Page 265 - TheHopiIndians

MESA FOLK OF HOPILAND 257

have all their ceremonies to bring rain, and there is
nothing else quite as important in their thoughts.
In the same way the Southwest has made the settlers
workers in stone and clay, for Nature has withheld
the precious wood. Few other parts of the world
show so clear an instance of the compelling power of
the surroundings on the customs of a people.
Why or how the pueblo builders came into this
inhospitable region no one may decide. The great
plateau extending from Fremont's Peak to the Isthmus
of Tehuantepec, with its varied scenery, its plants and
animals, and its human occupants is replete with inter
esting problems of the Old New World. Perhaps as
the people crowded from the North along the Rockies
toward the fertile lands of Mexico, some weaker tribes
were thrust into the embrace of the desert and re
mained to work out their destiny. It would appear
that no tribe could adopt the land as a home through
free choice, because the sparseness of the arid country
must make living a desperate struggle to those who
had not the precious seeds of corn.
Corn is the mother of the Pueblos, ancient and mod
ern. Around it the Indian's whole existence centers,
and the prevalent prayers for rain have corn as the
motive, for corn is life. Given corn and rain or
flowing water, even in small amount, and the Indian
has no fear of hard times, but prospers and multiplies
in the sanitorium where his lot is cast.
If we travel backward into the Ancient Southwest