The Hactcin said to the boastful shamans, “All right, you people say you have power. Now bring back the sun.”
And so they lined up. On one side were all the shamans and on the other side were all the birds and animals. The shamans started to sing songs and make ceremonies. They showed all they knew. Some would sit singing and then disappear into the earth, leaving only their eyes sticking out. Then they would come back as before, but it couldn’t bring back the sun. It was only to show that they had power. Some swallowed arrows, and the arrows would come out of their flesh at their stomachs. Some swallowed feathers. Some swallowed whole spruce trees and then spat them up. But they couldn’t do anything about regaining the sun and moon. [The attribution of the loss of the sun and moon to the boasts of shamans (those who obtain supernatural power through a personal encounter with some animal or natural force) and the ridicule heaped on the ceremonies and legerdemain in which the shamans subsequently engaged in order to retrieve the loss, are indicative of the subordinate place shamanism plays in Jicarilla religion. Shamanistic ceremonies are used for emergencies and minor vises. For important occasions and for times when planning and preparation are possible, “long life ceremonies,” traditional rites, which have their genesis and rationalization in the myths and not in any personal experience of an individual, are invoked instead.]
Then White Hactcin said, “All you people are doing pretty well, but I don’t think you are bringing the sun back. Your time is up.”
Then he turned to the insects and the birds and animals and said, “All right, now it is your turn.”
The birds and animals spoke to each other politely, just as though they were brothers-in-law [a number of Jicarilla affinities must be addressed by a special third person form, called “polite form” because of the restraint and circumspection which are supposed to accompany it. By taking pains to be more formal and dignified, the birds and animals hoped to avoid the excesses of the thoughtless shamans].
Hactcin told them, “You must do something more than speak to each other in that polite way. Why don’t you get up and do something with your own power and make the sun come back?”
The grasshopper was the first one to try. “That’s not a difficult thing to do,” he said. He put up his hand to the east, to the south, to the west, and to the north in turn and then put down bread which had been baked in ashes.
White Hactcin asked, “What is this?”
Grasshopper said, “That is bread.”
“How do you make the bread?”
“Oh, with grain,” he said.
“What is in it?”
“Wheat. It grows. It has roots and leaves and pollen and a stalk.” [The grasshopper is considered the guardian of wheat.]
“All right, I can use that,” White Hactcin said.
Then the deer’s turn came. He said, “Hactcin hasn’t asked such a difficult thing.” He put out his hand in the four directions. Then he put down some yucca fruit.
White Hactcin asked, “What is it?”
“That is fruit. It is what I live on. It is a growing thing too. It has roots, stalk, leaves, blossoms, and pollen.”
“I can use that too. It is wonderful,” said Hactcin.
Then the bear stepped forth. He too put his hands out in the four directions. Then he put down a handful of choke-cherries. “This is what I live on,” he said.
“What is it?” asked White Hactcin.
“It is a fruit too. It grows. It has root, stalk, leaves, blossom, and pollen.”
“I can use it. It is good.”
Then came Ground Hog. He too put out his right hand to the four directions. In his hand was a berry.
“What is it?”
“It is a fruit. It is what I live on. It has a root, stalk, flowers, and pollen.”
“I can use it.”
Then Chipmunk came out. He too put out his hand in the four directions. He put down a strawberry.
“What is it?”
“It is a fruit. It has roots, stem, blossom, and pollen. It is what I live on.”
In the same way all the animals came forward in turn. Each put his hand to the four directions and each gave something which was his food to Hactcin. The birds and insects came too. The birds brought all kinds of seeds.
The last one to come was Turkey. He went to the east, strutting. Black corn lay there as if spilled. He did the same to the south, and blue corn lay there. He strutted to the west, and yellow corn lay there. And then he went to the north, and all kinds of vegetables and fruit lay there.
Hactcin asked him, “What is all this?”
“This is what I live on. They have roots, stems, pollen, and the corn has tassels on top. It has dew on it too.”
