In the principal kiva the customary elaborate ritual has been conducted for nine days by the Soyal fraternity, which is made up of members of the Agave, Horn, Singers, and New Fire societies. At one end of the kiva is placed the altar, consisting of a frame with parallel slats on which are tied bunches of grass, and in these bunches are thrust hundreds of gaudily painted artificial flowers. On the top are bows covered with cotton, representing snow clouds. Before the altar is a pile of corn laid up like a wall which has been collected in the village to be returned filled with fertility after the ceremony. Before the corn wall is a ridge of sand on which are set corn fetiches of stone and wood. The medicine bowl and many pipes, feather prayer-sticks, etc., are in position on the floor. There is also in the Walpi ceremony a performance of the Great Feathered Serpent who thrusts his grotesque head through an orifice in the screen and roars in answer to the prayers of the priests. After a series of musical songs accompanied by rattles, flutes, whistles, and bull-roarers, and interspersed with prayers, there is an initiation of novices. Then enters the first bird man, elaborately costumed, whose postures and pantomime imitate a bird. Next come another bird man and the Soyaluna maid who perform a strange dance, then comes Eototo, the forerunner of the _Kachinas_, bearing corn, and this episode closes with a stirring dance of the priests around the fireplace accompanied with song. Next occurs the fierce assault by members from the different kivas on the Soyal shield-bearer. With wild yells and dramatic action they thrust their shields against the sun shield as in deadly combat, but the sun shield-bearer forces them back and vanquishes them in turn. This remarkable drama represents perhaps the driving of the sun back into his northward path, so that he may bring life to the Hopi. The Soyal public dance is performed by a _Kachina_ and two _Kachina_ maids and is simple compared with the elaborate, multicolored pageant of other dances. At the close of the public ceremony the corn is distributed to the villagers, and for four days consecrated pahos are placed in the shrines, some for the dead and some for increase of flocks, corn, peaches, and all good things spiritual and temporal and the people feast and are happy.