They are very highly religious people and possess thousands of significant songs and prayers. The Handbook states that some of the ceremonies continue for nine nights, and that it is necessary for the shamans to spend years of study in order to become perfectly familiar with the complicated ritual. The Indians were much crowded before permitted to settle upon public lands. To meet this need, Commissioner Leupp in 1908 extended the reservation. Father Weber covers all the details in his excellent pamphlet. The white cattlemen and their friends set up a great uproar, indignation meetings were held, and Congress was importuned to prevent the Indians from living on the public domain. In fact, all sorts of pressure was brought to bear to reduce the size of the reservation—although it was manifestly too small. None of the Mexicans and Americans, for whom the business men and politicians of the southwest were so concerned, were living on the tracts they sought to control. On the contrary they lived in towns or settlements removed from the Indian country, and simply ranged their sheep and cattle over these tracts in charge of herders and cowboys. The Indians, the Navaho, against whom this hue and cry was raised, actually had their homes upon the tracts, and were dependent upon them for their living. Many of them lived in the same place for two or three generations. During all the disputes, no one was shot, and no violence occurred. Yet all that was possible was done to mislead Congress, as the following speech attests. [Illustration: RED GOAT AND HIS MOTHER, NAVAHO, 1902 Photograph by E. R. Forrest. ] “I want to say to the Senator (Bristow) that possibly he does not understand the conditions as they exist in our country. Possibly he is not aware of the fact that every year, two or three times a year, these Indians are allowed to go from their immensely rich reserves to interfere with white men, American citizens, on the public domain, causing the killing of anywhere from one to a dozen people. This is an unfortunate condition of affairs. I can say to the Senator that we people down in our section of the country can deal with these conditions if we are compelled to; but this sometimes becomes a question of all a man has—of his property rights, of protection to his family and his children. Any white man, any American citizen, will then use such force as is necessary in protecting his family. All that we seek to do is to restrict the further location of these Indians upon the public domain until Congress can act again. The committee is being appointed, and I presume this matter will be investigated. It has been investigated before, and reports made, and no action taken. But this must cease; it must stop; and I tell the Senator from Kansas that it will stop.”—(_Congressional Record_, June 17, 1913, page 2320). Father Weber’s comment on it is very apropos:—