and ran wild over a vast\ntract of land covered with a mesquite forest. Mesquite is a fairly\ndense tree growth covered with strong and piercing thorns. When we\ncame to this place we had to cut our way through the thorny thicket,\nand our faces, hands, and bodies all suffered with fierce scratchings\nand thorn-pricks. Several times we stuck fast, and there was nothing\nfor it but to jump out into the water with ax in hand and cut away the\nobstructions or lift over the boat. My Indian, Jim, though dignified\nand serene, as I shall fully explain elsewhere, had the promptness\nthat over-niceness destroys. He was out over the side of the boat as\nquickly as I was, ready for the hard and disagreeable work. Had I\nbeen \u201cnicely\u201d dressed, and \u201cnice\u201d about the feeling of water up to my\nmiddle, too \u201cnice\u201d to wade for hours, sinking into quicksands, in order\nto find the best passage for the boats, we should have been there yet.\nWe cut down three mesquite trees, under water, in order to get our\nboats over the stumps. We forced our way through tall and dense arrow\nweeds, one in front and the other behind the boat, lifting and forcing,\npulling and pushing. It was not \u201cnice\u201d work, but it was invigorating,\nstimulating, and soul-developing.\n\n[Illustration: IN THE MESQUITE FOREST ON OUR WAY TO THE SALTON SEA.]\n\nThe other day I went photographing on the Salton Sea. When the launch\nstopped twenty feet from the island covered with pelicans, where I\nwished to make photographs, I shouldered my camera, stepped out into\nthe water, which came up to my thighs, and walked ashore. The engineer\nwondered. Why should he? Had I waited, the pelicans would have flown\naway. Speed was necessary. \u201cNiceness\u201d would have prevented my getting\nwhat I went for. When I stand on the lecture platform, or in the\npulpit, or in the drawing-room; when I meet ladies in the parlor and\ngo with them for an automobile ride, I dress as neatly as I can afford,\nand endeavor to look \u201cnice;\u201d but when I go into my garden to work, I\nput on blue overalls, a flannel shirt, and a pair of heavy shoes, and I\ntry not to be nice. I roll around in the dirt, I feel it with my hands,\nI revel in it, for thus, I find, do I gain healthful enjoyment for\nbody, mind, and soul. I owe many things to the Indian, but few things\nI am more grateful for than that he taught me how to value important\nthings more than \u201clooking neat\u201d and being \u201cnice.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nTHE INDIAN AND PHYSICAL LABOR\n\n\nMinisters and orators, teachers and statesmen, members of the W. C.\nT. U., as well as the Y. M. C. A., of the white race, all profess to\nbelieve that the white race believes in the dignity of physical labor.\n\nThat profession is often a lie.\n\nWe no more believe in the dignity of physical labor than we do in the\nrefinement of a hog. Our actions give the direct lie to our words.\nI am writing with the utmost calmness, and say these strong words\nwith deliberate intent. As a nation we are humbugs when we pretend to\nbelieve in the dignity of labor. Perhaps, after all, we do believe\nin it, but in most cases it is not for ourselves, but for \u201cthe other\nfellow.\u201d\n\nOn the other hand, the Indian really and truly believes in the dignity\nof physical labor. A chief would just as soon be \u201ccaught\u201d dressing\nbuckskin, or sewing a pair of moccasins, or irrigating his corn-field\nas lolling on a Navaho blanket \u201csmoking the pipe of peace.\u201d With the\nwhite race this is not so. Men believe in the dignity of labor as much\nas they do in the brotherhood of man. They would no more be seen doing\nphysical labor--wheeling a wheelbarrow, for instance, digging a ditch,\nbuilding a wall, plowing a potato patch, or doing any other physical\nwork, save the few things men are allowed to do without being thought\npeculiar, as, for instance, taking care of a small home garden, taking\nthe ashes out of the furnace, and things of that kind--than they would\nbe seen picking their neighbors\u2019 pockets or burglarizing their houses.\nWhen they want to gain exercise they go to some indoor gymnasium, where\nthe air is the breathed-over, dead air of a hundred people, and they\nswing dumb-bells, pull on weights, struggle frantically on bars, and\ndo other similar and fool-like things, because, forsooth, these things\nare gentlemanly; or they go out and swing golf-clubs and pursue a poor\ninnocent little ball over the \u201clinks,\u201d while gaping caddies look on at\ntheir wild strokes, and listen to the insane profanity with which they\ntry to compel themselves to believe that they are \u201cgentlemen, bah Jove!\u201d\n\n[Illustration: A HAVASUPAI GIRL, WEAVER OF BASKETS.]\n\nOf all the contemptible, shuffling, and mean subterfuges the white\nrace is capable of, this seems to me to be about the meanest and most\ncontemptible. To pretend to believe in the dignity of labor, and then\nat any and all opportunities afforded to labor to dodge away and do\nthese useless and selfish things that do not take off one ounce of the\nburden of physical labor we have imposed upon our fellows.\n\nLet me not be thought for a moment to be opposed to any healthful\nrecreation or sport. If golf be pursued as a recreation, for fun, I am\nheartily in accord with it and its promoters. It is when it is taken as\nan \u201cexercise,\u201d as a _substitute for honest and useful labor_, that I\nprotest against it, as a fraud, a delusion, a snare, and a contemptible\nsubterfuge. If you want real exercise, real work, go and relieve some\npoor fellow-man of his excess of hard work. Tell him you have come\nto give him an hour\u2019s rest, that he may go and study nature, go and\nlook at the flowers of your garden, wander into the woods and hear the\nbirds sing, or visit the public library and read some entertaining and\ninstructive book. If you are too ashamed to openly try to give an hour\nor two of rest and change to your \u201cbrother\u201d man, go and chop the wood\nfor the house, dig up the potato patch, wheel out the manure from the\nstable, or do some other _useful_ and beneficial thing. Pleasure is\npleasure, sport is sport, fun is fun, but to engage in these sports\nseriously, as a physical exercise to counteract the effects of your\nevil dietetic habits or other grossnesses, is to add hypocrisy and\nsubterfuge to evil living.\n\n[Illustration: HOPI INDIAN WEAVING A DRESS FOR HIS WIFE.]\n\nWhat labor the Indian has to do he does gladly, cheerfully, openly. He\nis not ashamed to have soiled hands or to be caught in the act. In this\nI am heartily in accord with him. If I ever wrote a creed one of the\nfirst articles of my religion would be: \u201cI believe in the benefit and\njoy of physical labor.\u201d If I had my way I would compel every member\nof the so-called \u201clearned\u201d professions (!), from preacher to lawyer,\nteacher and doctor, statesman, politician, and bartender, to spend not\nless than three hours at hard physical labor _every day_, and as for my\nbrother preachers, I would put them to road-making every Monday, for\nhalf the day at least, so that by practical knowledge of road-making on\nearth they might be better able to preach to their congregations the\nfollowing Sunday about the road to heaven. There is nothing that more\nreveals that we are a people of _caste_ and class than the attitude of\nthe rich and the \u201clearned\u201d toward physical labor. I am not in sympathy\nwith that attitude in any respect; I despise, hate, loathe it, and\nwould see it changed. To the Indian, for his honest respect for and\nindulgence in physical labor, I give my adherence and honor.\n\n[Illustration: VARIOUS ARTICLES OF USE AND ORNAMENT MADE AND DECORATED\nBY INDIANS.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE INDIAN AND PHYSICAL LABOR FOR GIRLS AND WOMEN\n\n\nIn the preceding chapter I have given the Indian\u2019s life, habit,\nthought, towards physical labor for himself and his sons. He holds the\nsame attitude toward it for his daughter and his wife. And not only\ndoes he so hold it, but the wife and daughter regard it in exactly the\nsame way. The out-door life of the Indian girl and woman makes her\nhealthy, vigorous, muscular, and strong. She glories in her physical\nvigor and strength, and wonders why her white sister is not equal to\nher in physical capacity. When I tell her that the white women pity her\nbecause, forsooth, \u201cshe has to do so much hard work, while the lazy\nmen sit by, smoking, and doing nothing,\u201d she looks at me in vacant\namazement. Once when I was talking in this way one of them said: \u201cAre\nyour white women all fools? Tell them we not only don\u2019t need their\npity, but we despise them for their habits of life that lead them to\npity us. The Creator made us with the capacity and power for work. He\nknows that all beings must work if they would be healthy. We would\nbe healthy, and therefore we do His will in working at our appointed\ntasks. We are glad and proud to do them. And as for the men: let them\ndare to interfere in our work and they will soon see what they will\nsee. We brook no interference or help from them.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: HOPI WOMEN BUILDING A HOUSE AT ORAIBI, ARIZONA.]\n\nSo their children (girls as well as boys) are all brought up from\nthe earliest years to work, and to work hard. Boys are sent out to\nherd sheep, horses, and cattle; to watch the corn and see that nothing\ndisturbs it. And the girls, as soon as they can toddle, become \u201clittle\nmothers\u201d to their younger brothers and sisters. As they grow older they\ngrind all the corn, gather all the wild grass and other seeds, make all\nthe basketry and pottery, and prepare all the food for the household.\nTo grind corn in the Indian fashion, with flat rock and metate, is\nno easy task for a strong man of the white race, yet I have known a\ngirl of fifteen to keep at work at the metate for ten hours a day for\nseveral days in succession, in order that there might be plenty of\nflour when guests came to the Snake Dance.\n\nOn one of my visits to the Hopi village of Oraibi I found the women\nat work building a house. This is their occupation. All labor among\nHopis is divided between the sexes in accordance with long-established\ncustom, and I think it is so divided in all aboriginal peoples. The\nmen undertook the protection of the home (were the warriors) and the\nhunting of animals for food. They also make the robes and moccasins.\nThose tribes that lost their nomad character and became sedentary added\ncare of the fields and the stock to the work of their men. The women\npractically undertook all the rest. The building of the home, its care,\nthe general gathering of seeds, and the preparation of all foods belong\nto them.\n\nAnd as a rule, they do their chosen or appointed or hereditary work\ncheerfully. They know nothing of the aches and pains of their weaker\nwhite sisters; they are as strong as men, so they have no fear of\nphysical labor. Not only this, but they enjoy it; they go to it with\npleasure, as all healthy bodies do. How often have I stood and watched\na healthy, vigorous man swing a hammer at the forge, or in a mine\nor a trench. How easily it was done, how gladly, how unconscious of\neffort! To the healthy woman, with reasonable strength, labor is also a\npleasure. To feel one\u2019s self accomplishing something, and able to do it\nwithout undue fatigue or exhaustion, what a delight it is!\n\nThe woman who honors us by coming to our house weekly to do the heavy\nwork, often reminds me of a panther. She fairly \u201cleaps\u201d upon her work\nwith an exuberance of strength and spirit that is a perfect delight,\nin this age of woman\u2019s physical disability and disinclination to do\nphysical labor.\n\n[Illustration: NAVAHO MAIDENS CARRYING WATER OVER THE DESERT].\n\nSo it is with Indian women. They sing in unison when a dozen of them\nget together at the grinding-trough; though the work is hard enough,\nwhen long continued, to exhaust any strong man. I have seen women kneel\nand pound acorns all day, lifting a heavy pestle as high as their heads\nat every stroke. In the case of these women builders at Oraibi: they\ncarried all the heavy rocks and put them in position, mixed their own\nmortar, and were their own paddies, and in everything, save the placing\nof the heavy crossbeams for the roof, to handle which they called upon\nsome of the men for aid, they did all the work from beginning to end.\n\n[Illustration: INDIAN MAIDENS TAUGHT BY THEIR MOTHER TO BE BASKET\nWEAVERS.]\n\nNow, while I do not especially want to see white women building a\nhouse, I do wish, with all my heart, that they had the physical\nstrength to do it or similar arduous labor. I do long for the whole of\nmy race that the women and girls shall have such vigorous health and\nstrength that no ordinary labor could tire them.\n\n\u201cBut,\u201d say my white friends,--women and girls,--\u201cwe don\u2019t want to work\nphysically; there is no need for it; we are not strong enough to do\nit; we exhaust ourselves, and then do not have energy enough for the\nother duties of life; we engage servants to do our menial labor for us.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: COAHUILA BASKET WEAVER WORKING IN THE OPEN AIR.]\n\nIndeed! In the first place I want to protest with all the power I have\nagainst the word and idea \u201cmenial.\u201d There is no menial service. All\nservice, rendered in willing helpfulness and love, is dignified, noble,\nand ennobling. He or she who accepts service from another with the idea\nthat the service is \u201cmenial,\u201d thereby degrades himself, herself, far\nmore than the person is \u201cdegraded\u201d by the performance of the service.\nI would rather have my son a good scavenger, working daily to keep the\ncity pure and clean, than be an \u201chonored\u201d lawyer, engaged in dishonest\ncases; a \u201csuccessful\u201d politician, tangled up with graft; a \u201cpopular\u201d\nphysician, selfishly deceiving his patients; or an \u201celoquent\u201d and\n\u201cdear\u201d minister, self-righteously lauding himself and pouring forth\ninane platitudes in high-sounding phrases from the pulpit. \u201cMenial\nservice\u201d is divine compared with these occupations when they are\ndemoralized.\n\nAnd the principle of all I have said applies to girls as well as\nboys. I would rather that daughters of mine should be able to scrub\nthe floor, bake bread, do the family washing and mending, repair the\nboys\u2019 clothes, knit, sew, and take care of the kitchen garden and the\nflowers, than strum \u201cThe Battle of Prague\u201d or \u201cThe Maiden\u2019s Prayer,\u201d\nwithout feeling or expression, on a half-tuned piano. The former\noccupations are holy and dignified as compared with the sham exhibition\nof the latter. I like to see a girl with an apron on, strong, healthy,\nwilling, useful, capable, engaged in useful household work, and if our\nyoung men had one-tenth part of the sense they ought to have, they\nwould hunt for such girls to become their wives and the mothers of\ntheir children, rather than for the dainty, white-faced, wasp-waisted,\nfinger-manicured dolls who are useful for no other purpose than to be\nlooked at.\n\nI have no desire to make pack-horses or slaves of intelligent women\nor girls, but I cannot help asking the question of them: \u201cWhich would\nyou rather be, strong enough to do any and all so-called menial and\nlaborious service, and endowed with perfect health, or be weakly\nand puny and live the life of ease and luxury that most women and\ngirls seem to covet?\u201d And upon the answer to that question should I\nbase my judgment as to the wisdom, intelligence, and fitness for the\nduties of life of the answerer. There is no dignity in woman superior\nto the dignity of being able personally (if necessary) to care for\nall the physical needs of her household; there is no charm greater\nthan the charm of strength combined with gracious, womanly sweetness\nexercised for the joy of others; there is no refinement greater than\nthe refinement of a gloriously healthy woman radiating physical,\nmental, spiritual life upon all those who come within the sphere of her\ninfluence.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nTHE INDIAN AND DIET\n\n\nA man is largely the result of what he eats. Indeed, many scientific\nspecialists now tell us that sex determination is largely the result\nof the food eaten by the expectant mother, so that according to what\nthe mother eats the unborn child becomes--male or female. Ploss in\nhis well-known \u201c_Ueber die das Geschlechtsverh\u00e4ltniss der Kinder\nbedingenden Ursachen_,\u201d D\u00fcsing in his painstaking \u201c_Die Regulirung des\nGeschlechtsverh\u00e4ltnisses bei der Vernehrung der Menschen, Miere und\nPflanzen_,\u201d and Westermarck in the \u201cHistory of Human Marriage,\u201d prove\nconclusively, from close study of actual experimentation, that the sex\nof the child is largely fixed by the quantity and quality of nutrition\nabsorbed by the mother. Hence it is not too strong a statement that a\nman is largely the result of his (or his mother\u2019s) food.\n\nAt first sight it will appear foolish to many of my readers to go\nto the Indian for ideas on diet, yet I think I can prove, more\nconclusively than the learned scientists whose books I have named above\ncan prove their theories, that the Indian has many ideas on diet which\nthe white race can learn to its great advantage.\n\n[Illustration: HAVASUPAI WOMAN MAKING BREAD IN THE OPEN AIR.]\n\nIn the first place, the normal aborigine, before he began to use the\nwhite man\u2019s foods, was perforce compelled to live on a comparatively\nsimple diet. His choice was limited, his cookery simple. Yet he lived\nin perfect health and strength. With few articles of diet, and these\nof the simplest character, prepared in the readiest and easiest ways,\nhe attained a vigor, a robustness, that puts to shame the strength\nand power of civilized men. Why? The reasons are not far to seek. In\nsimplicity of food there is safety. We eat not only too much, but too\ngreat variety, and every student of dietetics knows that the greater\nthe variety the greater the possibility that too much will be eaten.\nThe Indian, living his simple life, was compelled to be content with\nthe maize, beans, pumpkins, and melons of his fields, the peaches of\nhis orchards, the wild grass seeds, nuts, fruits, and roots he or\nhis squaw could gather, and the products of his traps or the chase.\nHere, then, was a restricted dietary. He had not much choice, nor a\nlarge menu for each meal. The smaller the menu the less, as a rule,\nany person will eat, be he Indian or white man. The extended menu is\na series of temptations to overeat. The simple menu of the Indian was\na preventive to gluttony. It will doubtless be recalled that when the\ngreat Bismarck was broken down in health, his physicians gave him no\nother prescription as to food than that he should eat but one kind of\nfood to a meal. This is a dietetic axiom: The less variety the less one\neats. In a diseased condition health can often be restored by giving\nthe stomach and assimilative organs less work to do.\n\nAmong the Indian race dyspepsia is almost unknown. To this fact that\nthey have a small variety of foods, this healthful condition is largely\nattributable. On the other hand, one has but to pick up any daily\nnewspaper to see the positive proofs of the dyspeptic condition of the\n\u201cgreatest nation of the world\u201d among the white race. There are nostrums\nfor dyspepsia without end. Syrups, pills, doses that work while you\nsleep, and dopes that work inside and out. Millions of dollars are\nannually spent merely in advertising these damnable proofs of our\nidiocy or gluttony, or both. A thousand nostrums flout their damned and\ndamning lies in the faces of the \u201csuperior race\u201d! And a drug store on\nevery corner of our large cities demonstrates the great demand there\nis for these absolute proofs of our vile dietetic habits. Every pill\ntaken, every nostrum swallowed, is a proof positive of our ignorance,\nor our gluttony, or our gullibility, and probably a good deal of each.\nSeventy-five millions of dollars were spent in 1905 in the purchase of\npatent medicines, every cent of which was worse than wasted.\n\nBefore the white race came and perverted--pardon me, civilized--him,\nwhat did the \u201cuncivilized Indian\u201d know of patent medicines? What did\nhe know of the diseases which these nostrums are supposed to cure?\nNothing! He was as ignorant of one as the other. In his native wildness\nhe was healthy and strong; only since he has been led into evil ways by\na false civilization has he so degenerated as to need such compounds.\n\nLet us, then, forget our civilization,--this portion of it,--and forego\nour physical ills and our patent nostrums, and go back to a simple,\nnatural, restricted diet. In that one course of procedure will be found\nmore restored health than all the physicians of the world can give\notherwise in a score of years. Let us learn to eat few things to a\nmeal, and those of such a nature that they will properly mix, and thus\nnot overtax the stomach in its work of digestion.\n\nWhen I sit down to the laden tables of my rich friends, or at the\ntables of the first-class hotels of the country, I sometimes find my\njudgment stronger than my perverted appetite. At such times I look\nover the bill of fare. I see ten or a dozen courses, varying from\ncocktails, oysters, and fish to ice-cream, fruit, and wines. There are\nmeats and vegetables, nuts and fruits, cooked and uncooked, pastries\nand jellies, soups and coffee, wines and spices, sauces, relishes,\nand seasonings galore, and I am more or less disgusted with the whole\nbusiness, and eat sparingly of but two or three dishes. At other times,\nalas! my appetite asserts itself, and I \u201cgo the pace\u201d with the rest.\nNow, when all these things, so elaborately prepared, so daintily\nserved, so \u201cnicely\u201d eaten, are disposed of and in the stomach, let me\nask (without any desire to offend): Is there the slightest difference\nin the contents of the stomach of such a person and the stomach of a\nhog filled with swill? In the first case there is cocktail and caviar,\nolives and celery, oysters and soup, fish and entremes, entree and\nroast, game and punch, ice-cream and cheese, pastry and fruit, nuts\nand crackers, with water, coffee, tea, or wine to liquefy it all, all\ntaken separately, but now mixed in one horrible mess within, and in the\ncase of the hog they were mixed first and swallowed mixed instead of in\n\u201ccourses.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: HOPI WOMAN, WITH BODY PARTIALLY EXPOSED, GRINDING CORN\nAT THE MEAL TROUGH.]\n\nO men and women of the white race, of the superior civilization,\nquit such gluttony and disease-breeding courses! Get back to the\nIndian\u2019s simplicity in diet. Learn the meaning of \u201clow living and high\nthinking.\u201d Stop pampering your sensual appetites and feeding your\nstomachs at the expense of your minds, aye, and at the expense of\nyour souls, for men and women who thus live continuously, generally\nbecome selfish, indifferent to the sufferings of others, \u201cproud\nstomached\u201d--which means much more than it seems to mean--and incapable\nof the finer feelings.\n\nNor is this all that the Indian may teach us as to diet. While at times\nhe eats everything he can lay his hands upon and also eats ravenously,\nin his normal condition he eats slowly and masticates thoroughly. Since\nHorace Fletcher wrote his most interesting and useful books on diet\nand life, the term \u201cfletcherizing\u201d has become almost universal amongst\nthoughtful people to express mastication to the point of liquifaction.\nBut I was familiar with \u201cfletcherizing\u201d before I had ever heard of Mr.\nFletcher. The Indians, with their parched corn, had taught me years\nbefore the benefit of thorough and complete mastication. I had gone off\nwith a band of Indians on a hard week\u2019s ride with no other food than\nparched corn and a few raisins. This was chewed and chewed and chewed\nby the hour, a handful of the grain making an excellent meal, and\nthoroughly nourishing the perfect bodies of these stalwart athletes,\nwho never knew an ache or a pain, and who could withstand fatigue and\nhardship without a thought.\n\n[Illustration: MY HAVASUPAI HOSTESS PARCHING CORN IN A BASKET.]\n\nA marked and wonderful effect of thorough mastication is that it\ndecreases the appetite from 10 to 15 per cent, and reduces the desire\nfor flesh meat from 30 to 50 per cent. The more we masticate the less\nwe desire to eat, and the more normal our appetites become. This in\nitself is a thing to be desired, for it is far easier not to have an\nabnormal appetite than it is to control it when it has fastened itself\nupon us.\n\nThen, too, while Indians will often eat to repletion, and at their\nfeasts indulge in disgusting gorging, they do know how to fast with\ncalmness and equanimity. I am not prepared to say that they will fast\nvoluntarily--except in the cases of those neophytes who are seeking\nsome unusual powers or gifts from Those Above--yet I do know that\nseveral times I have been with them when fasting was obligatory because\nof the scarcity of food, and they accepted the condition without a\nmurmur. I know a very prominent physician in San Francisco, who has\nan extensive practice, who pumps the food out of the stomachs of\nseveral of his gluttonous patients after their hearty French dinners.\nHe defends his course of procedure by saying that his patients would\nnot listen to him if he counseled fasting for even one meal, yet they\nare willing to allow him to remove the food after it is eaten, and to\nswallow some harmless \u201cdope\u201d that he gives them, because that is easy\nand requires no self-control.\n\nI know the power of appetite; I know how hard it is to eat only that\nwhich the reason tells us is best. I know how hard it is to eat slowly\nand thoroughly masticate the food, but I also know that these things\nare imperative if one would have perfect health. Therefore, in spite\nof my many lapses into the old habits, I persist in asserting the good\nover the evil, and in teaching the good to others, in the hope that,\nin my own case, the good course will become the easiest to follow, and\nin the case of the young who listen to me they may learn the best way\nbefore they have fallen into the evil way.\n\nThere is one other thing the white race might learn from the Indian,\nand that is that the habitual use of flesh is not essential to health.