XVIII
BUTTONS AND BONDS
And he sat down over against the treasury, and beheld how the multitude cast money into the treasury; and many that were rich cast in much. And there came a poor widow, and she cast in two mites, which make a farthing.—Mark, xii. 41, 42
I have heard it said by old-timers, and they could very nearly prove their suspicions through comparison of customs and the dragging in of the Bible, that the Navajo are the Jews of the Desert, a lost tribe of Israel. And suffice it to say that the true son of David has never been able to prosper in their country. The closest approach of these wanderers to the Navajo has been an invasion by marriage of a certain part of the Pueblo Indian country in New Mexico. Those who once made the effort to penetrate the Hopi-Navajo area of the Enchanted Empire have withdrawn, defeated and outwitted.
But if this is the advantage that the Navajo as a trader has over his white brother, in what relation does the Hopi stand to the Navajo? I cast about me for a simile, and find none.
The desert post-trader welcomes the Navajo when he comes on a purchasing expedition, because the Navajo is a spender and makes for quick sales and large profits. It is when the Navajo is trading wool and blankets and silver junk for hard dollars that the post-trader peels his eye to the nerve, and then hopes he will not get skinned. But the Hopi is maddening as a buyer. It will take a Hopi [[225]]longer to spend two bits than for a Navajo to squander a month’s freight-earnings. An astute trader once described the Hopi method to me.
“You know,” he said, as if in pain, “an Oraibi will come into my place, hungry. You can tell he is hungry by the look of him. Hasn’t had his breakfast. And he will have come to buy something to eat. And then he will stand before the canned-goods shelves, if I am not watching, and get a full meal by just looking at the labels. Yes sir! Seen it many a time—look at a can of pears and lick his lips until satisfied, then go out without changing a dime. Give me a Navajo every time.”
This same trader at Oraibi—Charlie was murdered by the Navajo, for all his love of them as customers,—would praise the Hopi as bankers. He was located ninety miles from his headquarters and several hundred of miles from his bank. A trader must pay in cash or negotiable checks to Indians, according to the regulations, and on that reservation they had to do it. There was no “tin money,” no trade tokens were used. Charlie would run short of cash.
“I can go to the door, and whistle,” he declared, “and get a thousand dollars silver from the mesa.”
The Hopi liked him, and trusted him, and once tried to protect him.