“The high sun was burning hot. The attendants came now and rubbed us all over with sacred sage until the red paint was gone and our skins were dry. Then they painted us again. They made my body yellow for the power to grow. Then they took some blue paint made from clay we used to get at Rawhide Buttes. With this my arms were painted from the elbows down, and my legs below the knees. The blue was for the power of the quarter where the sun goes down, the power to make live and to destroy, the power of the Thunder Beings and the rain. With these powers to help me, I would grow to be a great warrior; also a helper of the people, for the hoop of the people and the shielding tree belong to the yellow quarter. When they had done this, they painted something on my back, and it was a half-moon. They did not paint a new moon, because that would have meant going down to the spiritland beyond where the days of man end; and I was to grow in this world and be a great warrior. “While they were painting us the drummers sang about it like this.” The old man lifted a cracked, quavering voice, drumming on one hand with the other: “‘Father, paint the earth on me. A nation I will make over. A two-legged nation I will make holy. Father, paint the earth on me.’ “Last of all, they fastened strips of bison-hide around my wrists and ankles, that the strength of the bison might be mine. “I was then told to get my pipe back and place it again where I had placed it in the morning. The man held it in front of him with both hands, and when I reached for it he pulled it away. Three times he did this. Then I placed both of my hands on the top of his head and brought them slowly down along his neck and shoulders and arms. That was the fourth time I reached for the pipe, and he let me take it, saying, ‘_palamo yelo_ [thanks].’ Then I placed it against the cross-stick again, with the stem pointing upward. While I was doing this, other dancers were doing the same thing, and so the singers shared in the gift to the Ever-Living One. The power fell on them too, and drew us all closer together. “Blue Spotted Horse came and pierced the flesh on the breasts of two of the dancers, and through the cut on each he tied the end of one of the rawhide thongs that were fastened to the top of the sacred tree. When he did this, the two dancers only stared at the sun. They did not move; they did not make a sound. I had vowed secretly to do this on the fourth day, and I wondered if I could be as brave as they were.