UTA, MY HOSPITABLE HAVASUPAI FRIEND.
In September, 1907, I again visited the Havasupais and then had several wonderful illustrations of their real and genuine hospitality. We decided to camp below the home of an old friend of mine, Uta. As soon as our cavalcade of six persons on horses, mules, and burros appeared, with two pack-horses, he cordially welcomed us, and when I told him that we wished to camp below his hawa he took us into a fenced-in field, where there were peach trees and a corral for our animals. Here we were free from the intrusion of all stray animals, and were able to secure seclusion for the ladies of our party—for, of course, we were camping out and sleeping in the open. Knowing that we should want plenty of water, both for ourselves and our animals, and that it was quite a little walk to Havasu Creek, he took his shovel and in five minutes the limpid stream was flowing through the irrigation ditches close by. The peach tree over our heads—the best in the whole village—was placed at our disposal, and delicious indeed we found the fruit to be, and he sent us figs, beans, melons, and a canteloupe. Without a question as to payment, he supplied us daily during our stay with an abundance of dried alfalfa hay,—the fresh alfalfa not being good for our too-civilized animals. And in every way possible to him he sought to minister to our comfort and pleasure, and did not resent it in the slightest when I bade him retire at meal times, or while we were cooking our provisions.
MY HOPI HOSTESS WHO KEPT THE
NEIGHBORHOOD QUIET WHILE I SLEPT.
That we paid him abundantly when we left did not in the slightest alter the sweet character of his genuine and simple hospitality.
Another illustration of the most beautiful kind of hospitality and courteous kindness was shown by an old Hopi Indian woman pictured. I was visiting the Hopi pueblo of Walpi for the purpose of studying the secret ceremonies of the underground kivas of the Antelope and Snake clans prior to the Snake Dance. For fifteen days and nights I never took off my clothes to go to bed, but went from kiva to kiva, witnessing the ceremonials, and when I was too tired to remain awake longer, I would stretch out on the bare, solid rock floor, my camera or my canteen for my pillow, and go to sleep. Occasionally, however, when something of minor importance was going on during the daytime, I would steal upstairs to a room which I had engaged in this woman’s house. As soon as I stretched out and tried to sleep, she went around to the children and the neighbors and told them that the “Black Bear”—my name with these people—was trying to sleep, and was very, very tired. That was all that was necessary to send the children far enough away so that the noise of their play could not disturb me, and to quiet any unnecessary noise among their elders. This I take to be an extreme courtesy. I know people of both “low and high degree” in our civilization who resent as an impertinent interference with their “rights” any suggestions that they be kind or quiet to their neighbors,—much less strangers and aliens. But for my own sake I would far rather that my children possessed the kindly sympathy shown by these Indian children than have the finest education the greatest university of our civilization could grant without it.
CHAPTER XIII
THE INDIAN AND CERTAIN SOCIAL TRAITS AND CUSTOMS
In the treatment of younger children by those who are older, the white race may learn much from the Indian. While it must be confessed that Indian youth are cruel to the lower animals, I have never seen, in twenty-five years, an older child ill-treat a younger one. There seems to be an instinctive “mothering” of the little ones. The houses of the Hopis are built on the edges of frightful precipices, to fall from which would be sure and certain death; yet, although the youngsters are allowed to play around with the greatest freedom, such are the care and constant oversight of the little ones by those who are older that I have never known of an accident.
There seems to be none of that impatient petulance among Indian children that is so common with us; no yelling or loud shouting, and certainly no bullying or cowardly domineering.