Page:The Moki snake dance.djvu/10

 Snake race was being run, and the time is now ripe for the final spectacle. The snakes have been washed and placed in jars and the costuming begins. Long-haired, painted priests in scanty attire emerge from the kivas and go on various errands. Visitors and Mokis examine one another with mutual curiosity; the children are having a jolly time, for the Snake dance comes in their village but once in two years, and white visitors are sure to bring candy to put a climax to the stuffing of new corn, melons and other good things of August.

Other dances of the Mokis are more pleasing, as the Kachina dances, with their mirth and music, or the Flute dance, full of color and ceremony, but the Snake dance attracts with a potent fascination. One gets so interested in the progress of the dance that the anticipated element of horror does not appear amid the rhythmic movement and tragic gestures of the dancers with here and there the sinuous undulation of a venomous rattlesnake. Along the sky-line of the houses and on every available foothold and standing place are spectators. At Wolpi, the top of the mushroom-shaped rock is a favorite seat. The crowd is hardly less interesting than the dancers. Everyone, except the white visitor, is in gala costume, Moki and Navajo vying in gaudy colors. The Moki maidens have their hair done