H, AKER. 
 
 >oooooo< 
 
Bah-he and the Shaman 
 
 The story of a Navajo rite 
 between sunset and dawn 
 
 By Von Ogden Vogt 
 
 LITERATURE DEPARTMENT 
 PRESBYTERIAN HOME MISSIONS 
 156 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 
 
BAH-HE 
 
 ffl This picture of Bah-he was taken before 
 her illness. Notice the velvet jacket with 
 silver buttons, the silver bracelet and the 
 strands of beads as well as the tiny lamb. 
 If the camera had caught her smiling, you 
 would be struck vAth. the beauty of the 
 countenance. Even in this picture the regu- 
 larity of feature is well displayed. 
 
ffl The Navajo gives us about the last chance to do 
 
 the right thing by the Indian. 
 There are 28,000 people in the tribe and the 
 
 number is increasing. 
 They are lithe, sturdy, proud and independent, little 
 
 affected by contact vs^ith white people. 
 They are humorous, industrious, self-supporting and 
 
 pagan. 
 
 They rove over a desert plateau of 16,000 square 
 miles. 
 
 They raise sheep and goats, grow a little corn and 
 make blankets and silverware. 
 
 The Presbyterian church has the most extensive 
 work for them, one school, and a missionary at each 
 of three other places. The following are the needs 
 now:— 
 
 First, a medical mission. The government provides 
 physicians at the agencies and schools only. Thou- 
 sands of scattered shepherds and their families have 
 absolutely no medical care. A hospital is proposed. 
 
 Second, a mission school is essential for at least one 
 other station. There are about 6,000 children with 
 no school opportunity. 
 
 Third, a new house for the missionary at Fort 
 Defiance. 
 
 Fourth, smaller items, such as wagons and hospital 
 equipment. 
 
 Fifth, consecrated volunteers for a life service 
 amongst this fascinating people. 
 
 ffl Sunday schools should provide these things. 
 Arrange the contributions as soon as possible. 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN HOME MISSIONS 
 
 Address: YOUNG PEOPLE'S DEPARTMENT 
 156 Fifth Avenue. Now York City 
 
 No. 309-lst Ed. -4, 1908, 5M. 
 
It reads like fiction, but the charin of it — 
 the horror of it — is that it is true. It is the 
 tale of what actually transpired only the other 
 day, not in the dim ages before medical and 
 other scientific sanity and Christ and whole- 
 some living and brotherly love were heard of. 
 Mr. Vogt saw and heard with his own eyes 
 and ears. There is, perhaps, cause to lament 
 the passing of some of the romantic, guilelessly 
 simple features of the Indian life. But there 
 can be no lamenting the abolition of such 
 features as this. Superstition is often not sim- 
 ply picturesque; this is horrible, and the sooner 
 these " medicine man's " atrocities are sup- 
 planted by a Christian humanity the sooner 
 will a Christian nation and a Christian church 
 demonstrate their faithfulness. J. E. M. 
 
 No. 289. iBt Ed., 1, '08 
 
 Price, 5c. per copy; $4.50 per hundred 
 
BAH-HE AND THE SHAMAN 
 
 I. 
 
 EFORE I tell ght 
 of August seventeenth, you 
 should know that Bah-he 
 was made in a very fine 
 mould — and also you should 
 know about the night of 
 August sixteenth. 
 
 Bah-he was born in a land of lights. 
 About her father's hogan were hills of 
 yellow and wine and the shade of green 
 old cedars, twisted and torn half bare of 
 bark. Through a break in the table-land, 
 she could see long cliffs, the day's first 
 sun lit up as white and shining as the walls 
 the saint saw from Patmos. When she led 
 the goats and sheep over a ridge to the 
 west, the sweep of land was wide and far. 
 It reached away to the black bulk of Zilh 
 le jini. Lonely in the north a flat rock 
 raised its head above the desert floor, 
 almost a hundred miles away. 
 
 [3] 
 
Once Don Lorenzo, trader among the 
 Navajos for many years, says she is the 
 most faithful shepherd child on the reser- 
 vation. 
 
 Once she is ambitious to go to school. 
 Her sister Yashie and two others are ready 
 to go. Bah-he is crying and wants to go. 
 Her mother cannot spare her but she shall 
 have her chance. 
 
 Once the chance for school comes. Her 
 mother urges her to go. The uncles are 
 persuaded. They leave the decision with 
 Bah-he. Her mother is not well and the 
 other children are little. 
 
