The mask dances of the Southwest are much misunderstood by white people. We see in them only what is grotesque or perhaps obscene. Yet the spirits of evil and the spirits of goodness are represented under the Indian's masked dances, just as the old miracle plays represented Faith, Hope, Charity, Lust, Greed, etc. There is the Bird Dance representing the gyrations of hummingbird, mocking-bird, quail, eagle, vulture. There is the dance of the "mud-heads." Have we no "mud-heads" befuddling life at every turn of the way? There is the dance of the gluttons and the monsters. Have we no unaccountable monsters in modern life? Read the record of a single day's crime; and ask yourself what mad motive tempted humans to such certain disaster. We explain a whole rigmarole of motives and inheritance and environment. The Indian shows it up by his dance of the monsters. Perhaps one of the most beautiful ceremonials is the corn dance. Picture to yourself the _kivas_ crowded with spectators. The priests come down bearing blankets in a circle. The blanket circle surrounds the altar fire. The audience sits breathless in the dark. Musicians strike up a beating on the stone gong. A flute player trills his air. The blankets drop. In the flare of the altar fire is seen a field of corn, round which the actors dance. The priests rise. The blankets hide the fire. It is the Indian curtain drop. When you look again, there is neither pageant of dancers, nor field of corn. So the play goes on--a dozen acts typifying a dozen scenes in a single night. Good counsel, too, they gave in those miracle plays and ceremonial dances. "If wounded in battle, don't cry out like a child. Pull out the arrow. Slip off and die with silence in the throat." "When you go to the hunt, travel with a light blanket." We talk of getting back to Mother Earth. The Indian chants endless songs to the wonder of the Great Earth Magician, creator of life and crops. Fire, too, plays a mysterious part in all theories of life creation; and this, too, is the subject of a dance.