“That is very good. I think I am going to use you. You can help us make it grow,” he said to the turkey.
Then White Hactcin sent for Thunder of four colors from the directions. And these thunders brought clouds of four colors. The rain fell from these clouds. Then Hactcin sent for Rainbow to make it beautiful while they planted these things on the mountain.
Then those four, White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Holy Boy, and Red Boy, brought sand. It was sand of four colors. They brought pollen from all kinds of trees and from the fruits. They leveled off a place so they could work with the sand. They smoothed down the place with eagle feathers [sand on which ground drawings are to be traced is leveled off with eagle feathers today].
They had earth of four colors there too: black, blue, yellow, and glittering.
First they laid the sand down evenly. Then they made four little mounds of earth with the dirt. In each one they put some seeds and fruits which the animals had given. And on top they put the needles and leaves of the trees that were to grow on the mountains. On the top of each one of the piles of earth they put a reed. On top of the reed was attached the downy feather of an eagle and the downy feather of a turkey. The mounds of earth were in a row extending from east to west. The first one was the one of black earth, next the one of blue earth, then the one of yellow earth, and last the one of glittering earth.
Before the mountain started to grow, the Holy Ones took a black clay bowl and filled it with water. They did this because water was needed to make the mountain grow. How could it grow that tall without water? When they did this there was still no single tall mountain there. But they put the clay bowl of water there and then added all the things that the animals gave, and the mountain began to grow. That is why the black clay bowl, full of medicine, is used in the bear dance. And when the old people wanted holy water after that, they always got it from the mountain tops.
All the birds of the mountain and the mountain animals were there helping to make these mounds of earth grow. They all prayed. Then the two Hactcin and Holy Boy and Red Boy started to sing. They sang and sang and after a while all the fruit began to grow in these piles of earth.
The turkey was gobbling and strutting. When the mountain expanded he always did this. But they did not know how many times the mountain grew, for they had no sun and could not count [some say that the mountain grew twelve times, that it grew eight times and then the foolish girls stopped it. Then the Hactcin fixed it, and it grew four more times. (Inf.)]. Now we watch the sun and see the days pass, and in this way learn to count.
Every time the mountain grew there was a noise as though something was squeezed, a squeaking noise. All the four mounds of earth, as they grew, merged and became one mountain.
When the dirt had all grown together into one mountain, the two Hactcin and Holy Boy and Red Boy picked out twelve shamans who had performed many things when the people were showing off their power before. These were the ones who had been able to cut themselves and to swallow arrows. These people had ceremonies from different sources, from animals, from fire, from Turkey, from frogs and others things. They each had a shamanistic ceremony and they were shamans. They could not be left out. They had power and they had to help too. All with power were helping to make the mountain grow. Each animal and bird was contributing his power.
The four Holy Ones painted these twelve men and made them appear like the Tsanati of today [the marked tendency of the Jicarilla to discourage shamanism in favor of the “long life ceremonies” finds unmistakable expression here. To become effective in this rite of the growing emergence mountain, shamans have to be transformed into a dance group of the same kind as those that function in the traditional or “long life” ceremonies today. The word Tsanati refers to ritual gesticulation. Since a literal translation would be awkward, the native word is retained here]. They dressed them up with spruce branches and yucca leaves, using the narrow-leafed yucca and the broad-leafed yucca too. They wove the yucca and made a short skirt of it for the men to wear. They stuck spruce branches in around their waists. They tied yucca at the wrist and lower part of the arm and spruce at the upper arm. Six represented the summer and six the winter season. Therefore six were painted blue all over and six white all over. Yucca was tied to their ankles and to a place above the knee, and spruce branches were stuck in these circles of yucca. The faces, hands, and feet were painted. A line of black ran outward and down from each eye. They wore buckskin moccasins. One white eagle feather was tied in the hair of each, on top. In their hands were branches of spruce and blades of yucca. They held four kernels of blue corn in each hand.