 "No, I cannot leave her this winter." 
 
 Her mother's death leaves her the care 
 of small brothers and sisters. Even so, 
 the hope of school is not gone. Again she 
 decides against it. Her uncle has done so 
 much. He needs to be away. She cannot 
 leave the care of his sheep. 
 
 Once her voice is low and earnest as 
 she gives counsel to her sister Yashie. 
 Yashie is returning to school. She must 
 study and get all she can. Her sister wanted 
 the chance and it did not come. Yashie 
 must not waste her time nor be foolish. 
 It is a great opportunity. 
 
 t4] 
 
Once with a bad throat she comes wad- 
 ing through the snow of March, scarce 
 able to speak or eat. The missionaries 
 try to keep her in their home. 
 
 " No, I must not stay. Nobody else 
 knows where all the little goats belong." 
 
 She comes to be a grown woman, straight, 
 slender and well formed. Indeed, she is 
 beautiful. The cheek rises closer to the 
 eye than in the white woman's face, but 
 the skin is smooth and clear and the nose 
 small. The eyes are large and reserved. 
 They seem to reveal that she knows the 
 disadvantage of her race, and at the same 
 time display such self-respect and dignity as 
 mark only the personalities of the strong. 
 She Hves happily the young wife of Kei, 
 son of Donetzsosi's wife. 
 
 11. 
 
 The night of August sixteenth was un- 
 pleasant. The clouds of afternoon had 
 failed to develop into rain. Across the night 
 sky they were stretched in dull films that 
 half obscured a low moon. After some 
 miles through a dark valley, we followed 
 
 [5] 
 
a rising trail to the sage-brush plain of a 
 mesa top, the missionary, the Indian youth 
 Joe and I. A few rods on, between the 
 second man and the third, came the hissing 
 sound of a rattlesnake. He was killed in 
 the dark before we passed on. Soon, over 
 a low ridge, the sharp light of a camp fire 
 appeared, together with the night noises 
 of impatient sheep and goats in a little 
 corral. 
 
 Beyond the corral and beyond the sum- 
 mer shelter of cedar and pinon boughs is 
 the hogan of a Navajo family. Several 
 strong logs with great notches form the 
 framework of the circular hut. Other 
 timbers, from three to six inches through, 
 serve as the slanting wall and roof. Thick 
 layers of mud are plastered over the 
 exterior. 
 
 Without stopping at the shelter, we 
 enter the low doorway. 
 
 A fire lights the blackened timbers above 
 and the circle of dark faces about. To 
 the left are boys and men, to the right 
 little children and women, women old 
 and women young. Across the fire the 
 old shaman or Indian medicine man leads 
 in a wailing song. 
 
 [6] 
 
A little cry with a movement of the 
 women and I see where the sufferer lies. 
 Three women try to hold her quiet. The 
 beginnings of St. Vitus dance have come 
 only within the week. Higher and higher 
 rise the noisy notes of the singing men. 
 Even the little boys have joined in now. 
 When the sound falls again it is because 
 three or four men have stopped to smoke. 
 Twenty-two persons breathe in the little 
 space and the camp fire smokes and the 
 singers smoke. Stretching out beyond 
 the edge of the sheepskin where she lies, 
 the naked feet of the sick one twitch and 
 turn in the dust of the earthen floor. It 
 is Bah-he. 
 
 I do not know how long it was but it 
 seemed hours before the horrid noise ceas- 
 ed. The stifling air remained. The mis- 
 sionary rose and motioned the father of 
 the girl. Outside by the corral, he turned 
 about with a sharp tone: 
 
 " Danitda, sit down." 
 Then to Joe: 
 
 "Ask him why he doesn't kill his 
 daughter outright instead of by slow 
 degrees." 
 
 [7] 
 
Slowly and softly, Joe repeats in the 
 smooth words of Navajo. 
 
 " Why do you hold this ' singing,' 
 when she is getting worse rather than 
 better, when you promised not to hold 
 another? Animals, such as sheep and 
 cows, have more care for the safety of 
 their young. But here you are singing 
 over your own child and singing her 
 straight to the grave. 
 
 " You know as well as I that when she 
 was sick before she went to the hospital 
 and was cured, and yet you will not send 
 her again. 
 