\nWhen Captain Cook visited the Maoris of New Zealand, he found them a\nperfectly healthy people, and he states that he never observed a single\nperson who appeared to have any bodily complaint. Nor, among the number\nthat were seen naked, was once perceived the slightest eruption of\nthe skin, nor the least mark which indicated that such eruptions had\nformerly existed. As Dr. Kress says:\n\n\u201cAnother proof of the health of these people was the readiness with\nwhich wounds they at any time received healed up. In a man who had been\nshot with a musket-ball through the fleshy part of the arm, \u2018his wound\nseemed well digested, and in so fair a way to be healed,\u2019 says the\nCaptain, \u2018that if I had not known that no application had been made to\nit, I should have inquired with very interesting curiosity after the\nvulnerary herbs and surgical art of the country.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018An additional evidence of the healthiness of the New Zealanders,\u2019\nhe says, \u2018is in the great number of old men found among them. Many of\nthem appeared to be very ancient, and yet _none_ of them were decrepit.\nAlthough they were not equal to the young in muscular strength, they\ndid not come in the least behind them in regard to cheerfulness and\nvivacity.\u2019\u201d\n\nAt the advent of Captain Cook, the Maoris were practically vegetarians;\nthey had no domestic or wild animals on the islands, hence could not\nhave been flesh eaters.\n\nWhile our Indians of the Southwest will eat some forms of flesh at\ntimes, they are, generally speaking, vegetarians. The Navahos scarcely\never eat meat while in their primitive condition, and they are proud,\nindependent, high-spirited, vigorous, healthy, and strong. So with the\nHavasupais and Wallapais, and most of the aborigines of this region.\nThe Apaches also are largely vegetarians, and yet are known as a fierce\nand warlike people. They are fierce when aroused, but when friendly are\nkindly disposed, honest, reliable and good workers, strong, athletic,\nvigorous, and healthy. These facts demonstrate that flesh meat is not\nnecessary. Meat is another fetich of the civilization of the white\nrace, before which we bow down in ignorant worship. The world would be\nfar better off, in my judgment, and as the result of my observation and\nexperience, if we ate no flesh at all. Personally I am never so well\nphysically and my brain so active as when I live the vegetarian life,\nthough when I am at the tables of meat eaters I eat whatever comes and\nmake the best of it.\n\nThe experiences of thousands of healthy and vigorous white men\ndemonstrate that meat is not necessary to the highest development.\nWeston, the great pedestrian, is both a teetotaler and vegetarian;\nBernarr Macfadden and several of his muscular helpers are practical\nvegetarians; and athletes, business men, lawyers, judges, doctors,\nclergymen, and many others testify to the beneficial effects of the\nvegetarian diet. There is no man in the civilized world to-day that\nworks as hard and as continuously, physically as well as mentally,\nas Dr. J. H. Kellogg of the Battle Creek Sanitarium. He is a rigid\nvegetarian, and seldom eats more than one meal a day. Yet he works\nfrom 16 to 20 hours daily, edits two magazines, writes continually for\nscientific magazines and periodicals, attends to a vast correspondence,\nis the business head of the greatest sanitarium in the world, consults\nannually with thousands of patients, and keeps daily watch of their\ncondition, gives numberless lectures, is always experimenting on foods\nand surgical appliances and inventing new instruments and methods for\ncuring disease, and at the same time performs more surgical operations,\nperhaps, with less fatal results, than any other surgeon in the\ncountry. Besides this he is the president of the medical college,\nand lecturer to the students, and gives many lectures to the Medical\nMissionary Classes, and withal, finds time and strength to confer with,\ndirect the education of, and give personal love to the ten or fifteen\nchildren he has adopted into his home and made his own.\n\nHere is an additional item which adds strength to what I have written:\n\n\u201cThe attention of medical men has recently been called to the case of\nGustav Nordin, a hardy Swede who paddled his own canoe from Stockholm\nto Paris, reaching there in robust health after the long voyage, during\nwhich he lived on apples, milk, water, and bread.\n\n\u201cThe _New York Herald_ states that this dangerous and arduous voyage\nwas undertaken by the Swede to show what could be done by a man who has\ngiven up meat, tea, coffee, wine, beer, spirits, and tobacco. He prides\nhimself in eclipsing those \u2018vegetarians\u2019 who continue the use of tea\nand condiments.\n\n\u201cWhen in America, at the age of eighteen, Nordin was suffering so from\ndyspepsia that he could not take ordinary food. He therefore began a\ndiet of fruit, principally apples, whereby he attained to his present\nrobust condition of health.\u201d\n\nSo, meat-eating, alcoholic-liquor-drinking white race, cast aside your\nhigh-headedness and pride, your dietetic errors and ill-health, at one\nand the same time, and go and learn of the Indian simplicity of diet,\nwise limitation of your dietary, careful and thorough mastication, and\nabstention from all flesh foods.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nTHE INDIAN AND EDUCATION\n\n\nTake it all in all, I think I believe more in the Indian\u2019s system\nof education than our own,--I mean, in the principles involved. Our\neducation is largely an education of books. We teach from books, we\nstudy from books, we get our ideas from books. Joaquin Miller\u2019s reply\nto Elbert Hubbard, before quoted, seems to many people to be a foolish\nremark. But I see a profound thought in it. It was the poet\u2019s protest\nagainst the too great use of books. He regards books as subversive of\nindividual thought. He contends that books retard and prevent thought,\nand that we read, not to stimulate thought, but to deaden it. And\nundoubtedly too much reading and dependence upon books does deaden and\ndestroy not only thought, but, alas! far worse still, the power to\nindulge in individual thought. Hence books are often a hindrance and a\ncurse instead of a help and a blessing.\n\nThe Indian has no books. While he has tradition and legend, myth and\nstory, he has no written word. Everything that is, as differentiated\nfrom everything that is supposed, in his life has to be personally\nlearned by individual contact with the things themselves. Botany is the\nstudy of flowers, not of words about flowers. There is but one way we\ncan really study botany, and that is out in the fields with the flower\ngrowing before us. It must be seen day in and day out from its planting\nuntil its fruition. All its development must be known and understood.\nThe properties of its fruit, its roots, its stem, its leaves, for\nfood, medicinal, manufacturing, or other purposes are all connected\nwith the study. It is well to know the names of the plants, the names\nof all parts of plants, and the families and species to which they\nbelong, but these latter things, important and interesting though they\nbe, are but secondary or tertiary as compared with the primary out-door\npersonal and intimate knowledge I have referred to.\n\nThose who think the Indian uneducated should read Charles Eastman\u2019s\n(_Ohiyesa_) book telling of his boyhood days with his Sioux parents\nand grandparents. Eastman is a full-blooded Sioux, and though later\neducated at Dartmouth College, still shows by his writings and words\nhow much he reveres his wise teachers of the open air and the woods.\n\nThe fact is, that in matters pertaining to personal observation the\nIndian children are far ahead of our own brightest and smartest\nchildren; they observe the slightest deviations from the regular order.\nWho does not know of the Indian\u2019s power in trailing. I know Navahos,\nMohaves, Hopis, Havasupais, and others who will follow the dimmest\ntrail with unerring certainty, and tell you the details of the actions\nof the person or animal trailed. This is education of a wonderfully\nuseful kind; a kind that it would be well to give more of to our own\nchildren. Indeed, I have been saying, both privately and publicly, for\nmany years, and I here repeat it, that if my children were trained to\nobserve and reflect upon what they observed I should not care if they\nnever went to school until they were grown up to young manhood and\nwomanhood.\n\nThat keen, though unusual thinker, Ernest Crosby, in one of his books,\npresented the following, which perfectly meets my ideas and suggests\nwhat I mean in regard to the Indian:\n\n\nEDUCATION\n\n    Here are two educated men.\n\n    The one has a smattering of Latin and Greek;\n\n    The other knows the speech and habits of horses and cattle, and\n    gives them their food in due season.\n\n    The one is acquainted with the roots of nouns and verbs;\n\n    The other can tell you how to plant and dig potatoes and carrots\n    and turnips.\n\n    The one drums by the hour on the piano, making it a terror to the\n    neighborhood;\n\n    The other is an expert at the reaper and binder, which fills the\n    world with good cheer.\n\n    The one knows or has forgotten the higher trigonometry and the\n    differential calculus;\n\n    The other can calculate the bushels of rye standing in his field\n    and the number of barrels to buy for the apples on the trees in his\n    orchard.\n\n    The one understands the chemical affinities of various poisonous\n    acids and alkalies;\n\n    The other can make a savory soup or a delectable pudding.\n\n    The one sketches a landscape indifferently;\n\n    The other can shingle his roof and build a shed for himself in a\n    workman-like manner.\n\n    The one has heard of Plato and Aristotle and Kant and Comte, but\n    knows precious little about them;\n\n    The other has never been troubled by such knowledge, but he will\n    learn the first and last word of philosophy, \u201cto love,\u201d far\n    quicker, I warrant you, than his college-bred neighbor.\n\n    For still it is true that God hath hidden these things from the\n    wise and prudent and revealed them unto babes.\n\n    Such are the two educations:\n\n    Which is the higher, and which the lower?[2]\n\n    [2] From Plain Talk in Psalm and Parable, by Ernest Crosby.\n\n[Illustration: A NAVAHO GRANDMOTHER WITH THE BABY SHE LOVES, AND WHOSE\nEDUCATION SHE WILL DIRECT.]\n\nI would not have it thought that I am opposed to all systematic and\nbook education, even on our present plan or under our present system.\nMy protest is not so wide and sweeping as that. The main propositions\nupon which I base my opposition are:\n\n1. That we do not pay sufficient attention to the physical health of\nour students, making health of secondary, tertiary, or quaternary\nimportance, or often not giving it a single thought; leaving it\nabsolutely to regulate itself, when it should be the first, primary,\ndeterminate aim and object of all education.\n\nThis very day upon which I write I sat at a professor\u2019s table. He is a\nprominent educator in one of the important cities of the West. We were\neating breakfast. He was complaining of indigestion. As he ate I could\nsee his tongue seamed and coated, and his lips were rough and fevered\nas with stomach trouble. He helped himself to mush,--four times as much\nas a healthy man ought to have taken, and in far less time than it has\ntaken me to write this he had \u201cshoveled\u201d it all in and \u201cgobbled\u201d it\ndown. (The words in quotation marks are used thoughtfully, and they\nmore truthfully describe what was the absolute fact than any other\nwords with which I am familiar.)\n\nHe drank two glasses of milk warm from the cow, and ate French bread\nwhich had been heated in the oven and then saturated with butter. The\nnight before he had opened a can of sardines,--as he said, \u201cto see\nwhat he could eat,\u201d and after the mush he ate a few of them. Then the\nmaid brought in bacon and fried eggs and coffee, and he \u201cdid justice\u201d\nto them. Yet he wondered why he was troubled with indigestion, and\nhis poor wife sent word down from her bedroom that she regretted she\ncould not see me again as she was suffering severely with one of her\n\u201cregular\u201d sick headaches. My own breakfast consisted of a small quota\nof mush, some of the hot bread (there was no other), and some cold\nmilk. I felt well and happy after my frugal meal, while he confessed\nnot only to feeling heavy and \u201clogy,\u201d but _unsatisfied_ with what he\nhad eaten--a clear proof of an abnormal appetite and a disordered\ndigestive system.\n\n[Illustration: AN AGED COAHUILLA BASKET WEAVER.]\n\nNow, is it to be expected that with our teachers themselves so ignorant\nof the first principles of healthy dietetics our students should know\nany better? Our whole system of eating is wrong. We eat anything and\neverything our tastes--often perverted and depraved--demand, and we\nnever ask ourselves the question as to whether the food is good, or our\nmethods of eating it wise and proper. In my chapter on the Indian and\ndiet I discuss this question more thoroughly, but I refer to it in this\nconnection as one of the great defects of our educational system.\n\n2. My second proposition is, that we keep our students indoors all the\ntime,--as a settled, established custom,--with occasional short periods\nout of doors, instead of reversing the matter and _keeping them out of\ndoors all the time_, with occasional short periods indoors.\n\nWhy keep children or university students indoors? While in the\nwinter climate of the East outdoor life is not as possible as it is\nin the balmy West, there certainly can be much more time spent out\nof doors than there now is. We pride ourselves upon our scholastic\nprogressiveness, yet they do these things far better in Germany.\nThe educational and medical authorities of Berlin have organized a\nforest school for the city children of the crowded districts of Berlin\nand Charlottenburg. In a wide clearing 150 children follow--out of\ndoors--the usual procedure of school, delightfully varied with nature\nstudy at first hand. The hours of work are short, and fresh air and\nexercise are given a supreme importance. The children cook their own\ndinners at a camp-fire, and their desks and seats and shelter-sheds\nwere made from the timber felled to form the clearing. At 1 o\u2019clock\nthey are all required to take an hour\u2019s nap, for which each child is\nprovided with a blanket and a reclining-chair.\n\nThis is a move in the right direction. Our schools cost the nation\nmillions of dollars each year. Surely we have a right to demand that\nthey give us health for our children in exchange, instead of ruining it\nin so many cases as they now do.\n\nIn Japan out-of-door schools are quite common, especially when the\ncherry and plum trees are in blossom.\n\nIn Los Angeles, California, a business college holds many of its class\nsessions out of doors, and I trust the time will come when this will be\nthe rule in all schools, instead of the exception.\n\nI am perfectly well aware that there is danger that these statements\nwill be taken too literally. They must be taken as broad and general\nstatements. My conception is that in our present condition we _live_\nindoors and _go out of doors occasionally_. I would have that\nproposition reversed. We should _live out of doors and go indoors\noccasionally_.\n\nThe same common sense and rational mode of reading my words must be\napplied to all that I say on out-of-door education. Naturally, I am\nnot such a fool as to suppose that all educational or scientific or\nany other work can be done out of doors. Though I am not a college\nprofessor, and never shall be, though I am not a scientific expert,\nand never can be, though I am not many things that other men are, I\nknow enough--have observed and seen enough--to know that delicate\nexperiments of a variety of kinds need the most rigid indoor seclusion\nfor their successful conducting. But this does not alter my general\npropositions, viz., that the health of students is of more importance\nthan any and all education given in schools or colleges; that outdoor\nlife is more conducive to the health of students than indoor life, and\nthat, therefore, _where possible_, all education should be given out\nof doors.\n\n[Illustration: AN ALEUT BASKET MAKER. THESE WOMEN MAKE THE MOST\nDELICATE BASKETRY IN THE WORLD.]\n\n3. As a result of this indoor scholastic life, we content ourselves\nby teaching our children from books,--which at best are but embalmed\nknowledge, canned information, the dry bones of knowledge, words\nabout things,--instead of bringing them in contact (as far as is\npossible and practicable) with the things themselves. I believe in\nbooks; I believe in education; I believe in schools, in colleges, in\nuniversities, in teachers, professors, and doctors of learning; but I\ndo not believe in them as most of the white race seem to do, viz., as\ngood in themselves. They are good only as they are instruments for good\nto the children committed to their care. The proper education of one\nchild is worth more to the world than all the schools, colleges, and\nuniversities that were ever built. One Michael Angelo, one Savonarola,\none Francis of Assisi, one Luther, one Agassiz, one Audubon, is worth\nmore to the world than all the schools that ever were or ever will\nbe. And if, by our present imperfect and unhealthful school methods,\nwe kill off, in childhood, one such great soul, we do the human race\nirreparable injury. Let us relegate the school to its right place,\nand that is secondary to its primary,--the child. The school exists\nfor the child, not the child for the school. As it now is, we put the\nplastic material of which our nation is to be formed into the mould\nof our schools, and regardless of consequences, indifferent to the\npersonal equation in each child, overlooking all individuality and\npersonality, the machine works on, stamping this soul and mind material\nwith one same stamp, moulding it in one same mould, hardening it in the\nfire to one same pattern, so that it comes forth just as bricks come\nforth from a furnace, uniform, regular, alike, perhaps pretty to the\nunseeing eye, but ruined, spoiled, damned, as far as active, personal,\nindividualistic life and work are concerned. The only human bricks that\never amount to anything when our educational mill has turned them out\nare those made of refractory clay,--the incomplete ones, the broken\nones, the twisted ones, those that would not or could not be moulded\ninto the established pattern.\n\nThis is why I am so opposed to our present methods. Let us have fewer\nlessons from books, and more knowledge gained by personal observation;\nless reading and cramming, and more reflective thinking; fewer pages\nof books read, and more results and deductions gained from personal\nexperiences with things high and low, animate and inanimate, that catch\nthe eye and mind _out of doors_; and above all the total cessation of\nall mental labor when the body is not at its best. The crowding of sick\nand ailing children is more cruel and brutal than Herod\u2019s slaughter of\nthe innocents, and so utterly needless and useless that fools couldn\u2019t\ndo worse. What is the use of education to a sick person, and especially\nwhen the sickness is the result of the educational process. God save us\nfrom any more such education!\n\nDoubtless I shall be told that my ideas are impracticable. I know they\nare and ever will be to those who value \u201cthe system\u201d more than the\nchild. Granted that in cold and wet weather students can\u2019t get out\nof doors much. Then open all the doors and all the windows and give\nup the time to marching, to physical exercises, to deep breathing,\nto anything,--romping even,--rather than to cramming and studying a\nset number of pages, while the air breathed is impure, unwholesome,\nactively poisonous. When our educational methods thus interfere with\nthe health of the child, I am forever and unalterably opposed to them.\nWe had far rather have a nation of healthy and happy children, growing\nup into healthy and happy manhood and womanhood, even though devoid of\nmuch book knowledge, than a bloodless, an\u00e6mic, unhappy nation though\nfilled with all the lore of the ages. Give me, for me and mine, every\ntime, physical and mental health and happiness, even though we have\nnever parsed a single sentence, determined the family and Latin name\nof a single flower, or found out the solution of one solitary problem\nof algebra.\n\n4. My fourth proposition is, that as the result of this indoor\nbook-teaching our children are not taught to think for themselves, but\nare expected and required to accept the ideas of the authors,--often,\nindeed, they must memorize the exact words of the books. This is, in\nitself, enough to condemn the whole system. We could better afford to\nhave absolutely no schools, no colleges, no books even, than a nation\nprofessedly educated, yet the members of which have not learned to do\ntheir own thinking.\n\n5. As a conclusion, therefore, I am forced to recognize that, in a much\nlarger measure than we are ready to admit, our educational system is\nsuperficial, is a cramming process instead of a drawing-out--_educere_,\neducational--process, and no education so-called can be really\neffective, really helpful, that thus inverts the natural requirements\nof the mind. And that, when our system ignores the physical health of\nthe student, no matter what his age, it is a criminal, a wicked, a\nwasteful system that had better speedily be reformed or abolished.\n\nAll these ideas are practically the result of my association with the\nIndian and watching his methods of instruction. His life and that of\nhis family out of doors color all that he and they learn. I think\nit was John Brisbane Walker who once wrote a story, when he edited\nand owned the _Cosmopolitan_, about some college men, thoroughly\neducated in the academic sense, who were shipwrecked at sea. He showed\nthe helplessness and hopelessness of their case because of their\ninability to take hold and do things. The Indian can turn his hand to\nanything. When out of doors few things can feaze him. He knows how\nto build a fire in the rain, where to sleep in a storm, how to track\na runaway animal, how to trap fish, flesh, or fowl, where to look for\nseeds, nuts, berries, or roots, how to hobble a horse when he has no\nrope,--that is, how to make a rope from cactus thongs, how to picket\na horse where there is no tree, bush, fence, bowlder, nor _anything_\nto which to tie it. What college man knows how to picket a horse to a\nhole in the ground? Yet I have seen an Indian do it, and have done it\nmyself several times.[3] He knows how to find water when there is none\nin sight and the _educated_ white man is perishing for want of it, and\nhe knows a thousand and one things that a white man never knows.\n\n[3] See \u201cIndians of the Painted Desert Region,\u201d Little, Brown, &\nCompany, p. 15.\n\nAs I shall show in the chapter on the Indian and art work, the Indian\nbasket-weaver far surpasses the white woman of college education in\ninvention of art-form, artistic design, variety of stitch or weave,\ncolor harmonies, and digital dexterity, or ability to compel the\nfingers and hands to obey the dictates of the brain.\n\nEducation is by no means a matter of book-learning. It is a discipline\nof the eye, the hand, the muscles, the nerves, the whole body, to obey\nthe dictates of the highest judgment, to the end that the best life,\nthe happiest, the healthiest, and the most useful, may be attained,\nand if this definition be at all a true one I am fully satisfied that\nif we injected into our methods of civilized education a solution\nof three-fifths of Indian methods we should give to our race an\nimmeasurably greater happiness, greater health, and greater usefulness.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nTHE INDIAN AND HOSPITALITY\n\n\nAnother of the things I think we might well learn from the Indian\nis his kind of hospitality. Too often in our so-called civilization\nhospitality degenerates into a kind of extravagant, wasteful, injurious\nostentation. I do not object, on formal occasions, to ceremonial\nhospitality, to an elaborate spread and all that goes with it. But in\nour every-day homes, when our friends call upon us for a meal or a\nvisit of a week, it is not true hospitality to let them feel that we\nare overworking ourselves in order to overfeed and entertain them.\nWhen one has plenty of servants, the overwork may perhaps not be felt,\nbut the preparation and presentation of \u201cextra fine\u201d meals should be\nlooked upon as an unmitigated evil that ought to cease.\n\n[Illustration: THE NAVAHO INDIAN EXPECTS YOU TO PARTAKE OF HIS SIMPLE\nDESERT HOSPITALITY.]\n\n[Illustration: IN THE HOME OF A HOSPITABLE NAVAHO AT TOHATCHI.]\n\nWhy is it that the professional lecturers, singers, and public\nperformers generally refuse to accept such hospitalities? Every one\ndoing their kind of work knows the reason. It is because this \u201chigh\nfeeding\u201d unfits them for the right discharge of their duties. To\noverfeed a preacher (and I\u2019ve been a preacher for many years) is\nto prevent the easy flow of his thought. It is as true now as when\nWordsworth wrote it, that \u201cplain living and high thinking\u201d go together.\nFor the past five weeks I have been lecturing nightly in New York City.\nI am often invited to dinners and banquets, but I invariably refuse\nunless I am promised that a full supply of fruit, nuts, celery, and\nbread and butter, or foods of that nature are provided for me, and that\nI am not even asked to eat anything else. I don\u2019t even want the mental\neffort of being compelled to refuse to eat what I know will render my\nbrain \u201clogy,\u201d heavy, and dull.\n\nThen, again, when I am invited to a home where no servants are kept\n(as I often am), and see the hostess worrying and wearying herself to\nprepare a great variety of \u201cdainties\u201d and \u201cfine foods\u201d for me that\nI know I am far better without, what kind of creature am I if I can\naccept such hospitality with equanimity? I go to see people to enjoy\nthem, their kindness, their intellectual converse, the homelikeness of\nthemselves and their children. If I want to \u201cstuff and gorge\u201d I can do\nso at any first-class restaurant on the expenditure of a certain sum\nof money. But at the homes of my friends I want them; I go for social\nintercourse; and to see them working and slaving to give me food that\nis an injury to me is not, never can be, my idea of hospitality. I\nwould not have my readers infer from this that I am unmindful of the\nkindly spirit of hospitality behind all of this needless preparation;\nnor would I have them think that I never eat luxurious things. I am\nafraid some of my readers would forego their kind thoughts towards me\nif they were to see me sometimes as I indulge in all kinds of things\nthat \u201cordinary people\u201d eat. But I do want to protest against the\nostentatious and extravagant manifestation of our hospitality, and also\nthe injuriousness of much of it when it comes to the food question, and\nto commend the spirit and method of the Indian\u2019s way. If friends come\nunexpectedly to an Indian home, they are _expected_ to make themselves\nat home. They are not invited to the \u201cfestive board\u201d to eat, but they\nare _expected_ to share in the meal as a matter of course. Hospitality\nis not a thing of invitation, whim, or caprice. It is the daily\nexpression of their lives. Every one, friend or stranger, coming to\ntheir camp at meal times is for the time being a member of the family.