33. Knitting.—They knit stockings with four needles, but these stockings are devoid of heels and toes. As the needles now used are of wire and obtained from the whites, it might be thought that the art of knitting was learned from our people; but knitted leggings, made of human hair, and wooden knitting-needles, have been found in the Navaho land, in cliff-dwellings which, there is reason to believe, were abandoned before the arrival of the Spaniards.
INDUSTRY.
34. It cannot be said of the Navaho men, as it is often said of the men of other Indian tribes, that they are either too proud or too lazy to perform manual labor. They are, and apparently always have been, willing to do any remunerative work. When the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad was constructed near their reservation, in 1881, much of the grading was done by Navaho laborers. The white men who worked with them, and who had the strongest antipathy to Chinese laborers, said that they liked the Indians because they were good comrades on the work and kept up prices. A stalwart man is not ashamed to wash and iron clothes for wages, which he may want only to spend in gambling. They have been employed at Fort Wingate to dig cellars and make adobes, and at the latter work proved themselves more expert than the more experienced men of Zuñi.
35. Begging, which among other tribes is so often annoying to the white man, is little practised by the Navahoes. The few who have ever begged from the author persuaded themselves that they had some claim on him. On the whole, they are a self-supporting people, and add to the wealth of the community at large. But little government aid has been given them since they were released from captivity and supplied with stock in return for that slaughtered by our troops when their land was invaded.
POETRY AND MUSIC.
36. For many years the most trusted account of the Navaho Indians of New Mexico and Arizona was to be found in a letter written by Dr. Jonathan Letherman,[303] of the army, and published in the Smithsonian report for 1855. Dr. Letherman had lived three years at Fort Defiance, in the heart of the Navaho country, when he wrote this letter, and he acknowledges his indebtedness, for assistance in preparing it, to Major Kendrick, who long commanded Fort Defiance. Both the doctor and the major were men of unusual ability. The former (having changed the spelling of his name to Letterman) afterwards distinguished himself as medical director of the Army of the Potomac, and the latter was, for many years, professor of chemistry at the National Military Academy.
37. From this letter the following statement concerning the Navahoes is extracted: “Of their religion little or nothing is known, as, indeed, all inquiries tend to show that they have none.” “The lack of tradition is a source of surprise. They have no knowledge of their origin or of the history of the tribe.” “They have frequent gatherings for dancing.” “Their singing is but a succession of grunts, and is anything but agreeable.”
38. The evidence of these gentlemen, one would think, might be taken as conclusive. Yet, fifteen years ago, when the author first found himself among the Navahoes, he was not influenced in the least by the authority of this letter. Previous experience with the Indians had taught him of how little value such negative evidence might be, and he began at once to investigate the religion, traditions, and poetic literature, of which, he was assured, the Navahoes were devoid.