 " A dog will be afraid when her young 
 are touched, but when she sees they are 
 helped she will lick the hand of her friends 
 in gratitude. We have helped your daugh- 
 ter before, but now you will not listen to 
 our words. She grows worse day by day. 
 Twelve days ago she could talk to us and 
 walk about; now three women must hold 
 her down. 
 
 " In these twelve days you have had 
 three medicine men to sing over her and 
 still she grows worse. How long is this to 
 last? Yashie her sister wants her to go 
 to the hospital. Others want her to go. 
 
 [8] 
 
You are the one keeping her back. Why 
 not take her to-morrow? I will go myself 
 if you cannot." 
 
 The steady voice stopped speaking. In 
 the silence I heard twice the cries of the 
 girl in the hogan. The air was chilly. 
 With my back to the three seated figures 
 I stood looking at the sickly moon and the 
 streaky clouds. Yashie stood beside me 
 crying. Then the missionary's strong 
 voice: 
 
 " What does he say? " 
 
 Joe asks for the answer. At length the 
 father speaks a few hurried words. Im- 
 passively Joe repeats: 
 
 " Well, he says that this shaman is 
 singing. He came here three days ago 
 and she is not so bad." 
 
 " You know that is not so. Ten days 
 ago she could walk and here she is helpless 
 to-night." 
 
 The father is obstinate. 
 
 " Well, wait until this singing is over 
 and she may be better." 
 
 " All right, go ahead and you will sing 
 her to her grave. If a white man were to 
 do such a thing as your treatment of your 
 daughter, he would be put in a jail. 
 
 [9] 
 
" I know I am speaking hard words. I 
 have never said such hard things to any 
 Indian, but I am trying to make you 
 realize what you are doing." 
 
 But the heathen father only rises and 
 enters the hogan. 
 
 Within Bah-he is sitting up. Heated 
 and tormented by the smoke and the 
 noise and the close presence of so many 
 breathing bodies, she tries to shake off 
 the blanket that is the only covering for 
 her shoulders. From the dark corners 
 beyond their elders, with eyes wide and 
 shining, the little children stare at her 
 heaving frame and the old medicine man 
 and the circle of men smoking. The 
 picture of the awesome rite is burning its 
 way through those child eyes to stay while 
 memory stays. 
 
 Without, the missionary tries to per- 
 suade other women and a young man. 
 No, the shaman must cure her. She has 
 seen a mad coyote and this is the cause 
 of her sickness. 
 
 The missionary enters again and the 
 medicine man begins talking. Joe repeats 
 his statement that if they did send her to 
 the hospital there would be no one there 
 
 [10] 
 
to care for her. At once comes the clear 
 voice : 
 
 " Were you ever there? No. Then why 
 do you make such statements, when you 
 know nothing about it? Here are people 
 now who have been there and been cured. 
 They were fed and warmed and a nurse 
 sat by them the whole night." 
 
 Then again, patiently but firmly, the 
 missionary turns to the people and ex- 
 plains that he could not be present and 
 hear such false statements without calling 
 them untrue. 
 
 An uncle of the girl feels driven to take 
 up the case. He explains the slow nature 
 of all cures, whether worked by Indian 
 medicine men or white people, talking at 
 length in trying to press his point. 
 
 But the missionary is prompt and tact- 
 ful again. 
 
 " Slivers, you know that you yourself 
 two months ago advised that she be taken 
 to the hospital. I was glad to hear that. 
 If they had listened to your words then 
 she would be well now." 
 
 Then enthusiastically he tries to per- 
 suade the uncle to give his consent if the 
 others will give theirs. The uncle only 
 
 [II] 
 
throws the case back on the father. Again 
 the father is besought. Again the father 
 puts him off. 
 
 " I do not know how to think, I am so 
 distressed by the words you spoke out- 
 side. Many Horses said it would be all 
 right to have this singing." 
 
 " Well," said the missionary, " tell him 
 he is a man, he is no boy. Why doesn't 
 he reason for himself and decide? " 
 
 So the struggle went, one strong man 
 against other strong men. But neither 
 by tact nor severity could anything be won 
 except a promise to talk it over and send 
 a later word. 
 
 III. 
 
 Saturday night, August seventeenth, I 
 rode again to the hogan under the guidance 
 of one of the uncles, arriving shortly after 
 sunset. The family and relatives were 
 just entering for the ceremonies of the 
 fifth successive night. Bah-he seemed to 
 be resting more comfortably. There was 
 much joking and laughter about the circle 
 around the fire. The company was about 
 
 [12] 
 
to " sing " as on the previous night. All 
 these people were crowded as before in 
 the small space, at its greatest length not 
 more than five paces. 
 