\nThere is no display, no ostentation, no show, no extra preparation.\n\u201cYou are one of us. Come and partake of what there is!\u201d is the spirit\nthey manifest. There is nothing more beautiful to me than to find\nmyself at a Navaho _hogan_ in the heart of the Painted Desert, and to\nrealize that I am expected to sit down and eat of the frugal meal which\nthe family has prepared for itself.\n\n[Illustration: HOPI INDIANS COOKING CORN IN AN UNDERGROUND OVEN.]\n\nMy contention is, that this is the true spirit of hospitality. You are\nmade to feel at home. You are one of the family. Formality is dispensed\nwith; you are welcomed heartily and sincerely, and made to feel at\nease. This is \u201cto be at home\u201d; this is the friendly, the human, the\nhumane thing to do. Unnecessary work is avoided; the visitor is not\ndistressed by seeing his hostess made to do a lot of extra cooking\nand \u201cfussing\u201d on his account; his heart is warmed by the friendliness\ndisplayed (and surely that is far better than merely to have his\nstomach filled); and, furthermore, if he be a thoughtful man who values\nhealth and vigor rather than the gratification of his appetite, he is\nsaved the mortification and the annoyance of having to choose between\nthe risk of offending his hostess by refusing to eat the luxurious\n\u201cobnoxities\u201d she has provided, or offending himself by eating them\nunder protest, and possibly suffering from them afterward.\n\n[Illustration: MOHAVE WOMAN POUNDING MESQUITE TO PROVIDE A DRINK FOR\nHER GUEST.]\n\nI was once visiting the Mohave reservation, at Parker, on the Colorado\nRiver. It was a very hot day, and I was thirsty, weary, and hot. As\nsoon as I arrived at the home of one old lady, she at once went out\nof doors to her wooden mortar, took some mesquite beans, pounded them,\npoured water over the flour thus made, and in a few minutes presented\nme with a copious drink that was both pleasing to the taste and\nrefreshing. Look at her face as she kneels before the mortar. It is a\nkindly and generous face. She cared nothing for the fact that it was\nhot, or that it was hard work to lift the pounder and make the meal\nfor the drink. She did it so simply and easily and naturally that I\naccepted the drink with the added pleasure that it was the product of a\nreal, and not an artificial, hospitality.\n\nFew visitors to the Snake Dance and the different religious or\nthanksgiving festivals of the Indians of the Southwest have failed to\nobserve the great amount of preparation that goes on for expected but\nunknown guests. It is known they will come; therefore preparations must\nbe made for them. Corn is ground in the metates, and _piki_ is made.\n\nAn old Navaho Indian, pictured on the first page, is a wonderful\nillustration of the natural generosity of the aborigine before he is\nspoiled by contact with the white. Many years ago this man, who had\nlarge possessions of stock, sheep, horses, and goats, with much grazing\nland, and several fine springs, was riding on the plateau opposite\nwhere the Paria Creek empties into the Colorado River. Suddenly he\nheard shouts and screams, and rushing down to the water saw a raft\nfilled with men, women, and children, dashing down the river to the\nrapids. When the raft and its human freight were overturned into the\nicy waters he did not hesitate because the people were of a different\ncolor from his own, but, plunging in, he rescued all those who were\nunable to save themselves, mainly by his own valor. It turned out that\nthe strangers were a band of Mormons seeking a new home in Arizona,\nand, being met by the barrier of the Colorado River, had sought to\ncross it with their worldly goods upon the insecure and unsafe raft.\n\nWhat could they now do? Though their lives were saved, their provisions\nwere nearly all lost in the raging rapids of the turbulent and angry\nColorado. Bidding them be of good cheer, this _savage_ Indian led them\nto one of his _hogans_, where immediately he set his several wives\n(for the Navahos are polygamists) to grinding corn and making large\nquantities of mush for the half-famished white strangers. He thus fed\nthem, daily, for months. In the mean time, he allowed them to plant\ncrops (he finding seed) on his land, using for irrigation therefor\nwater from his springs.\n\nBut he had not given himself proper care after his icy bath. His legs\nbecame drawn up by rheumatism, and from that day to this he has been\na constant sufferer from his exposure to the cold water of the river\nand his after-neglect caused by his eager desire to care for unknown\nstrangers.\n\nThe awful irony of the whole thing lies in the fact that in spite\nof what he had done, the recipients of his pure, simple, beautiful\nhospitality could not, or did not, appreciate it. He was \u201conly an\nIndian.\u201d He had no rights. _They_ were American citizens,--white\npeople; civilized people. Why should this Indian own or control all\nthis fine land, all these flowing springs, all these growing crops? It\nwas wrong, infamous, inappropriate. Therefore, to make matters right,\nthese grateful (?) civilized (!!) Mormons stole from him the best part\nof his lands, and the largest of his springs, and for years laughed at\nhis protests; until finally a white friend was raised up for him in\na brave United States Army officer, now a general in the Philippines,\nI believe, who presented the case of the Indian to the courts, fought\nit successfully, and lived to see the Indian\u2019s wrongs in some small\nmeasure righted.\n\nTo this day the Indian is known as \u201cOld Musha,\u201d the name given to him\nby the people whom he befriended in their distress, because mush was\nthe chief article of the diet that his hospitality provided for them.\nTruly did Shakspere write:--\n\n    \u201cBlow, blow, thou winter wind,\n      Thou art not so unkind\n        As man\u2019s ingratitude!\u201d\n\nThat Indians know how to be beautifully courteous to their guests, I\nhave long experienced. I have eaten at banquets at Delmonico\u2019s and the\nWaldorf-Astoria (New York), the Hotel Cecil (London), the Grand Hotel\n(Paris), and many and various hotels between the Touraine (Boston) and\nthe Palace of San Francisco and the Hotel del Coronado. And I have seen\nmore vulgarity and ill-breeding at these choice and elaborate banquets,\nmore want of consideration, more selfishness, and more disgusting\nexhibitions of greediness and gluttony than I have seen in twenty-five\nyears of close association with Indians.\n\nI was once expected to eat at an Indian chief\u2019s _hawa_, or house. The\nchief dish was corn, cut from the cob while in the milk, ground, and\nthen made into a kind of soup or mush. A clean basketful was handed to\nme, with the intimation that I was to share it with two old Indians,\none on my right, one on my left. I asked my hostess for a spoon, for I\nknew I had seen one somewhere on one of my visits. She hunted for the\nspoon, in the meantime sending to the creek for an _esuwa_ of fresh,\nclean water. When it was brought, she carefully washed her hands and\nthen gave the spoon seven scrubbings and washings and rinsings before\nshe handed it to me. I felt safer in using it than I do many a time\nat a city restaurant when the \u201cculled brother\u201d brings me a spoon that\nhe has wiped on the \u201ctowel\u201d which performs the multifarious duties of\nwiping the soiled table, the supposedly clean dishes, the waiter\u2019s\nsweaty hands, and--far oftener than people imagine--the waiter\u2019s sweaty\nface.\n\nDuring the time we were waiting for the spoon the old Indians by my\nside sat as patiently and stoically as if they were not hungry. When\nthe spoon was handed to me, I marked a half circle on the mush in front\nof me, in the basket, then divided the remainder for them. Each waited\nuntil I had eaten several mouthfuls before he inserted his own fingers,\nwhich served as his spoon, and then we democratically ate together.\n\nNow, to me the whole affair showed a kindly consideration for my\nfeelings that is not always apparent in so-called well-bred strangers\nof my own race. I\u2019ve had many a man light a cigar or a cigarette at a\ntable at which I\u2019ve been compelled to sit in a restaurant with never\na \u201cBy your leave!\u201d or \u201cIs this agreeable?\u201d From the Indian we imagine\nthat we ought not to expect much of what we call \u201chigher courtesy,\u201d yet\nI find it constantly exercised; while from the civilized white race we\nexpect much, and, alas! often are very much disappointed.\n\nIt is a singular thing that while I am writing these pages about the\nlessons we may learn from the Indian, the Bishop of London, speaking\nin Trinity Church, New York, in September, 1907, should enunciate\nideas remarkably similar to those held by the Indians. The Indian owns\nnothing for himself: it belongs to all his tribe. What is this but the\nstewardship--in a rude and crude fashion perhaps, but nevertheless\nstewardship--as declared by the bishop, who says:\n\n\u201cThe one sentence, which above all others I would say to you, a\nsentence as yet unlearned in London and New York, and which if adopted\nwould cleanse the life on both sides of the Atlantic is--life is a\nstewardship, and not an ownership.\n\n\u201cHave you ever thought why there are any rich and poor at all? That\nis the question I had to face in London. They had asked me how I\nreconciled my belief in the good God loving all His children, with the\nwretched millions in East London, seemingly abandoned by both God and\nman. I had to face that question, and I have had to face it ever since.\nThere is but one answer--the rich minority have what they have merely\nin trust for all the others. Stewardship, non-ownership, is God\u2019s\ncommand to all of us.\n\n\u201cYou are not your own. Nothing that you have is your own. We haven\u2019t\nlearned the Christian religion if we have not learned the lesson of\nstewardship.\n\n\u201cMy home has been the home of the Bishop of London for 1,300 years.\nSuppose I should say that it was my own, and that the Bishop\u2019s income\nof $50,000 a year was my own. I would be called a madman. The man who\nthinks he owns what he has in his keeping is no less a madman. This\napplies alike to the boy and his pocket money, and the millionaire and\nhis millions. Disregard of this trust is the cause of all the social\nevils of London and New York.\u201d\n\nTo resume my experiences with the Indians:\n\n[Illustration: UTA, MY HOSPITABLE HAVASUPAI FRIEND.]\n\nIn September, 1907, I again visited the Havasupais and then had several\nwonderful illustrations of their real and genuine hospitality. We\ndecided to camp below the home of an old friend of mine, Uta. As soon\nas our cavalcade of six persons on horses, mules, and burros appeared,\nwith two pack-horses, he cordially welcomed us, and when I told him\nthat we wished to camp below his _hawa_ he took us into a fenced-in\nfield, where there were peach trees and a corral for our animals.\nHere we were free from the intrusion of all stray animals, and were\nable to secure seclusion for the ladies of our party--for, of course,\nwe were camping out and sleeping in the open. Knowing that we should\nwant plenty of water, both for ourselves and our animals, and that\nit was quite a little walk to Havasu Creek, he took his shovel and\nin five minutes the limpid stream was flowing through the irrigation\nditches close by. The peach tree over our heads--the best in the whole\nvillage--was placed at our disposal, and delicious indeed we found the\nfruit to be, and he sent us figs, beans, melons, and a canteloupe.\nWithout a question as to payment, he supplied us daily during our stay\nwith an abundance of dried alfalfa hay,--the fresh alfalfa not being\ngood for our too-civilized animals. And in every way possible to him he\nsought to minister to our comfort and pleasure, and did not resent it\nin the slightest when I bade him retire at meal times, or while we were\ncooking our provisions.\n\n[Illustration: MY HOPI HOSTESS WHO KEPT THE NEIGHBORHOOD QUIET WHILE I\nSLEPT.]\n\nThat we paid him abundantly when we left did not in the slightest alter\nthe sweet character of his genuine and simple hospitality.\n\nAnother illustration of the most beautiful kind of hospitality and\ncourteous kindness was shown by an old Hopi Indian woman pictured.\nI was visiting the Hopi pueblo of Walpi for the purpose of studying\nthe secret ceremonies of the underground _kivas_ of the Antelope and\nSnake clans prior to the Snake Dance. For fifteen days and nights I\nnever took off my clothes to go to bed, but went from kiva to kiva,\nwitnessing the ceremonials, and when I was too tired to remain awake\nlonger, I would stretch out on the bare, solid rock floor, my camera\nor my canteen for my pillow, and go to sleep. Occasionally, however,\nwhen something of minor importance was going on during the daytime,\nI would steal upstairs to a room which I had engaged in this woman\u2019s\nhouse. As soon as I stretched out and tried to sleep, she went around\nto the children and the neighbors and told them that the \u201cBlack\nBear\u201d--my name with these people--was trying to sleep, and was very,\nvery tired. That was all that was necessary to send the children far\nenough away so that the noise of their play could not disturb me, and\nto quiet any unnecessary noise among their elders. This I take to\nbe an extreme courtesy. I know people of both \u201clow and high degree\u201d\nin our civilization who resent as an impertinent interference with\ntheir \u201crights\u201d any suggestions that they be kind or quiet to their\nneighbors,--much less strangers and aliens. But for my own sake I\nwould far rather that my children possessed the kindly sympathy shown\nby these Indian children than have the finest education the greatest\nuniversity of our civilization could grant without it.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nTHE INDIAN AND CERTAIN SOCIAL TRAITS AND CUSTOMS\n\n\nIn the treatment of younger children by those who are older, the white\nrace may learn much from the Indian. While it must be confessed that\nIndian youth are cruel to the lower animals, I have never seen, in\ntwenty-five years, an older child ill-treat a younger one. There seems\nto be an instinctive \u201cmothering\u201d of the little ones. The houses of the\nHopis are built on the edges of frightful precipices, to fall from\nwhich would be sure and certain death; yet, although the youngsters are\nallowed to play around with the greatest freedom, such are the care and\nconstant oversight of the little ones by those who are older that I\nhave never known of an accident.\n\nThere seems to be none of that impatient petulance among Indian\nchildren that is so common with us; no yelling or loud shouting, and\ncertainly no bullying or cowardly domineering.\n\nThen, too, there is a very sweet and tender relationship existing quite\noften between the very old and the very young. I know this is not\nunusual or peculiar to the Indian, but I deem it worthy of note here.\nI have often seen a grandfather going off to his work for the day in a\ncorn-field with his naked grandson on his back, and the youngster clung\nto the oldster with an affection and confidence that were absolute.\n\n[Illustration: AN APACHE GRANDMOTHER AND HER PET.]\n\nIt should also be observed that respect and reverence are nearly always\npaid to age. In a council the young men will invariably wait until\nthe old men have spoken, unless they are definitely called upon. If a\ncigarette is offered to a young man in the presence of his elders, he\nwill not enjoy it until the older ones have lit theirs and taken a few\npuffs. A girl or young maiden will not sit down until places are found\nfor the older ones and they are comfortably seated, and, of course, the\nsame rule applies to the boys and youths.\n\nIt may also seem strange to some of my readers that I insist that the\nnative Indian is inherently honest. I did not use to think so, and\nI know of many dishonest Indians. But as a rule these are the ones\nthat are partially civilized. They have had so many things given to\nthem without rhyme or reason that they come to regard all things of\nthe white men as theirs. Scores of times I have left my wagon, laden\nwith provisions and other materials, such as cameras, camera plates,\nclothes, etc., and I have been gone for a week or a month. As I now\nwrite I can remember only twice that anything was taken. Once a young\nman, who had been to our schools, broke into a box of oranges that I\nhad taken as a great luxury after a desert tramp, and ate several of\nthem. I soon learned who the culprit was, made complaint against him,\nhad him brought to my camp, and asked him why he stole my oranges. It\nmust be remembered that it is an unwritten, but well-understood, law of\nthe desert regions that a truly hungry man is always allowed to help\nhimself to needful food, but without waste or extravagance, and with\ndue care for the owner or those who may come after.\n\nThis young man claimed that he had taken my oranges because he was\nhungry. I gave him the lie direct; for, said I, \u201cHad you been hungry,\nyou would have been willing to eat meat and potatoes and bread.\nInstead of that you went prowling around until you smelled these\noranges and then you stole them. In future, even if you are hungry, you\nmust keep away from my wagon and camp, for if ever you touch my things\nagain, I shall see that you are severely punished.\u201d It was a stern\nreprimand, yet in this case it seemed to be necessary.\n\nThe other time that things were taken from me was when I had promised\ncertain women and girls some calico and bead necklaces in return for\nsomething they had done for me. Foolishly I showed them the bag in\nwhich the calico was. My hostess was also to be a participant in the\ndistribution of favors. While I was away on a several days\u2019 exploring\ntrip she took it into her head that she ought to have the first\nchoice, and, as I had promised the piece to her, there would be no\nharm in taking it. When she had made her own choice, and told of it,\nof course she could not protest against the others making theirs, so,\nwhen I returned to my Indian home I found the bag pretty well looted.\nIt was not long before, little by little, the whole story leaked out.\nWhen I was sure, I told my host, and informed him that I wanted every\npiece of calico and every necklace returned instanter. In twelve hours\neverything was back in place, as if by magic. Then for several days I\nkept the promised recipients in a \u201cstate,\u201d for I intimated that their\nconduct was so reprehensible that I doubted whether I should give them\nanything or not. This made them very anxious, and when they \u201cdropped\nin,\u201d two or three at a time, I took the occasion to tell them how I\nresented their helping themselves to my things while I was absent.\n\nWith these two exceptions, in twenty-five years\u2019 experience I have met\nwith nothing but perfect honesty. (No, now I remember, a small whip was\ntaken from my camp many years ago, but when I complained, it was found\nand returned.) I have left camera plates by the score in boxes that\ncould have been opened, and the results of my months of labor destroyed\nby nothing but idle curiosity. But when I have explained that I was\ngoing away and expected to find everything untouched on my return, I\nhad no fear, no misgivings, and invariably found everything in perfect\norder when I came back. I doubt whether I could leave things where the\nwhole population of any of our American cities could get at them and\nfind them untouched after a week\u2019s or a month\u2019s absence.\n\nAnother interesting fact about the Indian is that when he gives a name\nto a child or an adult, it generally means something. Among ourselves\nnames are often-times either quite meaningless or senseless. For\ninstance, my parents gave to me the name George. When I was old enough\nto begin to care about such things, I asked and found out that \u201cGeorge\u201d\nmeans \u201ca husbandman.\u201d And all through my life I have borne that name--a\nhusbandman--when my ignorance of agricultural pursuits, I am sorry to\nsay, is simply dense and unspeakable. What is the sense of giving such\nnames to children? And when we come to the Algernons, and Reginas, and\nSigourneys, and Fitzmaurices, and all the high-sounding but altogether\nmeaningless names with which we burden our children, I long for the\nsimplicity of the Indian\u2019s habit, the poetry, the prayer, that so often\nare connected with the names they give. The old Hebrews knew something\nof this, for we read of many of their names having a definite and\ndecided significance.\n\nOne day I found a Chemehuevi Indian with the name\nTow-um-bow-i-si-co-rum. After a little working of it out, I found\nthe name signified: \u201cThe reddish golden pathway of glory made by the\nsetting sun from the zenith to the horizon.\u201d I asked the man\u2019s mother\nhow he came to have such a name, and here is her reply! \u201cAs I gave\nbirth to my son, I looked up in the heavens and there I saw the golden\nreddish glory reaching from above where I lay to the faraway west,\nwhere the sun was just setting. So I said, \u2018It is an omen, and may it\nalso be a prophecy,\u2019 and my heart went out in prayer to Those Above,\nthat the pathway of life of my newly-born son might be one of golden\nglory until he, too, passed out of sight in the west; so I called him\nTowumbowisicorum, which signifies what I have said.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\nTHE INDIAN AND SOME LUXURIES\n\n\nMost city men regard a shampoo as a city luxury of modern times,\nexcept, of course, for the rich, who could always have what they\ndesire. Yet the shampoo is more common with some Indians than with\nus, and they enjoy it oftener than we do. The Indian\u2019s wife takes the\nroot of the _amole_, macerates it, and then beats it up and down in\na bowl of water until a most delicious and soft lather results, and\nthen her liege lord stoops over the bowl and she shampoos his long\nhair and scalp with vigor, neatness, skill, and dispatch. I have been\noperated upon by the best adepts in London, Paris, and New York, and\nI truthfully affirm that a white man has much to learn in the way of\nskillful manipulation, effective rubbing of the scalp, and delicious\nsilkiness of the hair, if he knows no other than such shampooing as I\nreceived.\n\nAnother so-called luxury of our civilization is an every-day matter\nwith the Indians of the Southwest. That is the Russo-Turkish bath. The\nfirst time I enjoyed this luxury with the Indians was on one of my\nvisits to the Havasupai tribe. I had been received into membership in\nthe tribe several years before, but had always felt a delicacy about\nasking to be invited to participate in this function. But one day I\nsaid to the old Medicine Man, as he was going down to _toholwoh_, \u201cHow\nis it you have never invited me to go into _toholwoh_ with you?\u201d My\nquestion surprised him. He quickly answered, \u201cWhy should I invite you\nto your own? The sweat-bath is as much yours as it is mine.\u201d \u201cThen,\u201d\nsaid I, \u201cI will go with you now.\u201d\n\nThe \u201cbath-house\u201d consisted of a small willow frame, some six or eight\nfeet in diameter, which, at the time of using, is covered over with\nNavaho blankets, etc., to make it heat and steam proof. A bed of clean\nwillows was spread out for the \u201csweaters\u201d to sit upon, and a place left\nvacant for the red-hot rocks. As soon as all was prepared I was invited\nto take my seat; one Indian followed on one side and the Medicine Man\non the other. Then one of the outer Indians handed in six or eight\nred-hot rocks, and the flap of the cover was let down and the bath was\nfairly \u201con.\u201d Directly the shaman began to sing a sacred song which\nrecited the fact that Toholwoh was a gift of the good god, Tochopa, and\nwas for the purpose of purifying the body from all evil.\n\nAs soon as the song ended, we were all sweating freely, but when the\nflap was opened, it was not to let us out, but to receive more hot\nrocks. As we sang a second song the heat grew more penetrating, so\nthat the words seemed to have real meaning. Our petition was that\n\u201cthe heat of Toholwoh might enter our eyes, our ears, our nostrils,\nour mouths,\u201d etc., each organ being named at the end of the line of\npetition. The song comprised a great long string of organs, some of\nwhich I had never heard of before. By this time sweat was pouring off\nfrom our bodies, but the flap was opened only to receive more rocks.\nAt the third time a bowl of water was handed in to my companion, which\nI was reaching for in order to enjoy a drink, when, to my horror and\nsurprise, he sprinkled the water over the red-hot rocks. The result\nwas an instantaneous cloud of steam, which seemed to set my lips and\nnostrils on fire and absolutely to choke me and prevent my breathing.\nYet the two Indians began another song, so I determined to stick it\nout and stand it as long as I could. Of course, in a few moments the\nintense heat of the steam was lost, and then I was able to join in the\nsong. At its close the same process of steaming was repeated, and then\nI sprang out and dived headlong into the cool (not cold) waters of the\nflowing Havasu, where for a long time I swam and enjoyed the delicious\nsensations with which my body was filled. Then, after a rub down with\nclean, clear, clayey mud, and another plunge, I lay in the sun on a bed\nof willows, listening to the Indians tell stories, and I can truthfully\nsay I never felt so clean in my life.\n\n[Illustration: A MOHAVE INDIAN WRAPPED UP IN HIS RABBIT SKIN BLANKET.]\n\nThis bath is taken by thousands of the Southwest Indians once a week\nas a matter of religion, so that, as a fact, while their clothes are\nragged and dirty, and they themselves appear to be dirty, they are\nreally clean. It must be confessed, on the other hand, that too many\nAmericans value the appearance of cleanliness more than the reality.\nThey would far rather appear clean even if they were not than _be_\nclean and appear dirty. It is better to combine both reality and\nappearance, but, for my own sake, if I had to choose between the two, I\nbelieve I would rather _be_ clean than only _appear_ clean.