Then the four Holy Ones made six clowns [the literal translation of the term for the Jicarilla clown is “striped excrement;” the clowns’ ability to cure stomach ailments with scatological practices is connoted. The clowns of the Emergence were decorated with four black stripes. Clowns that function in war-path ceremonies are designed with six black stripes.]. They were painted white all over except for four black stripes, one across the face, one across the chest, one across the upper leg, and one across the lower leg. The stripes went around the whole body. Each arm also had four black stripes. On their wrists they wore a band of narrow yucca and one around the neck. They wore loin cloths of deerskin, and they wore moccasins. Yucca bands were put around their ankles. Rattles of deer hoof were tied to the yucca at the ankle, two to each foot. The hair was gathered up and brought to a point on each side. These “horns” were painted white with four black stripes. They stuck out like horns. And at the top of each one was one eagle feather.
In the right hand they carried the broad blades of yucca. This was called their whip. It had a downy eagle feather at the very end. With this the clown protects the holy places against any woman whose menstrual period has come. If a woman is in that condition the feather points to her and the clown chases her away with it. This whip is used against sickness too.
In the left hand they carried a branch of spruce. These people are powerful. If you have touched the bone or marrow of a man or dog, though you did not realize it, and then later put your hand to your mouth, it makes you sick. You can’t digest food. You vomit all the time. Then these clowns are the people who can cure you.
All those who were present helped. They all worked to make the mountain grow. It was getting large. The people wanted to travel on it. The mountain had much fruit on it now. There were cottonwood and aspen trees on it and streams of water flowed from it too. It was very rich in everything. Yucca fruit and all other fruits were growing on it by this time, all kinds of berries and cherries. The turkey, more than anything else, was the one who made the mountain grow. When he gobbled and strutted it would begin to rise.
It was very dark and they couldn’t see well. They had the feathers by which they obtained some light, but they could not see all over.
Two girls went up on the mountain when no one was watching them. A little later the mountain stopped growing and would rise no more.
Then White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy said, “Something must have happened up there.”
They sent the whirlwind to find out about it. The wind went up there. He saw tracks.
They all continued with their songs and prayers, but the mountain would no longer move.
Whirlwind sent a message to the two Hactcin telling them to go up and fix the damage. Turkey was responsible for all growing things and so he first went up and saw what the two girls had done. He came back and told the two Hactcin. The Hactcin requested that the people remain where they were.
The two Hactcin went up with Holy Boy and Red Boy. They saw all that the girls had done. They saw how the reeds and many other plants were damaged. The girls had been chasing each other and wrestling and trampling on the holy plants. They had even used the holy mountain as a toilet. So White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy cleaned up everything and fixed it up. The girls were no longer there. They had gone down the mountain again.
White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy came down to the people again after performing a ceremony there. They asked the people who had been on top of the mountain, and they found out which girls had done it.
“Why did you go up there?” they asked these girls.
They blamed each other. One said, “She wanted me to go up.” The other said, “No, she told me to go.” They said they had intended to go only a little way but that they had seen berries and fruit ahead, and so had gone from one plant or tree to another until they had climbed to the top.
Now all the people came together once more and sang, and the mountain began to grow again. It grew just a little higher. It grew four times and then it wouldn’t rise any more.
White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy went up the mountain again. They saw that the top of the mountain was still a little way from the sky and from the hole through which they could see to the other earth. So they all held a council to decide what they would do next.
They sent up Fly and Spider. The spider put his web all around, and the fly and the spider went up on it. That is why, in February or March, when the first warm weather starts and the first flies appear, they come on the sunbeams, which stand for the spider’s web. [The Jicarilla will not kill spiders for this reason. The nexus in Jicarilla ideology between the spider’s web and the sunbeam is made explicit in the birth rite, where a cord of unblemished buckskin, called in the rite “spider’s rope,” is stretched from the umbilicus of the child towards the sun.] You will see the sun’s ray come through the window and the fly will come in on it, right into the house.
