The camps and villages are particularly lively in winter, when there is not much to do in the way of hunting, farming, or fishing. The sound of the drum, gambling songs, and rattles make the evening merry where the village is one of skin tipis or other light structures, but among the Pueblos the walls of the houses are so thick that sounds do not easily come through. The great drum is penetrating and its deep “bum-bum-bum” could be heard vibrating on the winter air, but other sounds were muffled or extinguished altogether by the walls. One moonlight evening when I arrived before the town of Oraibi, about eight o’clock, not a single sound was distinguishable, and to judge by appearances, the place was a deserted ruin, till the dogs got a sniff of our approach and then pandemonium ruled so far as they were concerned. Many tribes have an assembly house, where there are various congregations in the winter evenings, to sing and to dance. Among the Pueblos these congregations, when there are women or girls involved, take place in an ordinary dwelling; the kiva, which is council room, club, and society lodge, seldom being open to women. An orchestra that performed in a Kabinapek assembly hall described by Stephen Powers is worth mentioning. “The orchestra, eight in number, all young men, were squatted together opposite the entrance, four facing four. Between them was a hollow slab, serving as a kind of drum to be beaten by a drummer with the naked foot, and each of them held in his right hand a little stick, split half way down, to be used as a clapper in keeping time. The dancers were all young women, who stood in a curved row in front of the orchestra.” This orchestra sang a chorus accompanied by the clappers they held. “Like everything they sung it has no meaning. They all sung in a high falsetto voice, the women especially, so that they were less agreeable to listen to than the men. The sharp monotonous clacking of the sticks and the dull tunk, tunk of the slab drum were execrable.” He states that they kept perfect time, however, and also that “there was one short passage in this chorus which when chanted by the men alone was one of the most moving I ever heard. These three rude, barbaric, and wholly unintelligible syllables, hu-di-go, were trilled and prolonged out with a sweet, soft, and wild melodiousness that I shall not forget to my dying hour.”[291]