 It took some half hour for two young 
 men, under the medicine man's direction, 
 to whittle smooth two green sticks of wood. 
 The smaller piece of wood was bound with 
 a sinew thong to the end of a long smooth 
 stick. As the singing began four small 
 piles of cedar bark, shredded and dried, 
 were placed in the central space. As the 
 singing rose, a young man rolled rapidly 
 between his hands the long stick, the end 
 of which played in a notch of the other 
 piece of green wood. At length the sticks 
 began to smoke and the spark came. By 
 careful blowing the first pile of cedar bark 
 was lighted to a fire. Slowly, one after an- 
 other, the four piles were lighted, by the 
 patient efforts of the young man. 
 
 The hands of the young man who rolled 
 the stick were blistered. 
 
 While the fires were being lighted and 
 the singing became sharper and more 
 shrill, Bah-he was brought to the space 
 between the fires. All her clothing was 
 removed except a single skirt. With bared 
 
 [13] 
 
shoulders shaking, she still held fast the 
 instinctive shield of folded arms. The 
 smoke became almost unendurable. Five 
 fires were burning besides the smoke of 
 tobacco. I could not see across the space. 
 My eyes stung and the tears ran in great 
 drops down my face, although I was sit- 
 ting immediately beside the opening to the 
 outer air. The sufferer was immediately 
 between the fires. 
 
 While the fires burned down, still the 
 noise continued. When finally the whole 
 substance of each pile, one by one, had 
 been consumed to ashes, a woman rose, 
 gathered the black ashes of the first pile 
 and conveyed them to the sacred basket the 
 shaman held in his hands. In the basket 
 this black mass was mixed with water, 
 amidst the long-drawn intonations of the 
 singers. In the same way all of the four 
 piles of ashes were used to prepare the 
 black substance, half paste and half liquid. 
 
 Then two women proceeded with the 
 baskets to the sick girl as she sat, now 
 tossing her arms about, well nigh suffo- 
 cated and tormented beyond endurance. 
 
 Beginning with her feet — while the 
 song reached into cries and shrieks — they 
 
 [14] 
 
painted her whole body until every spot 
 was covered, black as coal, save the white 
 of her shifting eyes. 
 
 Then, one by one, all the women in the 
 hogan smeared their feet and hands and 
 faces. The little girls, down to the small- 
 est that could walk, followed in line after 
 their mothers. The oldest woman — she 
 was a great-grandmother, wrinkled and 
 bent — painted more of her body than any 
 of the others. With other incantations, 
 the grim old shaman sprinkled a pinch of 
 his herbs from a basket over various por- 
 tions of the invalid's body. Then with 
 their fingers, while the song kept moving, 
 several persons brushed red coals from 
 the fire to a half dozen spots in the room, 
 so that all might be in reach to wave with 
 their hands a stream of the curling smoke 
 over their faces. Various passes of the 
 hands and mutterings followed, while the 
 old man prepared a drink in the bowl of a 
 gourd. He walked across the little space, 
 brown hips exposed by the curious cut of 
 his garments, his lower legs bare, and 
 administered the drink to Bah-he, with 
 a faster final movement of the nasal song. 
 
 The ceremony was over. 
 
 [15] 
 
They wrapped the girl in blankets and 
 gave her to the care of the women. But 
 far into the night the exciting noise con- 
 tinued. Women brought in steaming 
 coffee and piles of bread. Over the feast 
 there was laughter, joking and smoking, 
 first of the men and then of the women. 
 When quiet came at last, they unrolled a 
 big sheepskin for me by the others around 
 the fire. Once, in the midst of a little 
 sleep, I saw that Bah-he was trying to rise 
 and the women trying to keep her still. 
 She could not win quiet for her heated 
 brain. I roused up with the first gray 
 and left the dark place just as a woman 
 moved to stir the fire. 
 
 As I crossed the sage-brush mesa the 
 sun rose. The clouds about the morning 
 were not red, nor purple, nor gold, but 
 silver white. It was Sunday morning and 
 the far desert hills were flooded with light. 
 Any but a stone man had prayed the Lord 
 of that day to bring her His peace, and to 
 the minds and hearts of her people, His 
 light. 
 
 [16] 
 
THE WOLFER P»ESS 
 NEW YORK