In old times, when one mourned, either man or woman, he cut off his hair, painted his body with white clay and went without moccasins; he also cut himself with some sharp instrument.
In those days also, when a man went out to seek his god, he went away from the village, alone, into the hills; and thus it happened that Snake-head-ornament, on his way to the hills, went mourning and crying past a garden where sat a woman, his clan cousin, on her watchers’ stage. Seeing him, she began to sing a song to tease him:
He said, “I am a young bird!”
If a young bird, he should be in a nest;
But he comes around here looking gray,
And wanders aimlessly everywhere outside the village!
He said, “I am a young snake!”
If a young snake, he should stay in the hills among the red buttes;
But he comes around here looking gray and crying,
And wanders aimlessly everywhere!