\n\nCivilized man, for centuries, has used hot baths of various kinds\nfor remedial and healing purposes. Throughout the world, wherever\nhot springs are found, men and women congregate in large numbers,\npalatial hotels are built, bath-houses established, and an army of\nhotel-keepers, physicians, nurses, masseurs, and bath operators\norganized. Some go to the baths just as they do any other fashionable\nthing, or in order to mingle with the gay and fashionable throng.\nOther idlers go purely for the pleasure they gain from such\nassociations, while still others go for the health they long for,--the\nstrength and vigor they have lost. And there can be no question that\nthey often gain it. In spite of the fashionable doctors who care less\nfor the health of their patients than they do for their own fame and\npockets; in spite of the physical ills that come from the altogether\ninappropriate diet of the hotel dining-rooms; in spite of the\nexcitement of balls and parties, receptions and routs, common at such\nplaces; and in spite of the injurious influences of the gaming tables\ntoo often maintained, the use of the waters is often beneficial to a\nnumber of the patients. Were they to use the waters rationally, live\nhygienically, avoid all stimulating foods and drinks, and religiously\nrefrain from all unnatural excitements, there is no question but that\nthe use of the hot waters, the hot mud packs, and the like, would give\nhealth to many thousands who now derive but little benefit from them.\n\nFrom whom did the white race learn the use of the hot bath, the mud\nbath, and the like? He learned it from the Indian, and if he would\nstudy the present methods of the Indians he would find many details\nconnected with these baths that he might learn to his great advantage.\n\nWhen the Indian goes to the bath he makes of it an almost religious\nceremony. In one of the illustrations an old Indian Shaman is telling\nto the younger ones the things they should heed before going into the\n_toholwoh_, or sweat bath, the frame of which (as yet uncovered) is\nclose at hand. The hot waters that bubble out from the interior of the\nearth he regards as the special gifts of the gods. He prays that he\nmay not use these gifts unworthily. Just as the Mohammedan believes\nthat the desert is the \u201cGarden of Allah\u201d and that no one must walk in\nit who is sinful until he has first asked for forgiveness, so does the\nIndian believe that the waters of healing will turn to his injury if he\ndoes not use them in the right spirit. Would it not be well if we--the\nsuperior race--approached this good gift of God in like manner?\n\n[Illustration: THE SHAMAN TELLING THE STORY OF THE FIRST TOHOLWOH.]\n\nThe natural simplicity of the Indian at the baths also offers a good\nlesson to us. Instead of seeking for gaiety, frivolity, fashion, and\nthe means of pampering his appetite, he goes to the baths of nature\nresolved upon quiet and restfulness as far as possible. He seeks to\nprepare his mind beforehand, that the physical means used will be\nbeneficial. In other words, though he is a rude, untutored savage,--so\nwe say,--he has a clearer conception of the effect the mind has upon\nthe body in real, practical healing, than has a large part of his\ncivilized brothers and sisters. As a rule, we go to a physician, or to\na sanitarium, or to baths--I mean those of us who are sick and desire\nhealth first of all--without any other thoughts than \u201cI am sick. To go\nhere may do me good. I hope it will.\u201d Instead of preparing our minds\nbeforehand by thoughtfulness, getting ourselves into the proper mental\nattitude to be helped, we leave it to chance, to the surroundings,\nto the doctor, and thus often fail to get the benefit we might have\nreceived. We carry our business cares, our family worries, our\nmoney-getting, with us and thus defeat the end for which we go.\n\nNor is that all! When we get there we want \u201call the comforts of a\nhome.\u201d In other words, we must be assured that we have a bedroom\nwhich we can lock up at night, a bedstead with a mattress as soft and\nunhealthy as the one we regularly sleep on, stuffy closets where we can\nhang our clothes,--and the rest.\n\nThe Indian finds his bedroom under the stars. He puts the invalid flat\non the ground,--a sheepskin, perhaps, between him and the earth, but\nthat is all. When will the superior white race learn that rejuvenation\nof the body comes quicker to those who \u201cshed\u201d their civilization,\nforswear their home comforts, quit their indulgence in fixed-up dishes,\nrefrain from social frivolities (commonly called duties), and first\nand foremost,--after throwing away all the cares and worries that come\nof being so highly civilized,--get to a place where it is possible to\nsleep out of doors _on the hard ground_, protected, of course, as the\nIndians are. Get into the woods, on to the hills, down in the canyons,\nout on the deserts. Take a roll of blankets along, and no matter what\nthe weather, learn to sleep on the bosom of Mother-Earth, out of doors.\nAnd if the region is one near hot springs or mud baths, all the better.\nMake it for the time being your home.\n\nAh! how wise is the Indian in his choice of a home. I have before\nreferred to this, but I cannot help writing of it again. Home! It is\nnot a place of unrest to him, where it requires the labor of wife and\ndaughter, or a host of servants, to keep it in order; where polished\nfurniture, polished floors, polished doors, polished mirrors, keep\none forever with wiping-cloth in hand, removing the marks of careless\nfingers; where bric-a-brac is accumulated and piled everywhere to the\nshattering of nerves if the children get near it, or careless visitors\nhappen to call; where \u201csocial demands\u201d are so great that children\nare relegated to the care of servants; where brothers and sisters\nscarce have time to know each other, and husbands and wives meet\nsemi-occasionally--no, it is not a home of this kind. To most Indians\n\u201ceverywhere\u201d is home provided there is a little shade, water, and grass\nfor his burro or pony. In the mountains, where he can shelter under\nan overhanging rock, or in the forest where he has a roof of emerald,\nsupported by great pillars of pine or cottonwood or sycamore,--there\nis home. In the desert, where the roof is millions of miles high,\ndecorated with suns and moons and stars and comets and meteors and\nMilky Way and countless nebul\u00e6, and the walls are bounded on the east\nby the rising sun, and on the west by the setting sun, and God\u2019s own\nlaboratories make new, fresh, pure air every moment--there is home.\n\nThe San Francisco disaster taught thousands of people the healthfulness\nof the outdoor life. People who had been ailing for years, puny\nchildren, an\u00e6mic youths and maidens, dyspeptic parents, all \u201cpicked\nup\u201d appetite and health when compelled to live in the parks and on the\nstreets.\n\nLet us heed the lesson. Let us follow the example of the Indian and\nbe more simple, more natural. Let us relegate to the museum the\ncollecting of curios and bric-a-brac and the thousand and one things\nthat so crowd our houses as to make museums rather than homes of them.\n\n[Illustration: A MOHAVE WOMAN WHOSE HAIR HAS BEEN \u201cDRESSED\u201d IN MUD.]\n\nI do not suppose it is necessary that I should say that in our\ncivilization we cannot _literally_ do as the Indian does in this\nmatter. That is not my thought. What I would urge is that we live more\nsimply, and that, like the Indian, we get out of doors more, instead of\nhousing ourselves the more as we become more \u201ccivilized.\u201d And that, in\nthe arrangements and accumulations of our home we make personal health,\ncomfort and happiness the most important considerations, rather than\ndisplay, and to win the approval or envy of our neighbors.\n\nBut to return to the hot springs. The Indian has always used them. He\nalso learned and bequeathed to us the knowledge that mud is a useful\ntherapeutic agent. The Yumas, Mohaves, and others who live near the\nbanks of the Colorado River are in the habit of regularly plastering\ndown their hair and scalp with thick, black mud. They go where it is\nclean and fresh,--washed down by the rushing waters of the mighty\nColorado through the great canyons--and, rubbing it well into their\nhair, they cover it over with a cloth tied over the scalp and go on\nabout their daily work. They keep the hair thus covered with mud for\na day or two, and then wash it off and give the scalp a thorough\ncleansing. What is the result? Whether the fact be a result from the\nuse of the mud or not, it is a fact that these river Indians have\nlong, glossy black hair free from all disease, and their scalps are\nas healthy as the hair. They have no dandruff, no falling out of the\nhair, and do not need any hair tonic or dye. The mud contains enough\nof the finely ground sand commingled with the softer silt to make a\nhealthful mixture for gently exciting the scalp when the rubbing off\nand cleansing process takes place. And covering the hair as well as\nthe scalp with the mud and allowing it to dry on demands that the\nhair shall be well rubbed as well as the skin. The effect is to clean\nthe hair thoroughly, and who knows but that the excitement generated\nby thus rubbing the hair as well as the scalp has something to do\nin promoting the healthful flow of the elements required for hair\nnutrition? Be that as it may, I know the fact, which is that these\nIndians, men as well as women, have hair, long, black, glossy, reaching\ndown to their waists, and they attribute its healthfulness to the\nregular use of the mud-pack and rub.\n\nNow, while we may not care to pack the hair in mud, we can certainly\nutilize the idea. I have done so for years. I often give my scalp\nand hair a mud bath, and it is both agreeable and exhilarating, and\nI had the assurance a few months ago from one of the leading scalp\nspecialists of the East that my scalp was in an absolutely healthful\ncondition--one of the very few found in such condition in the large\neastern metropolis.\n\n[Illustration: A MOHAVE INDIAN WHOSE HAIR AND SCALP HAVE BEEN CLEANED\nWITH MUD.]\n\nThe Indian also uses mud--and by this I mean the clear, pure,\nuncontaminated earth and sandy mixtures found in the rivers of the\ndesert west--for wounds. There is little doubt but that he learned\nthis from the animals. Who has not seen a dog, after a fight in which\nhe got worsted, run and throw himself into a mud puddle? Many years\nago--about twenty--I read an account of a battle between a wildcat and\na dog, and the writer, who saw the conflict, told how the dog went\nand bathed himself in mud thereafter. The brief sketch made such an\nimpression on me that I knew just where to find it, and I have hunted\nit up, and am now going to copy it for the benefit of my readers. It\nwill help explain why the Indian does the same thing. He has observed\nthe animals bathing in the mud, when wounded, as this dog did.\n\n\u201cThe dog has won the battle; but he has got some ugly scars along his\nsides and flank. Observe, that overheated as he is, he does not rush\ninto that clear stream. He takes his bath in that shallow spring with\na soft mud bottom. Note how he plasters himself, laying the wounded\nside underneath, and then sitting down on his haunches, buries all the\nwounded parts in the ooze. That mud has medicinal properties. The dog\nknows it. No physician could make so good a poultice for the wounds of\na cat\u2019s claws as this dog has found for himself. Pray, if you had been\nclawed in that way by either feline or feminine, would you have found\nanything at the bottom of your book philosophy so remedial as this dog\nhas found?\u201d\n\nThe Indian\u2019s use of mud, therefore, is seen to be an inheritance as the\nresult of his observation of the animals. Since the time I heard of the\ndog and wildcat fight I have had occasion to watch the Indians many\ntimes. I have used the mud with them, and always with good results. And\nif, when some four and a half years ago I was bitten on the thumb by a\nrattlesnake, and for a week was supposed to be hovering between life\nand death, I had thought enough to have done as the Indians do,--gone\nand put my hand and arm in a mud bath at the side of a stream or at the\nbottom of a shallow spring, I should have fared as well as I did (and\nperhaps better), though I had two skilled physicians, an accomplished\nprofessor, and a devoted nurse to care for me.\n\nAnd when I was supposed to be well again,--months afterward,--I found\nthat the deadly poison had in some way lodged in the lining of the\nstomach, so that, at times, it would cause a nervous and muscular\ndisturbance that made me suffer intense agony. I then recalled the use\nof mud by my Indian friends, and I hied me away as speedily as I could\nto the hot mud baths of Paso Robles, in California. There the sulphur\nwater at a temperature of over 110\u00b0 Fahrenheit comes bubbling into a\ngreat wooden tank filled with the soft, velvety mud, black as ink, of\nthe tule marsh. Into this tank I stepped, and gradually worked my way\ninto the mud, lying down in it, and wriggling and working my body until\nI was as near covered as I could be. I brought great armfuls of the\nhot, soft, and soothing nature poultice over my stomach and body, and\nthen lay there as long as it was wise to do so. What mattered it that I\nwas blacker than a negro when I came out. Two minutes with a bucket and\na hose and I was cleaner than ever. One week of these baths and I lost\nthe poison, never again to return. I never think of Paso Robles and the\nmud baths there without a deep sense of gratitude that some of us at\nleast have learned how to utilize some good things that the Indian has\ntaught us.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\nTHE INDIAN AND THE SEX QUESTION\n\n\nHaving studied medicine somewhat in my life, I have been permitted as\na \u201cmedicine man\u201d to know more of the intimate life of the Indian women\nthan many white men. In this article I propose to give the results of\nmany observations in this field, with full assurance that there are\nmany things the white woman may learn from the Indian, both in her\ntreatment of herself and her children.\n\nIn the first place, the period of adolescence in both boys and girls is\nregarded with the importance it deserves.\n\nThe white race has much to learn from the Indian in its treatment of\nboys and girls at this age. My blood is made to boil almost every\nday when I am in our cities and see young girls, just entering into\nmaidenhood, coming home from school, an\u00e6mic, pale, nervous, irritable,\nalmost victims of St. Vitus\u2019s dance, often dyspeptic or with a cough\nfastening its hold upon them, because their parents are so blind and\nfoolish as to prefer book and school education to health. To me such\nparents are guilty of cruelty and criminality, and I would sooner\nimprison them and take away the control of their children from them\nthan I would the forger or the housebreaker. They are cruel in that\nthey are either ignorantly or wilfully ruining the health,--perhaps for\nlife,--of their children, and they are criminal in that by so doing\nthey are injuring the future welfare of the state. Boys, too, are\ntreated exactly the same at this time as at any other, and when the\ngreat mystery of sex awakening is upon them, they are sent to school\nas usual, treated with the same untrue answers to the questions that\narise that they were given to quiet their minds when they were little\nmore than babies. I am thankful there has been much of an awakening in\nthis matter during the past twenty years, and that I have had an active\npart in it. I think it was in 1888 that I published a small book on sex\nteaching for the young.[4] It is as imperative to warn the young to-day\nas it was then. The Indian boy is instructed fully into the mystery of\nsex just as soon and as simply as he is in every other question that\narises, and at puberty he is made the subject of specific ceremonies\nthat teach him the meaning of the change that is coming over him. He is\ntreated with a new dignity, is formally recognized as having entered\nman\u2019s estate, and is sent out into the woods or the solitude of the\ndesert \u201cto come to himself.\u201d\n\n[4] \u201cThe Guiding Light,\u201d in two parts, to be had only from the author,\n1098 N. Raymond Ave., Pasadena, Cal. In paper, 50 cents; in cloth,\n$1.00 postpaid.\n\nIn the case of girls, ceremonies of instruction, purification, and\ndedication are almost universally observed. The adolescent is set\napart from her fellows, and the elder women give her definite and full\ninstruction as to what the change that is taking place in her life\nmeans. She is shown the importance of the new function, and how much\nthe welfare of the race depends upon it. Then she is made to undergo\nceremonies that last for several days, in which her body and all its\nfunctions are dedicated to the tribe. She is one of the future mothers\nnow, and, as such, is entitled to all respect and consideration. There\nis no foolish reserve, no \u201cmodesty,\u201d so-called, which arrogates to\nitself the right to criticise the wisdom of God in creating human\nbeings male and female that they may marry and propagate their kind\nupon the earth. For, wherever one finds the sort of \u201cmodesty\u201d that is\nashamed of natural and God-given functions, there is either a mental\nperversion for which the victim is to be pitied, or a moral perversion\nwhich is to be reprobated. Every Indian girl is given fully to\nunderstand what the function means, with all its possibilities, and she\nis taught to pray that, when the time comes, she may have a lover, and\nthat he may be a good husband, and that, in due time, she may be the\nhappy and healthy mother of many happy and healthy children.\n\nAnd in some tribes there are certain shrines where the girls are taught\nto go and offer their prayers that lovers, husbands, and children--not\none or two of the latter, but many--may be given to them at the will of\nthe gods above.\n\nThis is to dignify sex, to train the girls that wifehood and motherhood\nare holy and to be desired, and that they are not matters merely\nto jest and joke about, or to talk in secret whispers about one to\nanother, as if the very subject were unholy and unclean.\n\nThen a matter of practical healthfulness is observed that white parents\nneed very much to learn, it appears to me, especially in this age of\nscholastic crowding and mental overworking. Each month the girl is\nrequired to rest, in order that she may preserve and maintain her body\nin perfectly healthy condition. She may go where she will, but she must\nbe quiet and still, in order that the function may be not disturbed,\nand that its regularity may be established. Not only this, but this\nhabit of rest is kept up so long as the function continues through\nlife. Even on the march a woman may stay behind (if she so desires) and\nrest for a day or so. The result of this rest at such times is shown in\nthe strength and vigor the women show during pregnancy and at birth.\nThey seem to store up strength, and, as I shall later show, childbirth\nto most of them is no more a time of peril, pain, or distress than is\nbreathing.\n\n[Illustration: A HAVASUPAI MOTHER, PROUD OF HER MAN-CHILD.]\n\nMothers who neglect to thus instruct and care for their daughters at\nthe adolescent period are criminals both to their children and to the\nrace. Among the ancient Greeks such a mother would have been regarded\nas a monstrosity; yet many mothers have confessed to their physicians\nthey have never had one word of converse with their daughters upon\nthis most important subject. When I see children going to school at\nthis adolescent period, and being forced by our competitive system\nof education to strain every nerve to cram the required amount of\nfacts into their brains, I do not wonder that we have so many sickly\nwomen who are incapable of being the mothers of healthy and happy\nchildren. Far better that our children be not educated in chemistry,\nand literature, in physical science and art, than that they unfit\nthemselves for the happy relations of a beautiful marriage and sweet\nand tender parenthood. For let the new or the old woman say what she\nwill, the divinely ordered plan is that women shall be wives, and happy\nwives at that, capable of making their husbands happy, or at least of\ncontributing their share to that end, and also that they shall know\nthe joys of maternity. Unhappy indeed is that woman whose physical\ncondition is such that she refuses to know the sweet touch of her own\nbaby\u2019s body, and denies herself the blessed privilege of training its\nsoul for a beautiful and useful life.\n\nThe Indian mother sees to it that her daughter is early taught her\nfuture possibilities and the will of Those Above in regard to her, and\nthe growing woman would as soon shirk the responsibilities of her sex\nas she would refuse to eat. The consequences are that normal births\nwith Indian women are practically painless and entirely free from\ndanger. I have known a woman to deliver herself of her child, sever the\numbilicus, and then walk half a mile to the creek, walk into it with\nthe baby, and give herself and the child a good washing, then return to\nher camp, suckle the little one, and proceed to attend to her duties as\nif nothing had happened. At another time I saw a woman, less than half\nan hour after her child was born, start off for a heavy load of wood.\nTheir freedom from constricting waist-bands, their absolute freedom of\nbody, their nasal and deep breathing, their muscular exercise through\nlife, their open air sleeping and living,--all have much to do with\nthese easy births.\n\n[Illustration: THE AUTHOR DESCRIBING THE SYMBOLISM OF THE PAIUTI BASKET\nDESIGN.]\n\nTo a good Indian woman, also, there is nothing more evil than to\ncircumvent the will of Those Above by refusing to have children. Such a\nwoman would be almost a monstrosity to an Indian, who would be unable\nto comprehend the mental workings of such an abnormality. Children are\nto be desired, to be longed for, and to become a joyous possession. In\nthe making of some of their basketry the Paiuti women weave a design\nwhich shows the opening between the upper and lower worlds through\nwhich the souls of all children born into this upper world must come.\nBy a correspondence of the symbol with the thing symbolized, the\nPaiuti weaver believes that if she closes up this opening in the\nbasket, she will render herself incapable of bearing any more children.\nTherefore, even though you were to offer her her weight in money, you\ncould not persuade her to close up the aperture in the basket\u2019s design.\nThis would be circumventing the will of the gods.\n\nThe same law, too, applies to the suckling of her child. The Indian\nmother never dreams of foregoing this healthful duty and pleasure. She\nregards it as one of her special joys, in which she is superior to man.\nAnd just as the Paiuti weaver refuses to close the aperture in her\nbasket, so does the Zuni woman refuse to close, except with averted\neyes and a prayer that the gods will see she did it with unseeing eyes,\nthe tiny aperture in the mamm\u00e6 of the water bottles which she makes\nof clay in imitation of the human breasts. She dare not, even thus in\nsymbol, suggest the closing of her own maternal founts.\n\nAh! beautiful simplicity and joy of naturalness. The God of men and\nwomen surely knew what was good for them when He set in motion the\nforces that created them. In harmony with His will and purpose we are\nhealthy, happy, normal beings, living lives of purity, progress, and\npeace. In opposition to His will we are unhealthy, unhappy, abnormal\nbeings, full of wretchedness, impurity, and misery. In many things\nthe Indian, too simple to go far away from the Divine precepts which\ncome to him through contact with nature, is wiser than we. Let us then\nput on the garment of simplicity, seek to know the will of God, and\nwith hearts like little children learn the true way, and then seek for\ncourage to walk therein.\n\n[Illustration: A HEALTHY AND HAPPY PIMA MOTHER WHOSE BABY WAS GLADLY\nWELCOMED.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\nTHE INDIAN AND HER BABY\n\n\nI have elsewhere spoken of the Indian woman\u2019s reception of her child.\nIt is welcomed with joy, and yet in its first hour\u2019s treatment most\nwhite women would think its life would terminate. After seeing that\nit breathes properly--that is, through the nose--the mother carries\nher little one to the nearest creek or water-hole and gives it a good\nbath. Cold water has no terrors for her, and she does not fear its use\nfor the child. With this cold bath the child may be said to enter its\nearthly existence. Henceforth life is to be a succession of hardening\nprocesses. Indian babies get no foolish and weakening coddling. They\nare loved dearly and petted often, but are made to lie down on flat\nboards or basket cradles, with arms and legs strapped down, and are\nthus early accustomed to physical restraint. They sleep out of doors\nfrom the day of their birth, and become accustomed to all kinds of\nweather. For an Indian child who has taken cold we shall look in vain.\nThe name, the thought of such an ill is unknown.\n\nIf the parents have to move from canyon up to plateau, or go off to far\naway forests for the winter\u2019s supply of pinion nuts, the child is put\ninto its carrying basket, swung on the back of the mother, dependent\nfrom her forehead, and carried either on horseback or on foot to the\nnew stopping place. Simplicity and naturalness accompany every stage of\nthe little one\u2019s life until the age of puberty, when the child-life is\nsupposed to end, and the man or woman life begins.\n\n[Illustration: A HEALTHY AND HAPPY INDIAN BABY.]\n\nNow, while of very necessity our method of treating white children\nmust be different from this, we can learn many lessons from the Indian\nthat will materially benefit our race. The key-stone of the whole idea\nis found in the words: \u201cNo coddling.\u201d Not long ago I went to the home\nof an artist friend. His wife had just presented him with a fine,\nhealthy son. The wife\u2019s mother was present, and had taken charge of\nthe young mother and her baby. The room was stifling hot, so that I\ncould scarcely breathe, and when I went to see the baby it was wrapped\nup in a cradle with a sheet and _three_ blankets _over its head_. At\nonce I opened the doors and windows, taking good precaution to see that\nthe mother did not take cold. I gave both grandmother and new mother\na lecture upon the monstrous folly and cruelty of thus depriving the\nnew-born child of needed air for its expanding lungs. The lesson was\naccepted in the proper spirit, for the father fully agreed with me,\nand on the grandmother\u2019s departure, a few days later, the coddling,\nsmothering process ceased, and a cold bath, sleeping out of doors, and\na generally healthy treatment of the child substituted. I know this is\nan exaggerated case, but it serves as an illustration of the wrongful\nand excessive \u201ccoddling\u201d we give our children, from which follow such\nevils as weak lungs, weak throats, readiness to take cold, etc.