Those two went up where the sun was. They took four rays of the sun, each of a different color, and pulled on them as if they were ropes. They pulled them down to the mountain top. The ropes came down, black, blue, yellow, and glittering, one on each corner of the opening. From these rays of the sun White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy made a ladder. Out of the same material they made twelve steps and placed them across.
When Spider first came up on this earth, there was only one mountain, and that was to the east. Flint Mountain was its name. It is still there, west of Abiquiu.
The first animals to be sent up after Spider came down and announced that water was plentiful there, were two wild ducks. These are the ones they hunt now in October. They were sent up because it was thought that they could get along well in the water. But as soon as they came up they flew over to this mountain and stayed there until the water was sent away. When everyone was up on the earth, they came back and joined the others. v Now the fly and the spider went upward again on that ladder. They saw a great deal of water up there. They could see no ground at all. The spider made a cylinder of web which protected them and they went up to the top through this. Spider then wove four webs on top of the earth of four different colors and stretching in four directions so that White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy could ascend.
The four came up. Black Hactcin stood on the black web to the east, and the others took their places too. They talked of what to do, for the sun was past the middle of the sky already.
Then they said, “Let us make four hoops of the different colors, one black, one blue, one yellow, and one glittering.”
They did so and threw the black one to the east, the blue one to the south, the yellow one to the west, and the glittering one to the north. Every time they threw one, the water rolled back and grew less where they were standing. By the time they threw the fourth one, there was land where they stood. The water had receded from the land and had made the oceans as they are now.
But everything was still muddy. So they sent for the four Big Winds of the different colors and for the little winds too. The winds blew and made it all dry. But the winds couldn’t dry off certain places where the springs and rivers were.
When the wind was hurling the water back and exposing the land, it lifted the water high in the sky and held it there. Over by the oceans the water is still held there by the wind.
White Hactcin said to the wind, “Hold the water there and when it is needed we will let you know and you must blow and bring the rain.”
Hactcin talked to the thunder, “You must lead,” he said, “so people will hear and know the rain is coming and get ready. They will prepare buckets to fill and be ready to receive the rain.” Then he spoke to the sun saying, “You must shine on the lakes and rivers so that the steam will arise and turn to water and give rain. But Wind you will always carry the water in the air; you are responsible for it. If the heat does not pick up the water but leaves it around on the earth in the same way all the time, the water will become dirty and unfit for use. But by changing it in this manner it will be made pure and good for the people.”
High in the air there are four winds: the black wind from the east makes the water warm, the blue wind from the south makes it cool and fresh, the yellow wind from the west freezes the water and turns it to snow, and the glittering wind from the north turns it to ice and hail. These four people are always there handing around the moisture of the air. When it is handed to the wind of the north, it turns to ice. Then, when it is handed back to Black Wind of the east, he warms it and it turns to water again. That is why we have the moisture of the air in all these forms.
And some people who also control water live in the mountains. These are the people who were directed by the Hactcin to stay in the mountains and take care of them and of all within them. When the people first came up on earth there were no mountains. But when the monsters began to grow, the mountains too began to rise, for Hactcin made them to be barriers so that the monsters could not get to the people easily.
And Hactcin stationed people in those mountains then, saying, “This mountain will be your home.”
These people allow the water of the mountains to flow out, and thus there are springs.
We say that the fly is the messenger of the sun. It carries the news of the coming of the sun. And the spider has long ropes, we say. In ceremonies he helps people, and when he helps it is just as if a rope were lowered to one who has fallen in a deep place White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy said to Fly and Spider, “We need your help still. Make a web and extend it to the sky,” they said to Spider, “and then you two bring the sun down.”
The Hactcin sang and sang so the sun and moon could be gotten down, for the sun and moon had not asked permission when they went up as they did. It was the fault of the sun and moon that the people had such a hard time and had to come up on this earth.
