enter; though it may have happened that I never tried to enter at a time when outsiders were forbidden. The snakes are brought out of the kiva by one set of priests, or shamans, and dropped on the ground to be picked up by another set with much ceremony. At the end all the snakes are carried to the valley and liberated to return through their holes to the underworld, there to communicate the desires of the people to the gods. The towns of the Mokis on the East Mesa are now frequently visited by whites, but Oraibi and the others are not so often approached. When I went to Oraibi, in 1885, we were followed about by a band of curious small boys, and the women peered at us from the roof hatchways, quickly ducking out of sight if one of us happened to look their way. The men declined to talk except in monosyllables, and I am free to confess that it was a relief to finally mount and ride away. Oraibi has never had a reputation for hospitality. From there we went to Shimopavi, where our reception was exactly the reverse of what it had been at Oraibi, and I shall always remember with pleasure the frank, genial, smiling men who received us in one of the chief kivas, and the alacrity with which a clean repast of watermelon and piki was brought and placed before us. This only shows what a difference in manners may exist in the divisions of one tribe, and how easy it would be to denounce all the Mokis as being surly and ugly, if one saw only the Oraibi branch. [Illustration: AMERINDIAN PICTURE-WRITING Sixth Ann. Rept., Pl. V. Drawings by the Central Eskimo. See page 59. Fourth Ann. Rept., Pl. XXXVIII. Page of the Dakota Winter-Counts, also called by them “Counts Back.” See page 60. Fourth Ann. Rept., Pl. LXIII. Page from Red Cloud’s Census, Dakota. See page 60. Fourth Ann. Rept., Pl. IV. Ojibwa Mnemonic Record of a Midē Song. See page 58. ] [Illustration: BEGINNING OF THE MOKI “SNAKE DANCE” AT WALPI Antelope priests lined up This scene precedes the one on page 376 Photograph (reversed) ] A simple occurrence means to the superstitious mind of the Amerind a great deal. In illustration of this I may mention that two men I knew were one day at one of the Moki towns and carelessly entered a kiva where the preparing and blessing of certain sacred water were in progress. When they had departed, a frightened rock-wren fluttered in. This was accepted as an evil omen. The bird was immediately killed and some of its blood sprinkled over the floor of the kiva. Then it was taken to the first house the whites had entered when they arrived at the town, and more blood sprinkled wherever they had stood. After this the bird’s body was carefully laid outside, near the door. Thus the struggles of a dazed bird are considered by these people a portentous circumstance.