\n\nAs the exaggerated opposite of this, let me relate the treatment I\naccorded to my own children.\n\nWhen my first son was born, we were so located that I was compelled\nto be both physician and nurse. His first experience--after a good\nhot bath--was a cold bath, and within half an hour of his birth he\nwas sleeping out of doors. At five weeks of age he and his mother\naccompanied me on an eight-hundred-mile drive over the plains and\ndeserts of Nevada. We camped out, slept on the ground, and gave him,\nwhenever possible, an open air bath in the cold mountain brooks that\noccasionally were met with.\n\nA year or so after the second boy was born I was stationed in the\nlittle town of Cedarville, Cal., and one of the happiest remembrances\nof my life there was in winter when the snow was deep upon the ground.\nI would place a canvas upon the floor of my small study, where a good\nfire blazed in the stove, fetch in a couple of washtubs full of snow,\nthen undress the youngsters, and watch them as they sat in the snow,\nrubbed it on their naked bodies and laughed and shouted and crowed with\ndelight when I gently snowballed them.\n\nWhile they were little tots, every morning before being dressed they\nstood outside while I threw--not poured, but threw,--a bucketful of\ncold water over them. Then, after a vigorous and hearty rub down, they\nwent with me for a walk where they were allowed to run and jump and\nromp to their heart\u2019s content.\n\nThis I call a rational treatment of children. It certainly is a healthy\ntreatment, and those brought up under such an Indian method will never\nknow the aches, pains, ills, and weaknesses that most white children\nare afflicted with. And I would treat my baby girls, if I had any,\nexactly the same as my boys, for the health of the race more nearly\ndepends upon the health of the future mothers than upon that of the\nfuture fathers.\n\nIf it be thought that I am too extreme I quote an article entire from\na recent _Good Health_, entitled \u201cStrenuous Health Culture,\u201d in which\nit will be seen that others have done the same thing with equally good\nresults.\n\n    \u201c\u2018Time was when clothing, sumptuous or for use,\n    Save their own painted skins, our sires had none.\u2019\n\n\u201cYet they were far healthier and hardier than the present much-clad\ngeneration. Why does the savage go naked with impunity while the\ncivilized man shivers in his clothes, and is a prey to colds,\npneumonia, and a variety of diseases unknown to the naked savage?\n\n\u201cOne of the marvels of the normal human body is its wonderful\nadaptability--the maintenance of its equilibrium under constantly\nvarying conditions. By the regulation and adaptation of the heat\nfunctions of the body the bodily temperature is maintained at the\nnormal standard in spite of the changing temperature of the surrounding\natmosphere. But when the body is artificially heated continually, as\nby over-clothing and over-heated rooms, its functions become to some\ndegree dormant, and in consequence the natural bodily resistance is\ngreatly lessened.\n\n\u201cThe effort of the body to resist cold stimulates and strengthens. One\nwho can resist cold can resist all kinds of disease germs. This has\nbeen demonstrated by the success of the \u2018cold-air cure\u2019 for a variety\nof diseases.\n\n\u201cThe old-time coddling of delicate children, which still further\nlessened their vitality and weakened their powers of endurance, is\nnow giving place to its opposite. Judicious exposure to cold has been\nfound to be one of the best methods of strengthening weak infants\nand developing healthy children. At a recent conference of mothers\nheld in Minnesota, they were advised that a snowbank makes one of the\nbest cradles. One mother who had tried this treatment thought that it\naccounted for the unusual health and strength of the family.\n\n\u201cA Milwaukee physician, Dr. John E. Worden, has adopted this strenuous\ntreatment to prepare his babes for the rigors of life, and up to the\npresent his methods have been abundantly justified by their success.\nHis little daughters, Shirley and Jane, aged respectively eight and\nthree years, are two of the firmest and healthiest bits of humanity to\nwhom disease of all kinds is unknown. During the cold weather these\nchildren may be seen barefooted and bareheaded, clad only in their\ncotton garments, thoroughly enjoying a romp in the snowdrifts, and\nwithout even a goose-pimple on their skin.\n\n\u201c\u2018We are merely following out health rules,\u2019 said Dr. Worden, speaking\nof his unique methods of bringing up his children. \u2018We are aiming at\nprevention rather than at cure. We have brought the children up so that\nthey are fearless, and dread neither the ice-cold plunge nor a romp in\nthe snow in their bare feet. The door is always open, and they go out\nwhen they like and return when they are ready to do so. We do not force\nthe children to go out in the snow barefooted; they go out of their\nown free will, and play until they are tired, or their attention is\ncalled to something else.\n\n[Illustration: A HOPI INDIAN AT ORAIBI SHELLING CORN.]\n\n\u201c\u2018In the summer we send them out into the sun bareheaded and\nbarefooted, with orders to keep out of the shade. On the street cars\nthey are instructed to sit on the sunny side of the car. It is well\nthat they experience something of contrast; therefore, a cold bath is\ngiven them daily in the warm weather. In the winter they are allowed to\ngo outdoors to get stimulus from the cold air.\n\n\u201c\u2018Children brought up like tender hot-house plants are likely to\ncontract colds and other diseases, and to die as the result of not\nhaving robust constitutions. These children, on the contrary, will\nand do escape without any sickness; and should they get sick, their\nrecovery is almost certain, because of their being strong and in good\ncondition.\u2019\n\n\u201cBoth Dr. Worden and his wife are graduates of the University of\nMichigan, and Mrs. Worden was for a number of years before her marriage\na trained nurse.\n\n\u201c\u2018During my hospital training and institutional work,\u2019 says Mrs.\nWorden, \u2018I saw so much sickness due to weakened bodies that I\ninvestigated causes, and came to the conclusion that much of the\nweakness was due to a lack of physical development, to abuses through\nmistaken kindness on the part of the parents, that so weakened the\nimmature bodies that they could not withstand the attack of disease.\nWith our children, beginning from babyhood, we have had one aim, and\nthat is to give them strong physiques, and we have succeeded thus\nfar. They have never had one drop of medicine, and never been ill one\nmoment.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe clothing of these children is always light, and much the same\nsummer and winter. It is of cotton almost exclusively, and no\nbands are ever used. In the place of stockings the easy, sensible,\ncomfortable Roman sandal, made only in England, is worn.\n\n[Illustration: THE BEST NATURED BABY I EVER SAW. HER PARENTS ARE\nWALLAPAIS.]\n\n\u201c\u2018We believe in clothing them as lightly as possible,\u2019 says Mrs.\nWorden, \u2018depending on their excellent heat-making organs to develop\nany extra warmth needed in an emergency. This stimulates a necessity\nfor a good, strong internal circulation of the fluids of the body, and\ncreates a desire to exercise a little in order to keep warm. Over-warm\nchildren are usually lazy.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe Worden home is sunny and bright, with windows wide open day and\nnight, and the rooms kept always cool and fresh. No useless furniture,\nno bric-a-brac, no draperies, harbor dust and germs. The walls and\nhard-wood floors and few articles of furniture are kept scrupulously\nclean, but without ornament. The whole house is given over to the\nchildren, and there is no need for prohibitions of any sort.\n\n\u201cConcerning the diet of his children Dr. Worden says: \u2018No national\nor international problems concerning the welfare of our people are as\nimportant as our food problem. And yet it is a very simple one, solved\nby an all-wise Creator before the creation of man. Time enough is\nwasted in the kitchen of our modern homes, spoiling good food by making\nalmost impossible mixtures and then over-cooking these, to do all the\nnecessary work of any nation. This careless and ignorant diet leads to\nill-health, from which there is no escape unless we learn to lead a\nsensible life, eating moderately of natural foods, and these in simple\ncombinations.\n\n\u201c\u2018With our children, very little cow\u2019s milk is used, largely because\nof its unreliability in the city; but we do not favor an abundance of\nmilk anyway, after children have teeth to use on their food. Their diet\nconsists of fruits, cereals, nuts, and vegetables, no spices, vinegar,\netc., being used. Whole wheat flour, the bran included, is used\nexclusively.\n\n\u201c\u2018They are never urged to eat. We expect them to know whether they\nare hungry or not. Urging children to eat leads to overfilling of the\nstomach, and this to bowel disorders, and often death. Next to urging\nchildren to eat, as a cause of overeating, is variety. We never supply\nthem with a choice of foods at one meal. The diet for each meal is\nsimple, and yet in one season or year they get quite a variety, as\nexampled by a list of the fruits they get, one kind at a time: Apples,\npears, grapes, plums, cherries, oranges, pineapples, peaches, grape\nfruit, prunes, apricots, figs, dates, raisins, bananas, melons, and\nthe numerous kinds of berries--all choice fruit. They scorn anything\nwith a bad spot as being not fit to eat. Then again we buy them lots of\nnuts for food, not just for the fun of cracking and eating and usually\novereating. They get nut food as a United States soldier his rations.\nNext we have an immense choice of vegetables, of which they get one\nkind at a meal--never two vegetables to one child at the same meal. On\nsuch a diet it is no occasion for surprise that they have never been\nsick. The good health to be derived from a simple meal more than repays\nfor any fancied abstinence.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe Worden children are already little athletes. The elder girl is the\nyoungest basket-ball player in Milwaukee. Every evening they exercise\nfor a few minutes nude, incidentally getting an air bath to the skin of\nthe whole body while developing and strengthening the muscles.\n\n\u201cDr. and Mrs. Worden are not faddists. They are earnestly and\nsteadfastly endeavoring to fulfill the trust committed to them, to\ndevelop their children into strong healthy women, to strengthen their\npowers of endurance, and develop their physical faculties by bringing\nthem up in accordance with all the laws of health.\u201d\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAnother thing that I would have white women learn from their Indian\nsisters, is a thing they used to know but are rapidly forgetting. That\nis, the joy of suckling their own children. An Indian mother that does\nnot suckle her own child is almost unknown. With the \u201csuperior classes\u201d\nof the white race it is the opposite of this proposition that is true.\nNot only is this of great injury to the child, but it is fraught with\nmost serious consequences to the mother. Is it nothing that the mother\nof a child willfully puts away from herself all the little, fond,\nsweet intimacies that naturally grow out of this relationship; the joy\nof exercise of a natural and beautiful function; the feeling that\nthe baby life is still being sustained by the mother\u2019s own life-blood\ntransmuted by mother love and mother-processes into sweet, delicious\nfood that nothing else can equal?\n\n[Illustration: A DILIGENT HOPI BASKET WEAVER, WHO IS ALSO A GOOD\nMOTHER.]\n\nIt is a fact that all the higher affections and emotions of the human\nsoul have to be cultivated and developed. The child sees little or no\nbeauty in a sunset; it must be trained to recognize it. The love of\nNature grows as we cultivate it. The nobler emotions of self-sacrifice,\nhumility, kindliness, grow as we cultivate them, and while, where\nmaternity is a perfectly natural process, joy accompanies it in\nall its manifestations, there is no denying the fact that in our\nso-called civilization women have to cultivate the feelings connected\nwith the function to bring to themselves the joy they should normally\npossess. But that there is a joy in suckling one\u2019s own child many, many\nmothers--true mothers--have assured me, and I wish to add my voice\nto the supplications of the innocent child that every mother give of\nher own sweet, loving breast to the child she has brought into the\nworld. Some mothers refuse because it destroys the beautiful contour of\nthe bust; others because it demands too close confinement, and would\ntherefore prohibit regular attendance upon club or social functions.\nPoor women! Bartering their God-given rights and privileges for the\nmesses of pottage that society and club life afford--that is, afford to\nmothers at the time they should be with their babes. Can any society on\nearth, any club that ever existed, compensate for the loss of healthful\nnutrition given from a loving mother\u2019s breast? Let the statistics of\n\u201cbottle-fed\u201d babies attest the dangers that accrue from the mother\u2019s\nrefusal (or inability--for which she is to be pitied rather than\ncondemned) to suckle her own young.\n\n[Illustration: A PROUD AND HAPPY WALLAPI MOTHER.]\n\n[Illustration: A HOPI BABY WHO HAS NEVER YET KNOWN CLOTHES.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\nTHE INDIAN AND THE SANCTITY OF NUDITY\n\n\nWhile adults of both sexes among all Indians wear either a skirt or\na gee-string, there is not the slightest hesitancy in allowing the\nyoung, both boys and girls, to run about in a state of nudity. Since\nwe have sent white teachers and missionaries to the Indians, they are\nbeginning to learn that somehow--though they can\u2019t sort it out just\nhow or why--there is something indecent in allowing nude children to\nwander about their homes and villages. They are being taught to be\n\u201cashamed,\u201d--their children are becoming sex-conscious as are our white\nchildren, long before their time, and we are foisting on to them our\nhateful, impure, and blasphemous conceptions of nudity. For myself I am\nfree to confess that I have no sympathy with this kind of teaching. I\nthink it unnecessary, and not only unnecessary but a positive injury.\nI believe in the sanctity of nudity, especially in that of young\nchildren, and while with our present social customs we cannot allow our\nchildren to be nude or partially nude in public, I would that our minds\nwere as clean in this matter as are those of the Indians with whom I\nhave so long been acquainted.\n\nWhatever society may demand of us in public, there is no reason why,\nin private, both our children and ourselves should not spend a certain\nportion of every day, if possible, in contact with the direct rays of\nthe sun and the air. Every school in the land should be so equipped,\nand our children and their parents be so trained, that, under proper\ndirection, a certain part of every day the students could be so\nexposed. All know the benefit that comes from the exposing of the arms\nand legs to the sun and breezes at the sea-shore. Men, women, and\nchildren alike who flee the city for an annual holiday to the seaside\nreturn to their shut-in, civilized (!) life with renewed vigor and\nhealth. Why not give some of this life to city children every day\nin the year? Even in Eastern cities, in winter, a solarium could be\ncreated in the top stories of the schoolhouses, and there, with every\nwindow wide open, the children clothed in the scantiest of garments,\nas at the seaside, could go through physical and breathing exercises,\nand romp or play games for half an hour, to their great benefit both of\nbody and mind.\n\nWe have for so long trained ourselves to the half expressed belief\nthat there is something wrong about nudity that we find women\u2019s clubs\ndraping statues, and organizations rejecting figures because they are\nnude, which all ages and all civilized peoples have accepted as pure\nand chaste works of art. I would not for a moment have it thought\nthat I approve of all nude statues or pictures. Many of them have\nno virtue to commend them. Yet I would not indiscriminately condemn\nall works of art in the nude merely because they are nude. We have\nforgotten the appearance of a healthy body, and feel ashamed to see\none. By our mental attitude we accuse the Creator of indecency that\n\u201cmale and female created He them,\u201d for, not only do we veil the bodies\nof the opposite sexes from each other, (which is a perfectly correct\nand wise thing to do) but daughters are ashamed to be seen nude by\ntheir own mothers, and mothers by their daughters. I believe in the\nsanctity of nudity. Let the sexes remain apart, by all means, but let\nthere be less of false shame when men see nude men, or women see nude\nwomen, or either or both see nude children. It is a fact declared by\nthe most conservative of white explorers, that the naked tribes of\naborigines are the most pure, chaste, and truly modest. Our conception\nthat because Indians are unclothed they are therefore indecent and\nunclean, impure and unchaste, is a dirty conception, dishonoring to\nourselves and our Creator. _Honi soit qui mal y pense_, and \u201cto the\npure all things are pure\u201d are as true to-day as when they were first\nspoken and written, and while I am as opposed as is any one living to\nnude pictures and statues that have nothing to commend them but their\nnudity; while I am strongly opposed to promiscuous nudity either in\nwhole or in part, I am equally opposed to the mental attitude that\nnudity in itself is wrong, and that the Creator did not know His\nbusiness when he created us both nude and of different sexes.\n\n[Illustration: A HAVASUPAI CHILD BROUGHT UP TO ENJOY BEING OUT IN THE\nRAIN.]\n\nBenjamin Franklin, John Quincy Adams, and many others of the great men\nof the world, made it a daily practice to expose their bodies to the\nsun and the air. For years I have seized every proper opportunity\nto do so, such as when I took my fifteen days\u2019 rowing trip down the\nColorado River. When on the Salton Sea exploring trip; when out in the\ndeserts, the canyons, the forests, on the mountain tops, I endeavored\nevery day to give my body some exposure, and every night and morning,\nwhen camping out, before retiring and arising, I have a brief air bath,\nsometimes with vigorous physical exercises. Thus the power of God\u2019s own\nsun and air enter my body through every pore of the skin, and I enjoy a\nhealth, vigor, vim, and tingle of delight I can get in no other way.\n\nWhen I first visited the Havasupai Indians, all the men were nude, part\nof the time, save for the breech-clout. In their dances, in some of\nwhich I participated, it was a delight to see the movements of their\nperfect muscles, their bronze flesh glistening in the sun, or in the\nglow of the camp fires. And men, women, and children all bathed at the\nsame time, in the clear waters of Havasu Creek, all the adults, of\ncourse, wearing either a short skirt or a breech clout, but the major\npart of the body fully exposed. There was no immodesty and no thought\nof anything of the kind. Nudity or semi-nudity was taken as a matter of\ncourse, and neither by word or deed did anyone seem conscious of it.\nAfter vigorous swimming, the young men wrestled, the youngsters ran\nraces, the men indulged in various games, their bodies still exposed\nto the sun and the air, and no one could fail to observe the health,\nvigor, and robustness that came from this habit of life.\n\nThe Hopis train their boys and young men to their morning runs over the\ndesert in a state of almost complete nudity, and in their snake dance\nraces, nothing but the gee-string is worn, and people of both sexes\ngaze upon them with no thought of immodesty. Modesty is a condition of\nsoul, and has nothing to do with the exposure or covering of the body.\nOne may be a Godiva and be far more modest than another who veils not\nonly her whole body but even her face. And for myself, I wish to record\nmy conviction that it would be far better for the morals of civilized\nman if he would bring up his children of both sexes to recognize and\nknow the sanctity of nudity, rather than to cover the body as he does\nand to affirm by his words and suggest by his demeanor that he regards\nan exposed body as indecent. A small trunk can always be worn and this\nsuffices for every purpose of true modesty.\n\n[Illustration: A NUDE HOPI SPINNING WOOL FOR THE MAKING OF A DRESS FOR\nHIS WIFE.]\n\nIn many of the leading sanitariums of the world the patients are\nrequired to expose their bodies to the sun and air for a certain length\nof time daily. Here is a struggling to get back to a natural condition,\nan almost essential condition to the attainment and retention of\nperfect health. Of the outdoor gymnasiums for men and women at the\nBoulder Sanitarium, Colorado, Dr. Howard F. Rand thus writes:\n\n\u201cHere the men patients, clothed with simple trunks, bask in the\nsunshine on the sand which covers the ground, follow the trainer\nthrough the different lines of gymnastic work, finally plunging into\nthe pool and coming out ready to be dried and thoroughly rubbed.\nDonning their simple apparel, they can, if they choose, proceed up the\nmountain, and gather beautiful wild flowers and rest the eye on the\nsurrounding scenery.\n\n\u201cThe outdoor gymnasium is especially helpful in the treatment of\nwomen. It is very difficult to get them to dress properly when taking\nphysical exercise, and they are \u2018so afraid\u2019 of exposing themselves\nto the sunlight and \u2018ruining\u2019 their complexion. But the beautiful\nphysique of some of our young women who have trained in this line,\nand the assurance that they can so develop themselves, lead them to\nmake short trips to the gymnasium, and gradually they grow willing\nto be delivered from close wrappings, and expose themselves to the\nsunlight. The pleasure is enticing; enjoyment of exercise in this\nplace without the restriction of tight clothing rapidly increases, and\ndesired results are obtained by this means in less time than in any\nother line of training. The great essential is to have the person in\nnatural condition when exercising, so that all the organs of the body\nmay move freely and naturally, without let or hindrance. Number seems\nto increase the enchantment; hence the more readily do the timid and\nbackward take the first steps.\n\n\u201cAt first it is impossible for many to expand at the waist line; but\na jump into the pool, the temperature of the water being 70\u00b0 to 75\u00b0,\ncauses them involuntarily to inflate the respiratory organs, and\nthrough this and special training deep breathing becomes habitual in\nless time than it would in any other way.\n\n\u201cWe aim to have our patients spend at least one hour, twice a day\n(forenoon and afternoon), in the open-air gymnasium.\n\n\u201cSoon after beginning this course, the patient\u2019s skin, and mind as\nwell, will be found clearing up. He will say his appetite is better,\nand that he sleeps more soundly, and is gaining weight and strength.\nThe surface becomes brown in a short time, but as soon as pigmentation\nceases, there is a natural, pearly-white hue--a sure indicator of\nhealth.\u201d\n\nThese open-air gymnasiums are to be found at the leading sanitariums of\nthe world, thus clearly showing that the Indian idea of nudity has the\nsanction of the highest and wisest medical opinions of the white race.\n\nThe body is a sweet, a precious, a beautiful expression of God\u2019s\nthought; it was and is intended by the Divine as the house of the mind,\nthe soul, the immortal part of the human being. Paul expressly declares\nit is \u201cthe temple of the Holy Ghost.\u201d Every part of it is beautiful,\nevery part God-given. In health it is the most perfect machine ever\ndesigned, and the most beautiful. Every function it performs is a\nmarvel, every power contained within it a miracle. How obviously\nwrong then is anything that disparages, lowers, offends the high and\nsupreme dignity of this glorious structure. Yet we are ashamed of it,\nwe apologize for it, we teach our children to be ashamed of it and to\ncover it as an evil thing.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\nTHE INDIAN AND FRANKNESS\n\n\nAnother thing the white race might learn from the Indian, and it would\nbe well for them if they did, is the virtue of frankness. If an Indian\nlikes you or dislikes you, he lets you know. There is no pretense, no\nhypocrisy, and in his speech he indicates his feelings. Then, too, he\nis not offended by plain speech. If he lies and you tell him so, he\nhonors you; and if you lie, he will not hesitate to say so. Making the\nfingers of both hands as a tongue on each side of the mouth, he says:\n\u201cYou talk two ways at once,\u201d which is Indian for our ruder vernacular:\n\u201cYou are a liar!\u201d There are no conventional lies among Indians. They\ndo not speak untruths for the sake of politeness. They have learned\nthe lesson of the Man of Galilee, who two thousand years ago taught,\n\u201cLet your yea be yea, and your nay nay, for whatsoever is more than\nthese cometh of evil.\u201d Of course there are untruthful Indians, but\nwith the major part their word is never broken. I would just as soon\ntake the simple word of most of the Indians I know as that of the most\nupright and honored of the old-fashioned Southern gentlemen. And I\nwould no more think of insulting the Indian by putting his integrity in\nspeech on the same plane as that of the ordinary society or business\nman or woman of America than I would insult the lion by calling him a\nwolf. Strong words, but true, and capable of demonstration. Too often\nIndians who come in contact with the whites learn to lie, but the pure,\nuncontaminated, uncivilized Indian hates a lie and a liar as much\nas the proverb says the devil hates holy water. I shall never forget\nthe impression made in the court-room at Flagstaff, Arizona, when\nBigwoetten, a Navaho Indian, who had been charged with murder, and who\nhad sent word to the sheriff that it would be useless to hunt for him\nas he could never be found, but that, if he was wanted, he would come\nin when the trial began,--I say, I shall never forget the marvelous\nimpression caused by the proud stalking into the court-room of this\nold and dignified Indian, and his speech to the judge: \u201cThough I am\nsore wounded, and the journey over the desert has been dreary and long,\nand has well-nigh killed me, I gave my word that I would be here,--the\nword of a Navaho that never was broken--so here I am. Do with me as you\nwill, so that you do honestly.