Spider did as he was told, and he and Fly brought the sun and moon down. Then all held council and they decided that they would change Sun to a person, a living person, because he had disobeyed. They were afraid that if they didn’t do this the sun would go up again to some other place, and they had had a difficult time regaining the sun. They decided to do the same to Moon too. Before this Sun and Moon were alive, but they were not people. So White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy talked it over and said, “Of the sun we will make another people.” And they made the sun into a Taos Indian boy. And out of the moon they made a Jicarilla Apache girl. [Apache cosmology is not consistent concerning the sex of the moon. When the moon is thought of in connection with the woman’s menstrual cycle it is given female attributes. But Moon is also associated with Water, and Water becomes the father of one of the Culture Heroes. In an important ceremonial race Moon is represented as a male, as is the case again in the origin myth of the Hactcin ceremony.]
“Let them marry,” said White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy, “and then the Jicarilla Apache and the Taos Indians will be good friends and will not fight over little things.”
And so these two helped each other after this. They helped each other shine and give light.
Now they sent the sun and the moon back to the north again after they had become living persons. So they went back to the north. Then the sun started to go to the south. The moon followed. They went like this for one full day.
But then they thought about it.
“I don’t believe it’s right,” Sun said, “for one side of the earth has light when we go this way, and one has not.” [The earth is said to have the form of a woman whose feet point toward the east and whose head lies to the west.]
White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy thought about it. Then they changed it and had the sun and moon go from east to west. And the Milky Way that you see stretching from north to south across the sky is the first path of the sun and moon.
At first the sun and moon went together, at the same time.
“That’s not right,” they thought. “We will hold back the moon. Let the sun go first and then the moon can go at night.”
The moon was flat and round. It followed the sun, coming later. When the sun set in the west, it could be seen. The moon is a girl and was having her menstrual period just at that time. She was tipped up so that only the rim could be seen. That is what we call the new moon when it occurs now. So it is that our women have a period after a new moon, and that is why the girl’s puberty ceremony is always held at the new moon. And the new moon is used now for keeping track of the seasons.
The sun just kept going all the time.
When everything was ready in this upper world White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy went down below to the place where the people were waiting.
The people had a great deal of food on that mountain. They had much to eat while they were traveling. But they had not yet started upward. They were still below, in the underworld.
Then White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy sent up the crows, the four crows of the different colors. “You must go up there and see how everything is getting along.”
The crows came up. Some of the fish and water animals had died when the water was thrown back by White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy. The crows began to eat these dead bodies.
The other people were expecting them back. They wondered why the crows did not return. So finally they sent up White Weasel.
White Weasel went up and saw what the crows were doing. He returned and told the people, “No wonder they don’t come back. They are busy eating.”
So they sent Badger up then. Badger stepped into some place that was still muddy. He thought it must be muddy like that all over, so he went back and told them, “Oh, it’s still very muddy.” Because he stepped in the mud he has black on his paws now.
Then they sent up Beaver. When he got up there he tried to dam up the water. He stayed up there working and making dams.
Then Black Weasel was sent. Black Weasel came to Beaver and said, “What are you doing? The people are waiting for you.”
“Oh, I’d better dam up this water so that the water will be ready when the people come up.”
The rivers that are left us here today are the ones he dammed up.
Beaver knew that the people were on the journey to this earth and would be very tired. So be built a sweat house there where the people could come and get rested.
When Weasel came up he saw it. He asked, “What are you doing here? The people are waiting for you.”
“I’m making a dam for the poeple, so they will have water. When the people come they will already have water for drinking and to bathe in.”
“And what are you building?”
“That is my house. I call it keltca.” [This word means “beaver pelt” and is quite similar to the word for sweat-house, kiltka. The informant is employing a bit of folk etymology to hint that the word for sweat-house originally came from “beaver pelt.” Since there is a difference of tone as well as outline between these two words, this is extremely unlikely.]
