Page 110 - TheHopiIndians

AMUSEMENTS

The enviable title of "Song-Makers" has been
earned by the music-loving Indians of Tusayan, and
their fame as singers has gone out among all the tribes
of the "Land of Little Rain." Many a less inventive
Indian has come a long, wearisome journey to learn
songs from the Hopi, bringing also his fee, since songs
that give the singer magic power over the gods and
forces of nature are not to be had for the asking, be
sides to their learning a man must give the full devo
tion of his being and sit humbly at the feet of his in
structors. The land where the Hopi live may seem to
furnish slight incentive to song, especially when one's
ideas of the desert are of its dreariness and desolation ;
but when one sets foot in the sacred precincts of the
mysterious desert a new revelation comes to him and
he sees with these Indians that the wastes which un
fold from the high mesas are full of beauty of form
and brilliancy of color. Sunrise and sunset bring
wonderful tints into the landscape, — the distant blue
mountains, the violet cloud shadows, the tawny, whirl