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: THE AUTHOR HAVING A POW-WOW WITH THE YUMA INDIANS.]\n\nSeveral times, with perfect confidence, I have risked my life in\nexploring trips, on the mere word of an Indian that he would be at such\na place at a certain time with food and water. And such has been my\nexperience that now I never hesitate to accept the simple word of any\nIndian who has an ordinarily good reputation.\n\nI have often had pow-wows with various tribes and whatever they have\npromised me in such councils has invariably been performed.\n\nAnd yet there is a peculiar twist to the mentality of many Indians\nthat needs comment here. When a stranger is questioning an Indian\nabout anything that she (or he) deems of no great importance, as, for\ninstance, the meaning of a certain design on a basket, the Indian\nconception of politeness leads her to give you the reply your question\nseems to call for. For instance, if you see a zigzag design on a basket\nand you ask her, \u201cIs this to represent lightning?\u201d she thinks that is\nwhat you want it to represent, so she says, \u201cYes!\u201d Ten minutes later\nand her questioner asks, \u201cIs this the ripple of the sunshine on water?\u201d\nAgain with the same thought uppermost in her mind, that she must be\npolite to her questioner, that that is the answer asked for, she says,\n\u201cYes!\u201d And so on with a dozen different questioners, and all of them\nwith a different interpretation of the same symbol, her answer would\nbe \u201cyes\u201d every time. This, however, is not untruth. It is because the\nwhite questioner does not know that his is not the method of extracting\ntruth from an Indian. He has asked for a certain answer and he has it.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\nTHE INDIAN AND REPINING\n\n\nIn all my association with Indians, I cannot recall a single instance\nof repining, regret over the unalterable events of the past, weeping or\nwailing over joys lost, demoralizing self-pity, or magnified distress\nbecause \u201cwe have seen better days.\u201d The simple, unpretentious, really\ndemocratic life of the Indian disposes of these latter ills to which\nthe white race is heir by rendering them impossible, and repining and\nself-pity seem to have no place in their vocabulary. They weep and\nwail when their loved ones die; and they gather together and pray\nif drought or other natural evils destroy their crops, but when the\nweeping is done it is done, and life\u2019s duties are taken up without\nconstant repining or self-pity. What has happened has happened. Nothing\ncan alter it. It is the will of Those Above, or whether it is or not\nit _IS_, and that is enough. Hence why complain, why protest. Accept\nthe inevitable. Leave it alone. Let the dead past bury its dead. Do the\nwork of to-day; never mind the woe of yesterday.\n\nThis seems to me to be the Indian attitude. A kind of proud\nacquiescence, a manly, womanly recognition of facts, and a willingness\nto face them and thus triumph over them. Instead of magnifying their\nsorrows they minimize them by constant labor and by doing the very\nopposite, viz., magnifying their joys. Often have I heard this done.\nA widow speaking of her lost husband, and immediately referring in\ntones of joy to her boys and girls, her fine corn-field, her peach\norchard,--her blessings, in fact.\n\nIt is simply impossible for any one to estimate the amount of time,\nstrength, energy, and life that have been wasted by the white race\nin lamenting, repining, weeping, over things that could neither be\nhelped nor changed. And how absurd such lamentation is. If an evil\ncan be remedied, remedy it. If a wrong can be righted, right it. But\nto waste valuable time, strength, and energy in vain repining and\nself-pity is a crime that no Indian is so foolish as to commit. It is\nleft to the white race to thus show its superiority! This comes from\ntwo or three causes. First: Our race, mainly our women, are not as\nhealthy physically as the Indian, and where physical health is lacking\nit is so easy to yield to the force of evil circumstance. Strong men\nor women can force themselves into physical and mental activity and\nthese bring solace and forgetfulness of the pains, ills, and sorrows\nof the past. Second: The very ease and luxury of our lives which all\nwhite people so much covet, give us time and opportunity to sit down\nand study over sources of sadness, while on the other hand, the Indian\nwoman has her daily work that she must perform, willy nilly, and thus\nis kept from the contemplation of her sorrows. Third: There is in the\nIndian that calm serenity of mind and soul that belong only to either\nvery childlike or exceedingly cultured natures. With the Indian it is\nchildlike acceptance of the will of the gods; with Browning, it was the\ncalm philosophy of the highest culture. Unfortunately for most of us,\nwe have lost the religious simplicity of our ancestors, our childlike\nfaith and trust, and have not yet attained to the serenity of the\nphilosopher.\n\nI write this brief chapter merely to call attention to the facts, and\nto urge upon the white race the necessity, if it would preserve its\nserenity, of either reverting to the simple faith of the Indian, or of\ncultivating a religious philosophy that will produce an equal serenity\nand equanimity in the face of trial, sorrow, misfortune or death.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\nTHE INDIAN AND THE SUPERFLUITIES OF LIFE\n\n\nThe white race may learn much from the Indian as to the superfluities\nof life. There is no question but that we--the white race--are cursed\nwith the collecting habit; we are vexed by many possessions. And what\nis the good of much of what we gather? Mere trash, accumulated for\nshow; bought without much thought merely to gratify a passing whim, and\nhalf the time we don\u2019t know what to do with our purchases when we have\nmade them. Our _houses_ are no longer _homes_, they are converted into\nbric-a-brac establishments. Our children become a terror to us lest\nthey should touch this or that or the other, and our nervous systems\nare wrecked because of dread lest our fine \u201cJapanese bowl,\u201d or our\nelegant \u201cEtruscan vase,\u201d or our exquisite \u201cItalian figurine,\u201d or \u201cthat\nlovely Hindoo idol,\u201d should be injured.\n\nA year or two ago I was the guest in the home of an eminent scientist,\nwhose wife is herself a remarkable woman, gifted as a writer and public\nspeaker, and yet whose home is laden with extraneous material to the\nnerve-breaking point. One evening they were entertaining a well-known\nauthor and lecturer, and the hostess had called upon him to tell of\nsome of his interesting experiences. The guest was a normal, healthy\nman and gentle in his movements, but, while speaking, somewhat free\nin gesticulation. In one part of his story he made a quick motion and\npushed his chair gently back. In doing so he overturned a Japanese\nvase that stood on a slight pedestal near by. With a crash that shocked\nthe nerves of every one present, the valuable piece of bric-a-brac\nfell. Fortunately, it was not broken, but, with blanched face, though\nher voice was well under control, the hostess tenderly picked it up.\nShe endeavored to smooth over the accident, but the author\u2019s interest\nin his story was gone. He brought it to a lame conclusion, and gave an\nevident sigh of relief,--though quite unconsciously,--when his wife\nsuggested that \u201cthe babies might need her presence at home.\u201d After they\nhad gone I was witness of the grief and distress of the poor woman who\nlamented the injury to her treasure, and who evidently valued it far\nmore than she did the comfort and welfare of her visitors and guests.\n\nI sometimes go to homes where the furniture is of the elegantly\npolished or \u201cenameled\u201d type. To place a book or one\u2019s hand upon such\npolish is to mar the surface. The hostess must either keep the table to\nbe merely looked at, and be in constant terror lest some one outwit her\nvigilance and mar its \u201cbeauty,\u201d or resign herself to seeing it used and\nspoiled.\n\nNow, of all of these things, I constantly ask myself, What\u2019s the use?\nFor myself I value the health and happiness of my wife and my children\nmore than all the bric-a-brac that ever was, or ever will be, made. The\nnerves of the former, and the healthy, untrammeled movements of the\nlatter, are worth far more than a few \u201ccurios.\u201d And so with my guests.\nI want my visitors to feel free to move around and about in my home, as\nhealthy men and women ought to do, and if there is anything in the way\nof such action the sooner it is knocked down and smashed the better I\nshall like it. And as for \u201cenameled\u201d furniture: if I found any of it\nintroduced into my house where I was constantly in danger of marring\nit, I fear my \u201cangry passions would rise,\u201d and so would the polished\narticle, to find itself at the next moment on the woodpile. Human\nhappiness and comfort are of more value than many pieces of furniture,\nand he, and he only, is wise who keeps life as simple as possible, and\nfree from these needless, labor-creating, nerve-wearing luxuries and\nsuperfluities of life.\n\n[Illustration: THE WIDOW OF MANUELITO, THE LAST GREAT CHIEF OF THE\nNAVAHOS. ONE OF THE QUEENLIEST WOMEN IN DIGNITY, GRACE, AND CHARACTER I\nHAVE EVER MET.]\n\nIn both men\u2019s and women\u2019s dress, too, something may be said on this\nline. The tendency of the age is to add and add and add, until we are\nburdened by the superfluous. Women want laces, embroideries, tucks,\nruffles, pleats, and ribbons; they quilt, braid, hem, and fell to a\nfearful and wonderful extent,--all adding labor, trouble, and care to\nlife, and depriving them of time that could and should be more wisely\nand profitably spent. No one loves to see woman or man neater or better\ndressed than I, but there is a point of simplicity and native dignity\nbeyond which no one can go without getting into the realm of needless,\nwasteful luxury and harmful superfluity. Some men are as bad as some\nwomen, what with ties for every function and hour of the day, cuffs,\ncollars, vests, and creased trousers, all of which must be _a la mode_\nand _au fait_. To me these things reveal as much _non compos mentis_\nas they do _a la mode_, for mind should be, _and is_, superior to an\nexcess of such frivolity.\n\nRose Wood-Allen Chapman in _Good Health_ has sagely written upon this\nsubject. She well says:\n\n\u201cThe one important thing in life is character; your own character,\nthe character of your husband, your children, your friends. All other\nthings should be judged by their bearing upon this important matter.\nThings may be delightful in themselves; but if they tend to add to\nyour worries, if they are a barrier between you and your loved ones,\nif they interfere with the development of the higher faculties of your\nchildren, they become undesirable, inadvisable, and should be classed\nwith the superfluities of life.\n\n\u201cThe mother who prepares for her baby dainty, hand-made garments,\nwonderfully trimmed with lace and embroidery, in the majority of\ninstances is depriving that child of personal love and care that\nrightfully belong to him. What does he care for such finery? He wants\nhis mother\u2019s companionship, and for himself perfect freedom for\nall forms of activity. To so attire him that he must be constantly\ncautioned, \u2018Now don\u2019t get your dress dirty,' is to interfere with one\nof his inalienable rights. The wise mother will make her baby\u2019s clothes\nsimple, to serve as a background for his infantile charms, instead\nof taking the attention away from him to center it upon elaborate\nornamentation.\n\n\u201cMany housekeepers there are who bemoan their inability to keep up the\ninterests of their girlhood. They have no time now to play the piano,\nto read inspiring literature, to join the club, or to enter upon any\nphilanthropic work. They say they feel their deprivation; have they\never tried to see how many of their household tasks could be eliminated\nas superfluous?\n\n\u201cI have been in homes where there were two and sometimes three pairs of\ncurtains at each window. The effect was rich, but one whose mind was\nawakened to the question of the superfluities could but think of the\nextra work such hangings entailed.\n\n\u201cThen there are the \u2018cozy corners,\u2019 the Turkish divans smothered in\nover-hanging draperies, which the furniture stores are so eager to\nurge upon their customers as \u2018the very latest style.\u2019 Such corners are\ngathering-places for dust, and an unnecessary addition to the work of\nthe home.\n\n\u201cHeavy carpets on the floors may feel soft under foot, but they are\nhard to sweep, are never really clean, save after the annual beating,\nand so are both unhygienic and burdensome.\n\n\u201cThink how much less drudgery must be performed by the woman who has\nhard-wood or stained floors with a few medium-sized rugs! Her floors\ncan be wiped up quickly with a damp cloth, and her rugs thoroughly\ncleaned with a minimum amount of effort.\n\n\u201cAt the windows this same woman will have filmy net curtains, with\nruffled border, it may be, that are ordinarily cleansed by putting them\non the line where the wind can blow the dust out of them; or can easily\nbe laundered when more thorough cleaning is desired.\n\n\u201cOn her walls will be a few artistic pictures, with no overhanging\nfestoons or ribbons to catch dust and add to the labor. Bric-a-brac\nwill be conspicuous for its absence; photographs will be put away,\ninstead of covering her dresser and the walls of her bedroom. In a\nword, her aim will be to have her home light, airy, artistically\nfurnished, but in such a way as to be the least possible burden to her\nand to her family. Husbands and children find it hard to be careful of\nthe things that have been bought for show. Why not dispense with them,\nthen, and have only that which is necessary and usable?\n\n\u201cMany housekeepers have learned to dispense with unnecessary\nfurnishings, but are still slaves to elaborate meals, especially when\nthey entertain.\n\n\u201cIt is wise, in the first place, to remember that the health of the\nfamily is conserved by simplicity in the meals. Even though they are\nnow used to a larger variety at each meal, they can be gradually\naccustomed to a simple diet. No soup when there is dessert and no\ndessert when there is soup, is a very good rule for dinner. The other\ncourse should consist of a meat substitute and only two vegetables. A\nsimple breakfast food, with bread and butter and fruit, is enough for\nthe morning meal; while an equally simple supper should be entirely\nsatisfactory.\n\n\u201cIt is a temptation to leave the paths of simplicity when company is\ncoming; but if we just remember that our friends come to see us, not to\neat our food, we will find it easier to restrain our inclinations in\nthis direction. Oftentimes housewives become possessed with a spirit\nof emulation which leads Mrs. Smith to feel that she must set forth a\nmore elaborate meal than Mrs. Jones had served, while Mrs. Robinson\nin turn strives to eclipse Mrs. Smith, and as a result meals become\nso complicated as to be most burdensome to the hostess and almost\ndangerous to the guests. Let us confine our efforts to making our\nsimple entertainment as attractive as possible, and furnishing such wit\nand merriment therewith, such geniality and kindliness, as shall make\nour guests feel that they have partaken of a feast.\u201d\n\nI have already, in other chapters, commented upon some of these\nthings, as revealed in the light of the Indian\u2019s life. Their lives\nare, perforce, models of simplicity, devoid of luxuries and also\nof superfluities. It is not my intent to suggest that we should\nrevert to their method of living a simple and unluxurious life, but\nI do long with all my heart that we might take lesson from them,\nand find the golden mean between their life and our too complex and\nsuperfluity-laden life. If health and happiness are the ends to be\nattained in life _they_, with their rude simplicity, have surpassed\nus, with our elegant and ornate complexity. And for me and mine I\nprefer health and happiness rather than all the superfluities that\na commercially-cursed, bargain-counter, curio-loving, bric-a-brac\nadoring, showy, shoddy civilization can give.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\nTHE INDIAN AND MENTAL POISE\n\n\nOn a trip made recently from Yuma to the Salton Sea, down the overflow\nof the Colorado River, I found occasion to watch my two Indians in\ncontrast with four white men of more than ordinary intelligence and\nability. In some important things the Indians lost nothing by the\ncomparison. Indeed, several times I called the attention of my white\ncompanions to them, and to certain characteristics which are by no\nmeans confined to them, but that belong to most Indians, and urged\ntheir emulation. Some of these will form the subject of this chapter.\n\n[Illustration: CAMPING OUT ON THE WAY TO THE SALTON SEA.]\n\n[Illustration: JIM, OUR YUMA INDIAN BOATMAN.]\n\nOne member of my party was a \u201creverend\u201d--a missionary. He was a\nfine, open-hearted fellow whom we all liked, but every once in a\nwhile--indeed, I ought to say frequently--he would make suggestions to\nthe Indian to go here, or go there, which finally called forth (from\nme) a forceful rebuke. Let me explain the situation fully. When we\ncame to the place where the Colorado River left its banks and entered\na mesquite forest, its waters were naturally much divided. As we did\nnot know where each current led, and how soon it would spread so as to\nrender further progress in our boats impossible, it was a situation\nthat called for great knowledge as to determining the course of the\nbest and deepest current, and quick decision; for, as we were carried\nalong among mesquites, a few moments of indecision meant being thrust\ninto a mesquite tree, perhaps, where cruel thorns spared no one,\nbecause of his indecision. Reader, do you know what a mesquite is? Its\nproper name should be \u201cme scratch.\u201d If you come within ten feet of one\nit verily seems to reach out for you and scratch you somewhere. Imagine\nyour thorniest rosebush multiplied by fifty and all concentrated and\ncondensed into one tree with thorns much longer, far more pointed, and\nwith poison lurking on the end of them, and you have a not very much\nexaggerated idea of the mesquite. Now to have our missionary friend\nbawling out all the time, \u201cBetter go this way,\u201d or \u201cBetter go that,\u201d\nwas both annoying and useless, so I finally told him I had brought\nthe Indian because I knew that he knew a thousand-fold more of such\na current and how to get through this wilderness of mesquite than I\ndid. \u201cAnd,\u201d said I, \u201cas far as I am concerned, I should feel it was an\nimpertinence for me to make even a suggestion to the Indian. He _knows_\nwhere I _guess_, and yet as you know, I have had far more experience in\nthis kind of thing than you have. Don\u2019t you think it wiser for you to\nadd a little more silence to your possessions?\u201d\n\nHe was, as I have said, a royal-hearted fellow, and he took my rebuke\nin a manly, Christian way, for a few moments\u2019 reflection showed him\nthat what I said was wisdom.\n\nNow, while these wild and foolish suggestions were being made to the\nIndian, what did he do? It was most interesting to me to watch him.\nInstead of replying and arguing with a lot of vehement words, he smiled\nquietly, looked at me to see if I approved of the suggestion, and when\nhe saw my absolutely impassive face, went on following his own course.\nHad he been a white man--or like most white men--he would have shouted\nback that he was going some other way, or called his adviser a fool,\nor informed him that he knew his business, or some other equally\nagreeable thing.\n\n[Illustration: IN THE BOATS, IN THE RAIN, ON OUR WAY TO THE SALTON SEA.]\n\nThis serenity of mind in the Indian is often called impassiveness or\nstolidity. It shows how little the critics have known of the Indian to\nspeak thus. They are as sensitive as children, morbidly so sometimes,\nbut they have the self-control not to show it, and in matters like\nthis, where they are sure their knowledge is superior to that of their\nadviser, they go on with a proud disregard of criticism or censure.\n\nThis calmness was also shown in the face of danger. Several times we\ncame to places where there was both difficulty and danger. We had\nthree boats. In the first were Jim (the Indian) and myself, seeking\nout the way; in the second, Indian Joe and Mr. Louis Francis Brown\n(business manager of the Burton Holmes lectures); and in the third\nhis reverence and two others. When we came to the thrilling places,\nJim soon learned that he was to take the responsibility, save where\nthere was time and opportunity to discuss matters with me, and with a\ndignified self-reliance he made his choice, and then awaited results.\nIf they were unpleasant, as they often were, there was no murmuring, no\nshouting, no remonstrance. He took things as they came, and made the\nbest of them. The second boat followed, and there was little more said\nthere than in our boat; but from the third came a constant babble of\nvoices, cries to do this or that, shouts of warning, remonstrance, and\nfault-finding. I could not help contrasting the demeanor of the Indians\nwith that of the civilized whites, and wishing that the latter could\nand would learn the lesson so clearly taught.\n\nThe quickness of Jim\u2019s observations and his decisions were remarkable,\nand I wished my children, and others too, might have gone to school to\nhim for a year or two. He saw where the sand bars were that I could\nnot see; he could tell which way the wind was blowing, when to me it\nseemed to be blowing several directions at once; he was generally able\nto tell where the largest amount of water was flowing, and only two or\nthree times did he make a mistake so that we had to turn back. And\nwhen those times came, there was no grumbling, no murmuring, no finding\nfault. He accepted the disagreeable inevitable just as easily and\nreadily as he accepted the pleasant.\n\nThis silence and serenity in the face of annoyances is a very pleasing\nfeature of Indian life to me. What is the use of fault-finding and\ncomplaining over disagreeable things that cannot be helped? I have just\nhad an example (and he is but one of scores that occur to my mind) of\nthe opposite spirit shown by a very proud and haughty member of the\nwhite race. We were on the car together, coming from the East. The\nfirst time he had a meal in the dining-car he came back furious: the\nchicken was cooked two or three days ago, and was weeks old to begin\nwith; all the provisions were equally bad, the service was abominable,\nand the charges infamous. Then the speed of the train came in for\ncensure. They did things differently on the New York Central or the\nPennsylvania, (forgetful of the fact that those roads run through\nthickly populated centers, and have a passenger patronage ten times\nas large as is possible to the western railways that pass through\nunsettled and barren regions). Then, though it was perfectly delicious\nweather, he had to kick against its being warm and disagreeable, and\nso on _ad libitum_ until I was sick of him, as was everybody else in\nthe car. In twenty-six years of association with the Indians, I never\nmet with one such disagreeable grumbler. The white race retains that\ncharacteristic practically to itself. If things are disagreeable and\ncan be changed, the Indian calmly and deliberately goes to work to\nchange them. If they are unchangeable he serenely and silently bears\nthem. It is more manly, more agreeable, more philosophical.\n\nTime and again I have had white men with me on various trips who\nneeded to learn this simple and useful lesson. They made of themselves\nintolerable nuisances by their whining, whimpering, and complaining.\nThose of my readers who care to read Chapter XV in my \u201cIn and Around\nthe Grand Canyon,\u201d and the story of the Britisher on page 18 and onward\nin \u201cThe Indians of the Painted Desert Region,\u201d will see that I know\nthat of which I speak. And these are but two experiences out of many\nsimilar ones. Yet I have been with Indians again and again in places\nof distress, deprivation, and danger, and in all my experiences have\nnot heard a half hour\u2019s unpleasant words. Once I started to explore\na series of side canyons of the great Grand Canyon. My guide was\nSin-ye-la, an intelligent Havasupai. We had a most arduous trip; ran\nout of water and food; our horses gave out and we had to catch, saddle,\nand ride unbroken steeds, and finally he caught a wild mule upon which\nwe placed the pack. The horrors and anguish of that trip I have never\nwritten, yet there was not a suggestion of complaining from Sin-ye-la,\nuntil I decided to leave the canyons and go across the desert to a\ncertain spot where he did not wish to accompany me. Even then he merely\nstated his case with little or no argument and when I proved obdurate,\nrefused to accompany me, and in fifteen minutes we parted, good\nfriends, he to go his way and I mine.\n\nAnother time, as recorded in my Canyon book, I was caught in a\nmarble trap with Wa-lu-tha-ma, where it seemed impossible that we\ncould ever escape. The Indian\u2019s calmness was almost too much. He\nwas almost as resigned as a Mahommedan who believes in Fate. Yet,\nthough I remonstrated with him for his despairing attitude so that\nwe eventually got out, I believe I would rather have that bravery of\ndespair which dares to face death without complaining or whimpering,\nthan the fault-finding, \u201cWhy did you bring me into such dangers?\u201d or\n\u201cShall I ever get out of this horrible place?\u201d that some white men\nindulge in.\n\n[Illustration: WALUTHAMA, MY HAVASUPAI GUIDE.]\n\nWhen, on the Salton trip, we came to the beginning of the most\ndangerous part where I had been told we should go \u201cfifty miles in fifty\nminutes,\u201d and there were many rapids which would dash our boats to\npieces, and where undermined cliffs, forty, fifty, and more feet high,\nwere likely to be suddenly precipitated into the river, and might fall\nupon us and our boats and send us to instant destruction; when I told\nmy Indian of these dangers he calmly looked me in the eye and answered\nmy question, \u201cYou afraid to go, Jim?\u201d with a counter question: \u201cYou\nafraid?