And yet there is a peculiar twist to the mentality of many Indians that needs comment here. When a stranger is questioning an Indian about anything that she (or he) deems of no great importance, as, for instance, the meaning of a certain design on a basket, the Indian conception of politeness leads her to give you the reply your question seems to call for. For instance, if you see a zigzag design on a basket and you ask her, “Is this to represent lightning?” she thinks that is what you want it to represent, so she says, “Yes!” Ten minutes later and her questioner asks, “Is this the ripple of the sunshine on water?” Again with the same thought uppermost in her mind, that she must be polite to her questioner, that that is the answer asked for, she says, “Yes!” And so on with a dozen different questioners, and all of them with a different interpretation of the same symbol, her answer would be “yes” every time. This, however, is not untruth. It is because the white questioner does not know that his is not the method of extracting truth from an Indian. He has asked for a certain answer and he has it. CHAPTER XIX THE INDIAN AND REPINING In all my association with Indians, I cannot recall a single instance of repining, regret over the unalterable events of the past, weeping or wailing over joys lost, demoralizing self-pity, or magnified distress because “we have seen better days.” The simple, unpretentious, really democratic life of the Indian disposes of these latter ills to which the white race is heir by rendering them impossible, and repining and self-pity seem to have no place in their vocabulary. They weep and wail when their loved ones die; and they gather together and pray if drought or other natural evils destroy their crops, but when the weeping is done it is done, and life’s duties are taken up without constant repining or self-pity. What has happened has happened. Nothing can alter it. It is the will of Those Above, or whether it is or not it _IS_, and that is enough. Hence why complain, why protest. Accept the inevitable. Leave it alone. Let the dead past bury its dead. Do the work of to-day; never mind the woe of yesterday. This seems to me to be the Indian attitude. A kind of proud acquiescence, a manly, womanly recognition of facts, and a willingness to face them and thus triumph over them. Instead of magnifying their sorrows they minimize them by constant labor and by doing the very opposite, viz., magnifying their joys. Often have I heard this done. A widow speaking of her lost husband, and immediately referring in tones of joy to her boys and girls, her fine corn-field, her peach orchard,--her blessings, in fact.