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Show they consider to be immune to their 'taboos' and these evil spirits, It may seem st somewhat calam nay be asked to perform the burial. ho ltous for the Indian man to die in his home. He may be taken outside to iie, or may be placed in a cheap building that is easily destroyed, perha Inadvertent death in the hogan may make abandonment or destruct If necessa. abandoned, the entrance---on the east side to admit entrance of the sun's first morning rays, may be closed. and a hole in the north side of the structure. This will notify all Navajos of 'taboo' because of the death. yfire. lon the cut the - The hogan is usually built in a somewhat circular or hexagonal shape, th the roof tpering to a hole in the top to allow the escape of smoke. The floor may be sunken several inches into the earth to avoid surface The fire may be contained within a ring of stones in the center drafts. of thehogan. Mythical stories told by the aborigines are often long and tiresome to us. I take it that these, together with the 'taboos', are their force in the minds of both the Nalajos and the Moquis as lesing become 'educated' they by the whitemen. ver,y successful in controlling the natives. sent against the Navajos in 1804-05 (mote the coincidence with the Lewis and Clark Expedition up the Missouri River and on to tm Pacific coast). At the time of the Spanish expedition against them, it seems that the main stronghold was the Canyon de Chelly, The A early Spanish were-not strong punitive expedition was branch of the Chinle Wash. The warriors had secreted their women and children and old men in a recess, or cave, high up on the almost perpen dicular side-wall of-one of the branches of the canyon, where they were well secreted and safe from any attack that could well be made. That the redmen knew of the Spanish !orce in. the countr,y, I do not know; but it seems that when the cenquistadores passed through the canyon, the war: riors were off on one of their foraging expeditions. As they passed below the cave in the deep canyon, it is said, an Indian woman who had been a prisoner of white people in her earlier life probably feeling safe a on the on the steep canyon wall, taunted the soldiers. They deployed thselves -it is said· they suceded and opposite canyon; in killing every individual in the cave by gunfire. From this event, the came of that branchof main the name probably canyon---Canyon del Muerte the seems of It that (Canyon Death). spanish failed to establish garrisoned forts among the Indians; and even such a terrible event as this probably angered them instead of having a lasting effect in their control. side of the narrow 1849, when trouble riit Washington, then 86vrfigr In John . xue Na '\aJRs gke outith severity, Col. effected otl.NguaMexicoatD, a Treaty with them at their sacred spring at the site of the fUture Fort Defiance. It is said that Col. Edwin V. Sumner was not attacked by the Navajos in 1851, when he was constructing this fort because "the omens were not right". In 1858 a wagon-train was attacked at Black Rock, bringing supplies; (we may remember that th Joseph C. Ives exploring party was at Fort Defiance in the Summer of l85BeSo. page 44, this book). The next Summer about 1,000 warriors some 3 miles south of the Fort attacked the fort without as it was success. For several years after this, it seems thst the efforts of the Unite States to control the Na\ajos were inconclusive. In 1863, Kit carson with an ample miitary force was sent against them. His tlscorched earth" policy was to buand destroy houses and fields. Con de Chelly hoer; and the ersedby the United States Army, this time driven from that stronghold and decisively defeated. Some again trav Navajos were was 12,000 of them |