\u201d And when I said \u201cNo,\u201d and answered his further \u201cYou swim?\u201d\nwith a \u201cYes!\u201d he immediately replied; \u201cAll right, I go.\u201d\n\nOf course I do not wish for one moment to suggest that this virtue of\ncourage is not the white man\u2019s. For love of home and country white men\nwill go to death with a smile on their lips. But in work which the\nworld does not see, where men are simply paid two dollars a day wages,\nto face danger and possible death as a matter of course, this I have\nfound rare with the white man, and very common with an Indian. The\nfacing of danger and death is part of their every-day life. It calls\nfor the exercise of no special virtues. Strong in body, daring in mind,\nfearless in soul, duty must be done and done unhesitatingly, regardless\nof whether danger or death are lurking near. I am free to confess this\nlarge bold faith in life and the Supreme pleases me. The man who is\nalways seeking to guard his own life, who refuses to run any risks,\nwho never goes except where all is safe, may be a more comfortable man\nto live with, but as for me, I prefer the spirit of the man who dares\nand trusts; the man who does the unsafe things because it is his duty\nto do them, and who faces death and thinks nothing of it. The man who\nis prodigal of his strength and courage and faith is the man who saves\nthem. The man who is constantly watchful lest he overdo, who refuses to\nrun any risks, who would rather run away than dare, is the one who, in\nthe end, will be found short in manhood and worthy accomplishment.\n\nSo I emulate the Indian in these things, and seek to be like him. This\nprodigality and strength in work calls for more comment. Labor unions\nare making one of the greatest mistakes of their career in restricting\nthe full exercise of a man\u2019s energy. In limiting his daily output they\nare bucking against that which every man should strive to possess,\nviz., the spirit of prodigal energy in work. My Indian would row all\nday, and after a few hours of especially hard work I would ask if I\nmight not relieve him. \u201cNo; like \u2019em,\u201d was his reply invariably. He\nliked his work. It was a joy to him. What was the result? A body of\ntested steel; lungs equal to every demand; muscles that responded to\nevery strain; eyes as clear as stars; brain quick and alert because\nof a healthy body made and kept so by hard, continuous labor. We are\ntold that the Indians are lazy. It is not true. Some few may be, but\nthe Indians of the Southwest do their work heartily and well, and with\na prodigal energy that is as novel and startling to most white men as\nit is educative and suggestive to them. As for me, I have learned the\nlesson. When I reach a station and have time, I walk to my hotel, and\nrefuse to allow any one to carry my usually heavy grips. I seek for\nthe physical exercise. Many a time I arrange for an arduous exploring\ntrip in order to compel myself to great exertions. I know that when\nI get started I must go on, and in the going on, though I get very\nweary, I know I am developing power and hoarding up health, energy, and\nstrength for future use. A few weeks ago I started with a comrade for a\nfew hundreds of miles of tramping and riding over the Colorado Desert,\nup mountain trails, through waterless wastes. My part of the journey\nwas shortened by circumstances over which I had no control, but my\nassistant and artist took the whole trip, arduous and exhausting though\nit was, and I envied them and regretted my inability to go along.\n\nAnother thing my Indian helpers have taught me. That is a prompt\nreadiness to obey in any service they have agreed to perform, or\nanything that comes legitimately in the course of their work. There is\nno holding back, no remonstrance, no finding fault, no crying out that\nthey were not engaged to do this. They perform the service, not only\nwithout a murmur, but with a ready willingness that is delightful in\nthis age when every one expects a tip for the slightest service. This\ncomes from two things, viz., a strong, healthy body which responds\nwillingly to any ordinary demands upon it, and a healthy state of mind\nwhich neither resents service nor wishes to measure every expenditure\nof energy in a monetary balance. We are making a grand mistake in\nbasing our present-day civilization upon material wealth. \u201cWhat is\nthere in it for me?\u201d should be more than a query applying to mere cash.\nWhat is there in it of service, of helpfulness to my fellow-man, of\nhealthfulness to myself, of increase of my own strength and power. The\nmen who are relied upon by employers and by the nation are not the men\nwho have selfishly sought their own monetary gain. There is no doubt\nthat such seekers often seem to gain and do really gain a temporary\nadvantage; but it is not a real advantage. It is an advantage of pocket\ngained at a loss of manhood, physical, mental, and spiritual, and that\nman who is not worth more in body, mind, and soul than his pocket can\nnever be much of a man.\n\n[Illustration: CAPTAIN BURRO AND HIS SQUAW IN HAVASU CANYON, ARIZONA.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\nTHE INDIAN AND SELF-RESTRAINT\n\n\nFew of the superior white race would think of looking to the Indian\nfor examples of self-restraint, but I can give them here one of the\nmost marked examples in history. Before the advent of the white man\nin America the various aboriginal tribes roamed over the plains, the\nmountains, the foothills, and in the forests, and with snare and\ntrap, gin and bow and arrow caught or slew the game needed for food.\nThese tribes were often hostile to each other; they trespassed on\neach other\u2019s hunting-grounds, and in consequence, often fought in\ndeadly wars which came nigh to exterminating some of them. They were\nnot regardful, therefore, one would think, of the rights or needs of\nothers than themselves to the game they hunted; and it is absurd (so\nthe school-books would tell us) to assume that they would be provident\nor careful to preserve game for the future. Hence they would slay\nruthlessly (the same authorities would doubtless declare), indifferent\nas to the days to come and their future needs, merely seeking food for\nto-day, and gorging upon it to repletion. In this case, however, the\nschool-books would be wrong. In the hundreds or thousands of years that\nthe Indians controlled this great continent they never once \u201ckilled\nout\u201d any one of their hunting-fields.\n\nWhen the white race appeared upon the scene, game of every kind,--fish,\nflesh, and fowl,--was plentiful. Trappers and hunters went up and down\nthe rivers, where beaver and otter, musk and mink, lived, and through\nthe forests where birds nested and deer, antelope, and other game\nbrowsed; climbed the mountains where bear and puma lodged, and ever\ntheir bales of skins, furs, peltries, and hides loaded the canoes and\nthe decks of returning vessels. Here was the best proof of the Indian\u2019s\nself-restraint and provident foresight for the future, in that the\nwhite man found such an abundance of all kinds of game ready to his\nhand.\n\nThen came the master mind of an Astor who valued money more than\nthe future. What did it matter to him that game of a hundred kinds\ndisappeared from the face of the earth provided he could make a\nfortune? What cared he that men and women would starve in the days to\ncome so long as he could pile up his hoard of pelts, and sell them to\nadd to his wealth? Modern commercialism, that damned and damning spirit\nof our civilization that sees nothing but dollars, that would shut\nout the glory of the sun rather than miss the ten-cent piece close at\nhand, entered into the game. Then the sportsman and the pot hunter of\nthe white race came also, and between them and the Buffalo Bills who\nshot down buffaloes by the thousand for food to supply the builders\nof the transcontinental railways, in half a generation they cleared\nthe prairies of the millions of noble buffaloes which used to roam in\nvast herds, left nothing but slender bands or solitary animals of the\nmoose and elk, and drove these into almost inaccessible solitudes for\nself-preservation, and nearly stripped the country of deer, antelope,\nwild turkeys, and sage hens. Then they passed laws to protect \u201cgame,\u201d\nmaking a close season so that the Indians, who, in their days of\nfreedom and wildness, needed no law but their own good sense and\nself-restraint, cannot now shoot at all save in the few days when the\nrestrictions are removed. So that, practically speaking, the Indian\nnow has no hunting-ground; he is debarred from obtaining wild game for\nfood for himself and family, and all because of the infernal greed and\nequally infernal brutality of the pot-hunter. Here, then, is a national\nproof--for what I have said is practically true of every state in\nthe country--that the white race has much to learn of self-restraint\nfrom the despised Indian. Self-restraint as to greed,--for, until the\nadvent of the white, one Indian never sought to build up mere wealth\nat the expense of or to the injury or detriment of his fellows. This\nwas the white man\u2019s way, not his! He practised self-restraint, for the\nIndians knew and realized that if the animals were killed too closely\nthe species would soon become extinct, and future generations, if not\nthemselves, have to suffer.\n\nTo most people the Indian is a careless creature, content if his belly\nis filled to-day, improvident for the future, and therefore unwise,\nunthoughtful, and to be condemned. May it not be in this apparent\ncarelessness for the future the Indian is wiser than we, that he is\ndeliberately exercising a beneficial restraint? Think of the wild\nhurly-burly of our struggle to accumulate, and then consider the\nexpense, the worry, the endless care of protecting that which we have\naccumulated. One far wiser than the sages of to-day once declared that\nwe were to \u201ctake no thought for the morrow,\u201d and in His whole teaching\nand life reprobated the struggle for wealth, and the life of selfish\nease that comes with its attainment.\n\nOne of the greatest curses of our present age and civilization is\nlove of ease, craving for luxury, desire to \u201chave a good time.\u201d\nWe worship money because it brings these things, forgetful of the\nteachings of history that luxury and ease beget sensuality and vice,\nand these in turn beget disease, decay, and death. I am opposed to\ngreat money-getting on this account, and would not amass a fortune if I\ncould. As for leaving large sums of money to my children, especially my\nsons, nothing could ever induce me to do it. If much money should ever\ncome to me I hereby serve notice upon all concerned that I shall spend\nit, wisely and usefully, as my best judgment dictates, as soon as I\ncan, and anyhow get rid of it so that no son of mine shall say that the\nmoney I left him helped him on the downward path.\n\nThe Indian knows well the lesson that physical health comes only by\nthe exercise of the body, therefore he definitely refuses any course\nof life that would prevent it; he welcomes for himself, his wife, his\nsons, and his daughters physical work; he also knows that mental and\nspiritual improvement come only by the exercise of mental and spiritual\nfaculties, and he shuns everything that stultifies them. Did he know\nEnglish, he could sing with Thomas Gray:\n\n    \u201cFrom toil he wins his spirits light,\n    From busy day the peaceful night:\n    Rich, from the very want of wealth,\n    In heaven\u2019s best treasures, peace and health.\u201d\n\nAnd he puts into practical life what another of our sages well\nexpressed when he said: \u201cOccupation and exercise are the hand-maidens\nof purity and strength.\u201d Too often we merely read these wise words. The\nIndian lives them. In this the white race can well imitate him. He\nfaces hardship and danger with eagerness that thereby he may develop\ncourage and strength. He takes his sons and punishes them in what we\nshould call a cruel manner to develop fortitude; he sends them out\ninto the desert, mountain, and forest solitudes that there they may\nmeet and talk with Those Above. Every youth or young man who hopes to\nbe a \u201cmedicine man\u201d goes out to some such solitary place. He takes no\nfood, no nourishment of any kind, and fasts several days and nights.\nHe drinks nothing but a little water. He sleeps as little as possible.\nThen if spirits come to him he must obey the teachings and requirements\nof each one. These teachings and requirements demand the suppression\nof the natural instincts and desires, and the exercise of positive\nrestraints to an extent that the greatest religious devotee of the\nwhite race would scarcely be willing to submit to. One spirit demands\nthat water be drank but once a day, no matter how hot the weather;\nanother that no food shall be taken on three days out of each week;\nanother that no hide shall be made into moccasins, and so on. This,\ntherefore, means a life of self-denial and restraint that surpasses\nanything known in civilization. Our Catholic priests take a vow of\nperpetual chastity and obedience, the members of the religious orders\ngo further and pledge themselves to perpetual poverty, but these Indian\nmedicine men, who accept the aid of many spirits,--ten, twenty, and\neven thirty,--are limited and restricted in their lives to a degree\nthat is as astonishing as it is, to the majority of the white race,\nunknown.\n\nNow, while the specific acts of restraint of the Indian may not\nappeal to me, _the spirit of them_ is much needed by our whole race.\nSelf-restraint, self-denial, self-control, are the bulwarks of\nspiritual power. He only is strong in spirit who can control himself,\nhence I would that the white race would learn these lessons from the\nIndian.\n\nBrowning thoroughly believed in this spirit of self-restraint,\nself-sacrifice, self-control. In his Rabbi Ben Ezra he preaches some\nstrong doctrines. Nothing is more needed to-day than the following\nrobust and forceful words put into practical every-day living:\n\n      \u201cThen, welcome each rebuff\n    That turns earth\u2019s smoothness rough,\n      Each sting that bids, not sit, nor stand, but go!\n    Be our joys three parts pain,\n    Strive and hold cheap the strain,\n      Learn, never mind the pang; dare, never grudge the throe!\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\nTHE INDIAN AND AFFECTATION\n\n\nMost people of the white race may learn from the Indian in the matter\nof affectation. Few of us are simple and natural in our social manners.\nMy own family often joke me, when, in answering the telephone, I\nrespond in what they call my \u201cdressy tone.\u201d The other day a lady,\nwhose husband is a college professor, mistook me for a distinguished\neastern psychologist whose surname happens to be the same as mine.\nUntil she discovered her mistake she \u201cminced and mouthed\u201d in a most\nludicrous fashion (how I wish she could have seen herself as I saw\nher!) merely because she thought I was a prominent man in the field\nwherein her husband was a more humble member. The criticism on my own\n\u201cdressy tone\u201d is a perfectly just one. I find myself, often, \u201cputting\non style\u201d because I want to appear \u201cmy best.\u201d After due consideration\nI have decided to confess that--like most people--I have a variety of\n\u201ccelluloid smiles\u201d which unconsciously I put on or off as occasion\nrequires. We are not simple, not natural in our relationships one\nwith another. We feel that we must \u201cmake an impression,\u201d that we\nmust \u201cappear well.\u201d The result is we are unnatural, affected, often\ndeceptive, and many a time disagreeable. Affectation in speech and\nmanner is always a sign of mental meanness,--of what is commonly called\nvulgarity, and is never to be commended but is always to be condemned.\n\n[Illustration: APACHE INDIAN WHO REFUSED TO \u201cPUT ON STYLE\u201d TO PLEASE\nTHE WHITE MAN.]\n\nOn the other hand, if the President of the United States were to\nvisit a tribe of uncontaminated Indians, as, for instance, the Navahos,\nthey would treat him in exactly the same manner as they would the\nhumblest citizen; except, of course, that if the president asked for a\npow-wow they would give him one, and treat his words with respectful\ndeference. But there would be no affectation in their dealings with\nhim, no putting on of airs or style. With frank, open directness, with\nthe respect they show, as a rule, to each other, and no more, they\nwould listen to all he had to say and give hearty and manly response of\napproval or disapproval. They have no \u201ccompany manners,\u201d no changes of\nvoice which are used according to the social status of the listener.\nThere are no snobs among them. \u201cA man\u2019s a man for a\u2019 that,\u201d no matter\nwhether he wears an old army overcoat and a top hat or merely a tight\nskin and his gee-string.\n\nThe white race, too, is fearfully affected in its pretense at knowing\nmore than it can know. We are all ashamed to say, \u201cI don\u2019t know!\u201d I\nbelieve this applies more truthfully to women than to men. Since the\nera of the woman\u2019s club, the gentle sex has been wild to accumulate\nknowledge, and sadly too often, it is content to _appear_ to have the\nknowledge rather than appear ignorant. One has but to look over the\nprograms of a score or a hundred women\u2019s clubs, as I have recently\ndone, to see proof of this in the vast range many of them take _in a\nsingle season_. They crowd into an hour\u2019s or two hours\u2019 session what\nno person living can get a reasonable grasp of in less than from three\nmonths to a year of fairly consistent and persistent study. They jump\nfrom \u201cThe Romantic School of Music,\u201d one week to \u201cThe Effect of the\nRenaissance upon Gothic Art,\u201d the next, and the third week finds them\nswallowing a concentrated pill on \u201cThe Poets of the Victorian Era,\u201d\nwhile on the fourth they completely master all that can be learned of\n\u201cThe Franciscan Mission Epoch in California and Its Influence upon the\nIndians.\u201d\n\nYet let it not be thought that I am not a believer in education for\nwomen, women\u2019s clubs, and the like. I believe in everything that\n_really helps_. And if these clubs would compel mental exercise enough\nto give a fair grasp of _one subject a year_, they would be doing work\nof incalculable benefit. But this smattering of knowledge, this thin\nspreading out of scraps of information, feed no one\u2019s mind, and the\npretense that comes from an assumed knowledge does the mind and soul of\nthe pretender more harm than a dozen clubs can eradicate in a lifetime.\nHence, let us become simple-minded, as the Indians. They \u201cdon\u2019t know,\u201d\nand they know they don\u2019t know, and they are willing to say so.\n\nThere is another affectation to which I must refer. We Americans\npretend to be democratic, yet we have a caste of wealth that is more\ndisgusting, degrading, and demoralizing than the Hindoo castes, or the\nsocial scale of European aristocracy. We \u201ckow tow\u201d to an English lord\nas if he were a little god, and we bow and scrape and mince our words\nwhen we come in contact with the _nouveau riche_ of our own land, just\nas if they were made of different material from ourselves. The space\ngiven in our newspapers to the most trivial doings of Alice Roosevelt,\nboth before and after she married Congressman Longworth; the recital\nof the actions of the \u201csociety\u201d few,--the Vanderbilts, Astors, Goulds,\nCarnegies, Harrimans, Fishes, and the rest,--are proofs of our affected\nsnobbism. I have not yet attained to the mental serenity and calm\nphilosophy of the Indian, but I am seeking it, where I shall judge all\nmen and women not by their exterior circumstances of wealth, position,\ndress, or birth, but by inherent character, perfection of body, force\nof mind, and beauty of soul.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\nTHE INDIAN AND ART WORK\n\n\nEven our artists and designers may learn much of great importance from\nthe Indian. While to most of my readers it may come as a surprise\nthat I claim great artistic powers for the Indian, yet no one can\ncarefully study the basketry and pottery of the Amerind and not know\nthe perfect justice of the claim. In my larger work on this subject[5]\nI have fairly discussed the ability of the Indians in this regard; and\nto those who are not aware of the vast debt the white race owes to\nthe aboriginal woman in artistic as well as other lines, I earnestly\ncommend a perusal of that masterly work by a conscientious and thorough\nstudent, Otis T. Mason, of the Smithsonian Institution, entitled\n\u201cWoman\u2019s Share in Primitive Culture.\u201d\n\n[5] Indian Basketry and How to Make Indian and Other Baskets.\n\nIn reference to their basketry, however, more than a mere passing\nmention is required. The Indian weaver shows marvelous ability in the\ncreation of form, color, stitch, and design. Turning to Nature for\nher original inspirations she is not a mere copyist of what others\nhave done. All her forms are based upon utility, and therefore meet\nthe first and highest requirement of all art when applied to articles\nthat are to serve a useful purpose, viz., adaptation to use. There\nis no reversal of principles in manufacture, as is so often the case\nwith white workers who value appearance, so-called ornament, finish,\netc., rather than adaptation to purpose or utility. Wherever anything\nis allowed to usurp the place of this primary element, the work is\ndoomed even before it is made. On the other hand, frankness, honesty,\nsimplicity, directness, characterize the manufactures of the Indian.\nThey are to serve such and such a purpose; that purpose is openly\ndenoted. The result is that, to the unperverted eye, the artistic work\nof the unspoiled Indian is as perfect in form as it can be. There is no\nwild straining after unique effect; no fantastic distortions to secure\nnovelty; everything is natural and rational, and therefore artistically\neffective.\n\n[Illustration: ONE OF THE FINEST YOKUT BASKETS IN EXISTENCE.]\n\nIn color, too, the original work of the Indian weavers, before the vile\naniline dyes were forced upon them by the \u201ccivilized\u201d and \u201cChristian\u201d\ntraders and missionaries, was above criticism. The old baskets and\nblankets are eagerly sought after, at fabulous prices, by the most\nrefined and critical of artists and connoisseurs because of the\nperfection of their color harmonies. In every good collection are to be\nseen such specimens that are both the admiration and despair of modern\nartists.\n\nAs for weave, it is asserted upon the highest authority that there is\nnot a weave or stitch known to modern art that was not given to our\ncivilization by the aborigines. And they have many stitches of great\neffectiveness that we have not availed ourselves of. Take the Pomas\nalone--a tribe of basket-makers who live in northern California. They\nhave not less than fourteen different stitches or weaves, some of them\nof marvelous beauty and strength. In one of the accompanying pictures\nis a specimen of their carrying baskets. This basket will hold a large\nload of seeds or fruit, and when so laden requires a construction of\ngreat durability to sustain the burden. It is woven with this express\npurpose in view, yet it is artistically decorated with a beautifully\nworked out design. Here is an important lesson the white race might\nlearn, viz., that the utensils of daily life should be surrounded\nwith as much beauty as is practical. The kitchen should be as full of\nenjoyment to the eye, in reason, as the parlor. The cook and maid need\n\u00e6sthetic surroundings as well as--indeed, more than,--the mistress\nand her children. If social custom insists upon making servants of\none part of its members, the other part should be willing to make\ntheir \u201cservitude\u201d as comfortable and beautiful as is possible and\npracticable. Think of these poor, ignorant(!) Indian women making\nbaskets for porridge, carrying baskets, plaques for holding food, mush\nbowls, and a score of other purposes, all beautifully decorated and\nornamented with designs that express some emotion of their own souls,\nsome ambition, some aspiration, or some happy memory.\n\n[Illustration: EXQUISITE DESIGN ON A FINE YOKUT INDIAN BASKET.]\n\nIn the matter of these designs the white race has much it may learn\nfrom the Indian. Sometimes I have looked upon the patterns and colors\nof our wallpapers, our rugs, our carpets, our chintzs, our calicoes,\nand especially upon the wool work or embroidery of some women, and have\nbeen compelled to ask myself if hideousness could be carried to any\nfurther extent. Some of the designs were the absolute delirium tremens\nof craziness,--conventionality reconventionalized again and again,\nuntil it was made unlike to anything in \u201cthe heavens above, the earth\nbeneath, or the waters under the earth.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: A MISSION INDIAN BASKET OF GOOD DESIGN.]\n\nI was once lecturing to a \u201ccivilized\u201d and \u201ccultivated\u201d audience upon\nthis subject of Indian designs that have a personal meaning, and when\nI got through I heard one highly civilized and cultivated man exclaim\nin disgust: \u201cWhy, he\u2019ll soon try to make us believe that our own\nwall-paper patterns ought to mean something!\u201d\n\n[Illustration: A CHEMEHUEVI BASKET OF BEAUTIFUL FORM AND DESIGN.]\n\nMost certainly I will! The idea that we, the superior, the wise race,\nuse designs in our goods that are supposed to be beautiful to us, and\nyet that have no meaning! What absurdity and foolishness for our girls\nand women to spend hours on \u201cfancy-work\u201d (!), the designs of which\nare a crazy, intricate something to be dreaded rather than admired.\nThe Indians have more sense than to waste their time over such\nfoolishness. They have studied Nature in all her varying forms, and\ntheir minds are stored up with a thousand and one designs which they\ncan transfer at pleasure to their basketry, pottery, or blanketry. I\nhave had the pleasure of teaching this basic principle of art work to\nmany white women, and I learned it from the Indian. One woman wanted to\nget a design for her sofa pillows. I asked her if she had no flowering\nvine over her porch. She said \u201cYes.\u201d \u201cThen copy its leaf and flower,\u201d\nwas my reply, and when she did so, and saw the beauty of the design\nshe had _created_ from Nature, her soul was filled with a new joy, and\nshe wrote me that few things had given her more pleasure than the\ndiscovery of that basic principle.\n\n[Illustration: BASKET BOWL MADE BY PALATINGWA WEAVER.]