“Is this for the people?”
“No, it is my home. But whenever the bodies of the people are doubled up they will use it. When they are tired they will use it too. After a long sickness when they are run down they will use it. When they come up I will explain to them how to use it. I’ll explain to them what they should do. They should build a fire outside and put rocks in it. When these rocks are well heated they must throw them into the sweat house. The doorway must be closed by my own skin, by beaver skin, for when I go into my house I never wear my skin but take it off and hang it at the door. So let the people do likewise when they take a sweat bath. The door must always face to the east. The people must roll the hot rocks in with sticks and pile them all on the north side. Then they must throw water on the rocks and steam will arise. When it begins to cool down, more water must be thrown on the rocks. And the songs that are sung should be about Little Night. They must sing these, for they go into that small dark place which gives them the sweat bath and the cleansing.
“Two or four may go in and all can sing in there. And they should sing for long life too and sing of the sun and moon. Women may go in but not with the men.
“The sweat house shall be made of bent pieces of wood with brush and dirt over these. And it must be made by the water’s edge so that all can go into the water and wash after the sweat bath.
“The men must not use the same sweat house that the women use. If they do so they will become blind, and the women will become blind too if they go into the one the men have used.
“The sweat house, after use, is to be left standing, and it may be used again.”
Then from below White Hactcin, Black Hactcin, Red Boy, and Holy Boy sent the birds up first, because they have wings to fly. They came up in a flock.
Hactcin told the animals and people. “Now get ready. We must go up in the sky.”
At this time the girls were big with children [for explanation of these pregnancies see the story of Coyote in The Underworld]. This was the result of the things they had used on themselves in the absence of the men, when the women and the men had separated. They were already in late pregnancy when they started.
Now they all began traveling on the mountain going toward the top. The Hactcin made sure that everything was right and holy before they let the people start. There was no sun and so one cannot say that the people took four days to reach the vault of the underworld. But they traveled four times until they were tired and then stopped each time. The top of the mountain where they stopped last was twelve ladder steps from the earth hole. That was the distance between the mountain top and the earth hole. They had four ladders. The black ladder to the east was the one the men climbed up on. The blue ladder to the south was for the girls and women. The yellow ladder to the west was used by the young boys. The north ladder of a glittering color was used by all the little children.
First they prayed before the ladders. Holy Boy was the real leader of the ascent. It was due to him that the people were coming on this earth. So he prayed for the ladders and for the Hactcin, the clowns, and Tsanati.
Then the clowns came up first, for they had the whips of yucca with which to chase sickness away. At that time it was not known whether there was sickness on earth. They thought that perhaps the water animals which had died had some sickness. So the clowns came up and made everything wholesome for the people. They made the path that the people could follow.
White Hactcin was the next to come up. Holy Boy first dressed him up. He put a downy eagle feather on top of his head. He dressed him up with spruce. White Hactcin held a big whip made of yucca. A downy feather was at its end. In his left hand he held spruce branches.
The clowns uttered a certain laugh when they came up, so that all the sickness would be frightened, and the Hactcin made a different noise for the same reason. Black Hactcin ascended immediately after White Hactcin did. He had black specular iron ore and pollen all over his face. White Hactcin had pollen all over his face, and on the right side the seven stars of the Big Dipper were painted with specular iron ore. A sun of specular iron ore was designed on the middle of the forehead. On the left cheek was the moon, designed with specular iron ore. The bodies of both Hactcin were covered with white clay. They wore skirts of woven yucca like those of the Tsanati. At the arm and leg joints they wore yucca bands tied, and spruce branches were fastened on these.
Next Red Boy ascended. He, like the Hactcin, went up the ladder of the east. Then the twelve Tsanati came up. Then Holy Boy came up. After him came Turkey. All these came up the ladder to the east.
Now all these were up on this earth, and they prepared everything so that no harm should befall the people.
