But Adrian did not echo these sentiments. He was finding a world of deep interest in everything that went on. The antics of the dancers, the wrapt attention paid them by the squatty women clustered here and there, and who never once took their eyes off the circle of braves passing round and round in endless procession; even the way the children were fascinated by the sight—all these things Adrian was taking note of, for he wished to tell of his experiences later on. “Don’t forget that you’ve got a kodak along, Billie!” warned Donald, after the affair had been in progress so long that some of the dancers had fallen out of the circle utterly exhausted by the continuous movements, though others immediately took their places, just as the substitutes on a football team are injected into the game when injuries cause some of the players to drop out of the hot scrimmage. At that Billie awoke from his trance with a jump. “Oh! thank you for telling me about it, Donald!” he exclaimed; “whatever could I have been thinking about to forget that? And as I never expect to see another snake-dance in all my life, why, how could I have remedied the blunder? But thank goodness it ain’t too late yet.” Accordingly he set diligently to work to repair his error, and for some time the clicking of the rapid shutter told that Billie was getting snapshots of the whole scene, and individual parts of the same, as fast as he could work it. As the afternoon was now waning, the last act in the list of ceremonies bade fair to soon close in a blaze of glory. The wild dancers, spurred on by the continued incantations of the weird-looking old medicine man, and their own desire to show off before their people, seemed to be vying with one another in the endeavor to excel in grotesque acts. They wrapped the writhing snakes around their necks, and held them between their teeth in seemingly reckless fashion, much to the horror of some of the white spectators, but adding greatly to the delight of the dusky horde that gathered there, and gaped, and admired, and applauded in their own fashion. After all human nature is pretty much alike, when you come to take off the outward veneer that is given by different associations and methods of living. Adrian had seen just such sights as these, minus the rattlesnakes, and the weird dress of the participants, in many a gathering in the East, where thousands went fairly wild over a fiercely contested football game. As the twilight began to fall the furious dance came to an end at the command of the medicine man, whose word was law with the Zunis. He knew it had now reached its proper conclusion, and that the warriors were almost at the point of utter exhaustion. “All over but the shoutin’, and perhaps it’s safe for us to get down off this rock pile now,” remarked Billie, as the last of the dancers went staggering away, leaving the arena that had been the theater of their weird ceremony to the thronging squaws and boys and girls.