HOPI ANNALS
But chiefly I write of Life and Death, and men and women, and Love and Fate, according to the measure of my ability.
—Kipling to Gobind
The Hopi people are bound up in clanships, rituals, and ceremonies. Herbert E. Gregory, in his remarkable volume of statistics, entitled The Navajo Country, has this to say of them:—
These people have maintained themselves and preserved their race from extinction in a singularly unfriendly environment. With incredible skill they have practised the art of conservation of water, and that the mind of the race is intent on this one problem is shown by the organization of the clans and the elaborate ceremonies devised to enlist the coöperation of unseen Powers which are believed to control the rainfall. Endless toil and endless prayer, both directed to increase and to preserve the precious water, constitute the life of the Hopi.
A HOPI RANGER-RIDER
BLUE CAÑON: A STUDY IN BLUE-AND-WHITE
We find in their desert cairns of rock something different from an ordinary monument to mark land or to point a road, having in them special gifts of feathers or painted sticks. That certain clans may never be without the feathers of the eagle, these birds are captured young and reared in cages or at the ends of chains on the housetops. A curious sight to see: a captive eagle, baleful of eye, morose, sullen, posed at the edge of a roof, a brooding, vicious prisoner with beak and talons like razors, a [[337]]dangerous thing to approach carelessly. These birds must be reared unharmed, therefore the nests are robbed of the young. A wounded or crippled sacrifice will not be accepted; for, aside from being the source of feathers, it is said that eagles are smothered to death in certain ceremonies.