Page:The Pima Indians.pdf/192

] Tze-kinne, or Stone-house people, descendants of the cliff-dwelling Sobaypuris, whom they drove out of Aravypa Cañon and forced to flee to the Pimas for refuge about a century ago."

As soon as a child began to creep about it was taken by the parents some afternoon to the medicine-man in order that the rite of purification might be administered and the child's future be rendered free from harmful magic influences. Putting a sacred pebble and an owl feather into a seashell containing water, the medicine-man waved an eagle feather (fig. 100) about, while the parents and the child drank the water and ate some white ashes or a little mud. This simple ceremony was sufficient to thwart the malice of all evil demons; lightning would not strike the child, and the possibility of accidents of all kinds was thus precluded. As a further precaution the mother must not eat salt for four days thereafter.

This appears at first glance to be a modification of the Christian rite of baptism. Further investigation seems to show that it is similar to that and also to a purely aboriginal ceremony that in the opinion of the writer was practised before the advent of the friars. The Pimas declare that their "medicine-men got it up themselves." Cushing found "that the Zuñi of to-day are as eager as were their forefathers for baptism and for baptismal names additional to their own. But it must be remembered," he continues, "that baptism—the purification of the head by sprinkling or of the face by washing with medicine water was a very old institution with this people even before the Spaniards found them." He also ascribes the readiness of various other tribes to receive baptism to the existence of their own similar custom. This readiness is otherwise difficult to account for, as the zeal, and, at times, lack of judgment, of the priests led them to baptize as many of the Indians as they were able to con-