meet on the opposite side, and that this shell he must insist on having. The next largest shell, Wind told him, was but little smaller.262
596. Three days after this conference, people began to come in from different pueblos in the Chaco Canyon and from pueblos on the banks of the San Juan,—all these pueblos are now in ruins,—and soon a great multitude had assembled. Meantime, too, they collected shells and beads from the various pueblos in order to dress the atsá'lei as he desired. They brought him some great shell basins and told him these were what he wanted for the dance; but he measured them with his arms as Wind had told him, and, finding that his hands joined easily when he embraced the shells, he discarded them. They brought him larger and larger shells, and tried to persuade him that such were their largest; but he tried and rejected all. On the last day, with reluctance, they brought him the great shell of Kĭntyél and the great shell of Kĭ'ndotlĭz. He clasped the first in his arms; his fingers did not meet on the opposite side. He clasped the second in his arms, and the tips of his fingers just met. "These," said he, "are the shells I must wear when I dance."
597. Four days before that on which the last dance was to occur, the pueblo people sent out messengers to the neighboring camps
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Fig. 37. Circle of branches of the rite of the mountain chant, after ceremony is over.
of Navahoes, to invite the latter to witness the exhibition of the last night and to participate in it with some of their alíli (dances or dramas). One of the messengers went to the Chelly Canyon and there he got Gánaskĭdi, with his son and daughter, to come and perform a dance. The other messengers started for the Navaho camp at the foot of Tsótsĭl on the south (near where Cobero is