\n\nThink of the white race making baskets. Where do they go to for their\nforms and designs? In thousands of cases they take my own books and\ncopy from them! But where did I get them? I am no creative artist,\nno inventor of design! I got them, \u201cbody, soul, and breeches,\u201d from\nthe Indian,--every one of them; and yet the \u201csuperior race\u201d must go\nto them to copy, instead of so disciplining the powers of observation\nfrom Nature that designs for embroidery, for basketry, for fancy-work\nof every description, are contained within their own memories. The\nIndian\u2019s life has trained these wonderful faculties of observation and\nmemory. He was compelled to watch the animals in order that he might\navoid those that were dangerous and catch those that were good for\nfood; to follow the flying birds that he might know when and where\nto trap them and secure their eggs; the fishes as they spawned and\nhatched; the insects as they bored and burrowed; the plants and trees\nas they grew and budded, blossomed and seeded. He became familiar,\nnot only with such simple things as the movements of the polar\nconstellations and the retrograde and forward motions of the planets,\nbut also with the less known spiral movements of the whirl-winds as\nthey took up the sands of the desert; and the zigzags of the lightning\nwere burned into his consciousness and memory in the fierce storms\nthat, again and again, in darkest night, swept over the exposed area in\nwhich he roamed; with the flying of the birds, the graceful movements,\nthe colors, and markings of the snakes, the peculiar wigglings of\ninsects, and their tracks, and those of reptiles, birds, and animals,\nwhether upon the sand, the snow, the mud, or more solid earth, he soon\nbecame familiar. The rise and fall of the mountains and valleys, the\nsoaring spires and wide-spreading branches of the trees, the shadows\nthey cast, and the changes they underwent as the seasons progressed,\nthe scudding or anchored clouds in their infinitude of form and\ncolor, the graceful arch of the rainbow, the peculiar formation and\ndissipation of the fogs, the triumphant lancings of the night by the\ngorgeous fire-weapons of the morning sun, the stately retreat of the\nking of day as evening approached,--all these and a thousand and one\nother things of beauty in Nature the Indian soon learned to know, and\nfrom all these mental images he can readily draw when a design is\nneeded.\n\n[Illustration: AN EXQUISITELY WOVEN YOKUT BASKET SHOWING ORIGIN OF ST.\nANDREW\u2019S CROSS, FROM THE DIAMOND OF THE RATTLESNAKE.]\n\nIs it not well that the white race should learn to observe the things\nof Nature? We have a few nature writers: Thoreau, John Burroughs, Olive\nThorne Miller, Elizabeth Grinnell, John Muir, Ernest Seton Thompson,\nWm. J. Long, and Theodore Roosevelt, but why should we need nature\nbooks? We have the whole field of Nature for our own; every page is\nopen to us, and the need of these books is proof that we have not, and\ndo not, take the trouble to read Nature for ourselves. The Indian does\nbetter than this. He is a personal student. He finds joy and mental\ndevelopment in the results of his own observation, and until the white\nrace learns his lesson, it will be behind him in its joy in Nature,\nits wisdom gained from Nature, in the physical health, vigor, and\nstrength that Nature always gives to her devotees, and in the true art\ndevelopment that alone can come from familiarity with Nature in all her\nvarying moods.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\nTHE INDIAN AND RELIGIOUS WORSHIP\n\n\n[Illustration: THE DIGNIFIED AND SOLEMN ROW OF SNAKE PRIESTS IN THE\nHOPI SNAKE DANCE CEREMONIES.]\n\n[Illustration: HOPI INDIANS AT THEIR FLUTE CEREMONIES. THIS IS A PRAYER\nFOR WATER TO FLOW INTO THEIR DESERT SPRINGS.]\n\nAnother thing that the civilized of this age may well learn from\nthe Indian is intense earnestness and sincerity in all matters of\nreligion. It is a painful thing for me to go into many of our city\nchurches. Well-dressed women and girls and young men will sit and\nwhisper through even the most sacred parts of the service. Indeed, it\nis the exception, not the rule, that I ever go to a service without\nbeing outraged by some such exhibition of rudeness, ill manners, and\nirreverence. This kind of thing is unknown with the Indian. Religion\nis a serious thing. Fun is fun, and when he goes in for fun he does it\nwith thoroughness and completeness; but when his religious instincts\nare called upon, he puts aside all fun, and enters into the spirit of\nthe occasion with becoming reverence and solemnity. It is civilized\npeople who go into churches of other faiths than their own and gape\nand \u201cgawp\u201d around, whispering the while to one another at the strange\nthings they see. Protestants are particularly guilty of this serious\nvice. Roman Catholics are so trained to attend to their own devotions,\nand _to be devout_ in the house of God, that they pay no attention to\none another, but Protestants will go to a Catholic church, or one of\nsome other denomination than their own, and behave in a manner that I\nwould never insult the Indians by calling \u201csavage\u201d or \u201cuncivilized.\u201d\nAn Indian will not even set foot on the top of one of the underground\nkivas where religious ceremonies of one clan are going on to which he\ndoes not belong. I do not ignore the fact that this reserve comes from\nsuperstitious fear lest some harm befall him, and this fear, perhaps,\nis not good. But whether from fear or not, the reverence for the\nsacred place and the ceremonies going on is refreshing and gratifying.\nEspecially so is it to me after seeing, week after week, a crowd of\nso-called civilized young men (and old) lounging around a church door,\nsometimes smoking, making comments upon the people entering the church.\nI have as little toleration for the acts of these young men who thus\nselfishly rob people of their comfort and destroy their religious\nfeeling as I would have for any one who would laugh at sorrow, or make\na mock of the grief of the bereaved. And my feeling extends also to\nthe officials of the church who will permit such outrageous conduct.\nChurches are for the education of all the people in religious and\nhigher things. How can youth be educated in higher things when the\nvery precincts of the church are allowed to be used by them for acts\nof discourtesy, rudeness, and selfish disregard for the thoughts and\nrights of others? With the Indians these things never occur. In looking\nat ceremonies in which they have no part, their manner betokens the\nprofoundest respect and reverence. If not for the worship itself, it is\nyet shown to the feelings of those who do worship. I have photographs\nin my collection of Indian youths standing at the door of a Christian\nchurch while the priest within intoned the mass, or performed some part\nof the appointed ritual. The rapt expression of intent earnestness and\nseriousness is so far removed from the flippant, indifferent, careless\nexpression and attitude of many young men of my own race that I long\nfor the latter to know somewhat of the feeling and reverence of the\nformer.\n\n[Illustration: THE CHIEF PRIEST OF THE ANTELOPES MARCHING TO THE DANCE\nPLAZA.]\n\n[Illustration: THE CIRCUIT OF ANTELOPE PRIESTS BEFORE THE KISI IN THE\nHOPI SNAKE DANCE.]\n\nThen in the religious ceremonies in which they take part, their\ndemeanor is remarkable in its intent seriousness and earnestness.\nI have seen Indians at their shrines, when they thought they were\nentirely alone, pray with an agony of seriousness and fervor that I\nhave never seen equalled or at least surpassed. The priests of the\nSnake Dance and the Lelentu (prayers for rain and that water will flow\nfreely into the springs) are as earnest and sincere and devout as the\nmost consecrated Christian minister or priest I ever saw. And the\ndancers of the Acomas, Lagunas, Hopis, Navahos, Zunis, etc., enter into\nthese, their religious ceremonies, with an earnestness and reverence\nthat put to shame the flippant, bustling, looking-around, whispering\ncongregations of many of our so-called Christian churches.\n\n[Illustration: THE ANTELOPE PRIEST PRAYING BEFORE THE SHRINE OF THE\nWEAVER OF THE CLOUDS.]\n\n[Illustration: CARRYING THE SNAKES IN THEIR MOUTHS IN THE HOPI SNAKE\nDANCE.]\n\nNor is this all. The Indian\u2019s every-day attitude is one of reverence\nfor the Powers Above. He does everything with these before his mind.\nThe first thing he does on awakening is to propitiate all the powers\nof the five or seven cardinal points. When the sun rises he makes his\noffering to the powers behind it, that control and direct it, that it\nmay be a blessing throughout the day. Indeed, every act of his life\nmay be said to have a religious thought attached to it, so powerfully\nis the religious instinct developed within him. If you offer him a\ncigarette he will propitiate the Powers Above and Around and Below\nbefore he gives himself up to the full enjoyment of it. He does this,\nhowever, with such apparent unconcern that the stranger would never\ndream of it, even though he were looking straight at him. But the\nknowing will understand. When he sees the Indian quietly blow a puff\nof smoke to the East, he knows that is for the purpose of reminding\nthe good and evil powers that reside there that the smoker wishes\ntheir good influences to rest upon him, or, at least, that the evil\ninfluences shall pass him by. And the same thing when the smoker puffs\nto the North, the West, the South, and the _Here_. For the Navaho\nIndian believes that there are powers that need propitiating just here,\nwhile the Hopis add the powers of the Above and the Below, thus making\nseven cardinal points.\n\nThe secret prayers and rites of the underground kivas, or the medicine\n_hogans_ of Hopi and Navaho are marvels of sincerity, earnestness, and\nreverence. One is impressed whether he understands them or not, and\nthe white man comes away, or at least I do, with this feeling, viz.,\nthat I would to God the white race, so long as they worship at all,\nwould do so with such outward decorum, reverence, and earnestness that\nwould imply their real inward belief that the thing is more than a\nmeaningless, perfunctory ceremony that they must go through.\n\nAnother remarkable thing I would that the white race would learn from\nthe Indian is his habit of teaching the victim of a misfortune of\nbirth that his misfortune is a mark of divine favor. Let me explain\nfully. A hunchback or a dwarf among the Indians is not made the butt\nof rude wit, ghastly jokes, or of cruel treatment, as is generally\nthe case with such a one of our own race, but is treated with special\nconsideration and kindness. I knew a Mohave boy who was humpbacked when\nborn. The shaman or medicine man explained how the deformity came. He\nwas a special child, a gift from the gods above. He came from the Above\nto the Here on the exquisite pathway of a rainbow. But, unfortunately,\nthe rainbow rested over a very sharp, rugged mountain peak, which the\ngods did not see, and, as the child slid down to the earth, his poor,\nlittle, naked back caught on the sharp peak and was thus deformed.\nWith such a story of his origin his parents were made happy, and as he\ngrew older, he was treated with kindness and consideration by his boy\ncompanions. Now, while I would not gain this end by the superstitious\nstory of the Mohave medicine man, I would that we could in some way\nteach our boys to look with compassion upon the misfortune of such as\nhappen to be afflicted at birth, or to be light-witted, or in some way\nnot the equal of the majority.\n\n[Illustration: DRINKING THE EMETIC AFTER THE HOPI SNAKE DANCE.]\n\nIf an Indian be afflicted with hysteria, or fits of any kind, he is\nbetter treated as the result of his affliction rather than worse. Too\noften the white race makes these afflictions the cause of brutal and\nindifferent treatment, and adds sorrow to the already overburdened and\ndistressed souls of the suffering.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\nTHE INDIAN AND IMMORTALITY\n\n\nTo the materialist immortality is a foolish dream, to the agnostic an\nunjustified human craving, to the simple Christian a belief, and to the\ntranscendentalist a confident hope, but to the Indian it is as positive\nan assurance as is life. The white race has complicated its belief in\nthe future life with many theological dogmas. The Roman Catholic church\nhas its purgatory, as well as its paradise and hell; the first as a\nplace of purging for the sins committed in the body and that must be\nburned away, the second the abode of the blest, and the third the place\ninto which the damned are cast. The Seventh Day Adventists believe that\nonly those who are saved by \u201cthe blood of Christ\u201d and obedience to\nhis commands are blessed with the gift of immortal life. They contend\nit is a free gift as an act of God\u2019s grace and is not inherent in the\nsoul or spirit of mankind. Those who refuse to accept salvation by the\nvicarious atonement of Christ, they believe, will be annihilated. The\nPresbyterian believes that a certain number of mankind are foreordained\nfor salvation and heaven, and another number for damnation and hell,\nfrom the foundation of the world. The Universalist believes that all\nmen will ultimately be saved and therefore enjoy heaven, whilst others\nhave a belief in a \u201cconditional\u201d immortality.\n\nThe Indian believes in immortality without any admixture of complex\ntheological ideas. His is a simple faith which he accepts as he\naccepts life. He believes that when he dies his spirit goes to its new\nlife just as at birth he came into this life. And he believes that all\nthe objects he used on earth--food, clothing, articles of adornment,\nbaskets, horses, saddles, blankets--have a spirit-life as well as he\nhas. Hence, when one dies, his friends throw upon his funeral pyre his\nclothing, blankets, and other personal belongings, utensils for his\ncomfort, food for his nourishment on the way to the \u201cunder world,\u201d or\nland of the future, and strangle his horse that its spirit may aid\nhim on his journey. When death approaches he faces it with calmness,\nequanimity and serenity. Fearless and unafraid he awaits the coming of\nthe last great enemy. In effect, he cries out with Browning:\n\n    \u201cI would hate that death bandaged my eyes,\n    And forbore, and bade me creep past.\n    No! let me taste the whole of it; fare like my peers,\n    The heroes of old.\u201d\n\nNo shirking for him; as calmly as Socrates took the bowl of fatal\nhemlock, the Indian awaits death and proudly passes on to the new life.\nThose who are left behind may wail for their loss, but the one who\ndeparts asks for and receives no sympathy.\n\nNow, it is this simple acceptation of death as a natural thing that I\nwould have the white race learn. And yet it can never come to us as\nan act of simple faith as it is with the Indian. Our civilization has\nspoiled us for \u201csimple faith.\u201d That is practically impossible, save to\na few souls who, unlike the rest of us, have \u201ckept themselves unspotted\nfrom the world\u201d of speculative thought, or theological dogma. It can\ncome (and does with many) as the result of religious training, or\nas it did to Browning and Whitman. What wonderfully different minds\nthese two men had. One an aristocrat, the other a democrat, yet both\nfull of love for mankind, and each teaching with vigor and power the\nFatherhood of God, the real brotherhood of man, and the immortality\nof the soul. Read Browning\u2019s _Prospice_, part of which I have already\nquoted, _Evelyn Hope_, _Abt Vogler_, and these three stanzas with which\nhe opens his _La Saziaz_, and elsewhere calls a _Pisgah Sight_:\n\n    \u201cGood, to forgive:\n      Best, to forget!\n      Living we fret;\n    Dying, we live.\n    Fretless and free,\n      Soul, clap thy pinion!\n      Earth have dominion,\n    Body, o\u2019er thee!\n\n    Wander at will,\n      Day after day,--\n      Wander away,\n    Wandering still--\n    Soul that canst soar!\n      Body may slumber:\n      Body shall cumber\n    Soul-flight no more.\n\n    Waft of soul\u2019s wing!\n      What lies above?\n      Sunshine and Love,\n    Sky blue and Spring!\n    Body hides--where?\n      Ferns of all feather,\n      Mosses and heather,\n    Yours be the care!\u201d\n\nCompare these utterances with Whitman\u2019s rugged and forceful words:\n\n    \u201cPassive and faltering,\n    The words, _the Dead_, I write,\n    For living are the Dead,\n    (Haply the only living, only real,\n    And I, the apparition, the spectre.)\u201d\n\nAgain, in his _To One Shortly to Die_, what a triumphant note is in the\nlast two lines:\n\n    \u201cI exclude others from you, there is nothing to be commiserated,\n    I do not commiserate, I congratulate you.\u201d\n\nHow perfectly Indian, this attitude, this refusal to be sorry, and\nto offer congratulations rather than regrets. In his _Night on the\nPrairies_ his perfect assurance as to the future is clearly expressed,\nand while measuring himself with the great thoughts of space and\neternity that fill him as he gazes upon the myriads of globes above, he\nexclaims:\n\n    \u201cNow I absorb immortality and peace, I admire death....\n    O, I see now that life cannot exhibit all to me, as the day cannot,\n    I see that I am to wait for what will be exhibited by death.\u201d\n\nIn one poem he speaks of \u201cawaiting death with perfect equanimity,\u201d and\nin another says:\n\n    \u201cThee, holiest minister of Heaven--thee, envoy, usherer, guide at\n       last of all,\n    Rich, florid loosener of the stricture knot call\u2019d life,\n    Sweet, peaceful, welcome Death.\u201d\n\nAnd the reason for all this restfulness as to Death and the Future is\nexpressed in his Assurances:\n\n    \u201cI do not doubt that the passionately-wept deaths of young men are\n    provided for, and that the deaths of young women and the deaths\n    of little children are provided for. (Did you think life was so\n    well provided for, and Death, the purport of all life, is not well\n    provided for?)\n\n    I do not doubt that wrecks at sea, no matter what the horrors of\n    them, no matter whose wife, child, husband, father, lover, has gone\n    down, are provided for, to the minutest points.\n\n    I do not doubt that whatever can possibly happen anywhere, at any\n    time, is provided for in the inherences of things.\n\n    I do not think Life provides for all, and for Time and Space, but I\n    believe Heavenly Death provides for all.\u201d\n\nSo, reader, I care not how it comes into your soul, so that you have it\nthere, a rich and precious possession, this living, active, potential\nbelief in immortality. If you know _you are_ now, and that you will\nnever end, you will find that life itself becomes more enlarged and\ndignified. You will not be content with mere earthly aims, you will not\nrest satisfied to be a mere money-getter, but, realizing the immensity\nof your own capacities and powers, you will reach out for the eternal\nthings, the realities that abide forever. For Joaquin Miller never\nwrote a truer word than when he said:\n\n    \u201cFor all you can hold in your dead cold hand,\n    Is what you have given away.\u201d\n\nThis forever settles a thoughtful man\u2019s conception of mere\nacquisitiveness. Such gatherings-together are unworthy the soul that\nfeels and knows its own immortality. It needs a larger aim, a more\nworthy object.\n\nAnother thing in connection with what we call death, the white race\nmay well learn from the Indian. How often does press and pulpit expend\nitself in finding superlatives to pour out in lavish eulogy over the\ndead, who, while alive, never did a thing to win the love of their\nfellows. Such eulogy is unknown among the Indians. The \u201cpreacher of\nan Indian funeral sermon\u201d would no more dare wrongfully praise or\nlaud his subject than he would falsely execrate him. He must speak\nthe truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and while he\nis not called upon to expatiate upon the wrong-doings, the foibles or\nweaknesses of his subject, he must say no word of praise that is not\njustly earned and strictly true.\n\nIf this law were applied to the white race, what different funeral\nsermons and orations we should hear and read; and what different\ninscriptions we should read upon the tombstones found in our\ngrave-yards.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\nVISITING THE INDIANS\n\n\nOccasionally I meet with people who would like to visit real Indians\nin their real homes,--not the dressed-up Indians in a made home, like\nthose of the Midway Plaisance of the World\u2019s Fair or of a \u201cWild West\u201d\nshow, and they ask me how they can do so. To the ordinary traveler\nof to-day, who requires all the comforts of a Pullman and a dining\ncar, and who is not willing to forego them for the hardships of a\ncamping-out trip, my advice is don\u2019t, although the hardships are\nmore so in name than in fact. If one likes old clothes, fresh air,\nthe great outdoors, lots of sunshine, desert roads, and meals _al\nfresco_,--sleeping at night under the stars,--this is just the country\nfor such things. Given a good team, a careful driver who can cook\n\u201cfrontier style,\u201d and an agreeable traveling companion, and you will\nhave a new thrill--no matter what the weather is. Five dollars a day\neach person will cover average cost of outfit; meals extra.\n\nYet there are some Indians who may be seen without leaving the luxuries\nof our modern civilization. Two great railway systems in our Southwest\npass through the regions where live the Indians to whom I have referred\nin the foregoing pages. These are popularly known as the \u201cSanta Fe\u201d and\nthe \u201cSouthern Pacific.\u201d\n\nIn crossing the continent from Chicago to the Pacific Coast on the\nSanta Fe route, one strikes the \u201cIndian country,\u201d to which I refer,\nabout half a day before reaching Albuquerque, New Mexico. Here is\nwhat might be termed \u201cthe heart of the Pueblo Indian country.\u201d The\nword \u201cpueblo\u201d is Spanish for \u201ctown,\u201d so the name merely means the\nstay-at-home town Indians as distinguished from the nomad or wandering\ntribes of the great plateaus.\n\nAt Albuquerque one may see, in Fred Harvey\u2019s collection in the\nMission-style depot, a rare and precious gathering of Indian baskets,\nblankets, silverware, etc., that is one of the finest in the West. It\nranks with the highest, and was largely gathered and placed under the\npersonal direction of Dr. George A. Dorsey, the eminent ethnologist of\nthe Field Columbian Museum. Nearly all the pueblos may be reached with\nthis city as a radiating center, though Taos and the Indian villages\nof the northern Rio Grande valley are more accessible from Santa Fe.\nIsleta and Laguna are passed a few miles further west. A three hours\u2019\ndrive from Laguna, by way of the Enchanted Mesa, brings you to the sky\ncity of Acoma. Zuni is a day\u2019s stage ride south of Gallup, New Mexico.\nAt Winslow, or Canyon Diablo, Arizona, one may leave the railway for\nthe 70 or 90 mile ride across the Painted Desert to the region of\nthe Hopis, the snake-dancing Indians to whom I have often referred.\nAt Williams, a little further west, on the branch line to the Grand\nCanyon, one may visit the Havasupais, and at Kingman, the Wallapais.\nAt Needles, on the Colorado River, the boundary line between Arizona\nand California, one may see the Mohaves, and on the river, reached by\nboat from Needles, some forty miles below, are the Chemehuevis. In\nCalifornia, on the San Diego branch of the Santa Fe, one may reach\nvarious villages of Mission Indians; Pala, Rincon, and several others\nfrom Oceanside; and San Ysabel, Mesa Grande, Los Coyotes, etc., from\nSan Diego by team to Warner\u2019s Ranch. Saboba is reached on the San\nJacinto branch, and Temecula on the Temecula branch.\n\nThe Santa Fe passenger department publishes a beautifully illustrated\nand well written book on the Indians of the Southwest, and it is well\nworth sending fifty cents to their general offices in Chicago for a\ncopy.\n\nThe Southern Pacific also passes through a country where many Indians\nreside. The Apaches are reached from several of their Arizona stations,\nand the Pimas and Maricopas from Ph\u0153nix. At Aztec a stage takes one\nto Palomas, where an interesting band of Apaches are to be seen. The\nIndian reservation for the Yumas is just across the railway bridge at\nZuma, and from Mecca, near the Salton Sea, one may reach the desert\nIndian villages of Martinez, Agua Dulce, Santa Rosa, etc. Palm Springs\nis the station for the Palm Springs Indians, five miles away, and at\nPorterville, north of Los Angeles, one starts for the drive to the\nYokuts and other basket-making Indians.\n\nThis brief chapter makes no pretense to full treatment. It is merely a\nsuggestion of help to those who wish to follow the Indian to his real\nhome.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\nCONCLUSION\n\n\nIN the foregoing chapters I have attempted to present in helpful form\nideas that have slowly sifted into my own mind as my contact with the\nIndian has become less formal and restrained. In my case \u201cfamiliarity\u201d\nhas not \u201cbred contempt.\u201d I have learned many, and to me most important,\nlessons. In the hurry and whirl of our money-mad age and our\nmachine-driven civilization, we have scarce time to sit down calmly\nand contemplate anything, hence my earnest plea for a return to the\nsimple things, to the outdoors, to the quiet contentment of the Indian.\nDoubtless I have often said things both crudely and harshly, but I can\ntruthfully affirm that I have never intended to be harsh, though I am\nless careful that my utterances be polished and refined than that they\nshould find lodgment in earnest hearts.\n\nTo those who are honest and sincere in their desire to get the good out\nof what I have said, the flaws in my work will be generously passed\nby, and kindly disregarded. I have felt too intensely in the writing\nof some of these chapters to be able to judge what I have written by\nthe cool, critical standard of the rhetorician. I have learned from the\nIndian that the real thing to be desired in oratory is to get one\u2019s\nthought into the other man\u2019s mind and heart so that it will influence\nhis action. This has been my aim in writing these pages; so, in\nconclusion,\n\nI thank thee, dusky brother of the plains, the mountains, the forests,\nand the canyons, for this lesson and all the other lessons you have\ntaught me. I am grateful for the lessons of the higher civilization.\nI prize and treasure them, but equally am I under obligation to thee,\nthou red-skin, for recalling to me some primitive principles which\ncivilization ignores at its peril.\n\n\n[Transcriber\u2019s Note:\n\nInconsistent spelling and hyphenation are as in the original.]","title":"What the White Race May Learn from the Indian","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":58638}