Now it was the turn of the people. Ancestral Man was the first of the people to ascend. Ancestral Woman followed and was the first woman to emerge. Both walked up with age sticks in their hands. [The age stick, or the staff which an old person uses for support, is here mentioned as a symbol of the long life that man shall have on earth. It is constantly named in Jicarilla ritual songs.] They were dressed as White-Shell Woman and Child-of-the-Water dress for the girl’s puberty ceremony now. The other people followed. The men were to the east, the women to the west, and the children to the north and south. [At the time of the Emergence, the man who came out last had his hair parted, not in the middle, but on the side. The line of the parting was painted red. If you know this emergence story well, you can wear your hair that way. Both men and women did this. (Inf.).]
After the people the animals came.
The people emerged from a hole in a mountain. At that time this was the only mountain on the earth, besides Flint Mountain to the east. The other mountains grew up later, at the time of the monsters. Some say that the emergence mountain lies north of Durango, Colorado. Others say it is near Alamosa (Colorado). It was called Big Mountain.
Sky is our father, Earth is our mother. They are husband and wife and they watch over us and take care of us. The earth gives us our food; all the fruits and plants come from the earth. Sky gives us the rain, and when we need water we pray to him. The earth is our mother. [Taos is at the heart of the earth. Our own country used to be the Cimarron region. (Inf.).] We came from her. When we came up on this earth, it was just like a child being born from its mother. The place of emergence is the womb of the earth. [That the emergence tale is a myth of gestation is patent enough. It is seldom, however, that the native draws the parallel so conclusively.]
The animals came up, the elk, the deer, and all the others. But they were not wild animals. They were gentle and tame then. The animals came up any ladder which was nearest. After a while the ladders were all worn through, so many had passed over them. There were two old people, an old man and a very old woman who were far behind the animals. These two couldn’t see well; their sight was dim. Those two silly girls who had interfered with the growth of the mountain before were far behind too. They had been chasing each other and playing, and the people didn’t know it.
When the two old people came to the ladders, the ladders were worn out and they couldn’t get up. They stood there and called, “Come and get us. Take us too.” But there was no ladder nor any way to get them up. The old people tried to get the others to help them.
Finally they became angry. “All right,” they said, “we shall stay here. But you must come back some day.” They meant that the people must return to the underworld when they die.
Night came. The people on top tried to sleep. But they couldn’t sleep the first night. They couldn’t sleep the second nor the third. They wondered why. They wondered whether it was because something had been left behind.
Then they discovered that they had no lice in their hair. There were three kinds, black ones, grey ones, and the small ones, the nits. So they sent down to the old people for these. The two old people threw some up. The people divided the lice among themselves. The fourth night they all slept soundly. The people looked down through the hole. They couldn’t find those two silly girls among those on top. The light of the sun went through the hole and hit the tip of the mountain, illuminating it. There, in the light, sat those two foolish girls sewing shallow tray baskets.
They called to these two girls, but they wouldn’t come up. They wouldn’t obey.
Then Holy Boy made two butterflies out of the flowers. He made the kind that always go in pairs, the yellow ones.
The sun had power now. Holy Boy sent word to Sun. “You must help us and send a beam for the butterflies.” The sun did so and the butterflies went right in on that beam. [Butterflies and the rays of the sun are connected with love charms in Jicarilla thinking and are therefore well chosen to lure the girls to the upper earth. One way to gain the favor of a member of the opposite sex is to flash a beam of light in his direction by means of a shiny object. The butterfly, symbol of the fluttering and inconstancy of women, is encised or painted on flutes which young men play to attract sweethearts.]
The two silly girls caught sight of the butterflies.
“Let’s catch them and make designs. We have always made mountain designs on our baskets. Now we’d better make a butterfly design,” they said. “That is more beautiful.”
So they started to chase the butterflies. The ray of the sun came down and provided a ladder. The butterflies kept just out of reach above them. So they began to ascend the ladder, trying to get those butterflies. Before they knew it they were on top.