Page 176 - TheHopiIndians

168 MESA FOLK OF HOPILAND

cleverly pretended to take out of the sufferer 's breast
a stone arrowhead half the size of the hand.8
One may chance to see, even yet, a patient being
treated for headache or some minor ailment. The
method is very like massage, the eyebrows, forehead,
temples and root of the nose being rubbed with
straight strokes or passes, with occasional pressure at
certain points, while a preternatural gravity is main
tained by the operator.
The Hopi ideas and customs as to animals connected
'with their religious observances form an interesting
and picturesque feature of their life. An account of
some of the more striking customs in this regard fol-
laws:
A few years ago a story went the rounds about a
Hopi and his eagle which a Nayaho had taken. It was
related that the Hopi hurried to the agent with his
grievance and secured a written order commanding
the Navaho to restore the bird. With considerable
temerity the Hopi presented the "talk paper" to the
lordly Navaho, and as might have been expected got no
satisfaction. This story produced a great deal of
amusement at the time, but no one realized that there
was embodied history, folk-lore, religious custom, tribal
organization, archeology, and a number of other mat
ters recently made clear by Dr. J. Walter Fewkes.'
s Dr. J. Walter Fewkes, Journal of American Ethnology
and Archaeology, Vol. II, Boston, 1892, p. 157.
9 Property-Right in Eagles among the Hopi; Am. Anthro
pologist, N. S., Vol. II, Oct.-Dec., 1900.