riest draws a line on the trail with white corn meal
and across it three cloud symbols. The Flute children throw the
offerings they hold in their hands upon the symbols, followed by the
priests who sing to the sound of the flutes.

[Illustration: Figure 5.--Flute Ceremony at Michongnovi.

--Courtesy Arizona State Museum.]

"The children pick the offerings from the ground with sticks held in
their hands, and the same performance is repeated till they stand again
in the plaza on the mesa before the cottonwood bower, where they sing
melodious songs then disperse."

The foregoing description of Hough's is an account of the Walpi
ceremony, where we find only one Flute fraternity. Each of the other
villages has two fraternities, the Blue Flute and the Drab Flute. The
Flute Ceremony at Mishongnovi is perhaps the most impressive example of
this pageant as given by the double fraternity. Dr. Byron Cummings
reports this Mishongnovi ceremony as having several interesting
variations from the Walpi report given above. (See Figure 5.)

[Illustration: Figure 6.--Flute Boy before Costuming.

--Courtesy Arizona State Museum.]

On the ninth day women were observed sweeping the trail to the spring
with meticulous care, in preparation for the double procession which
came down at about 1:30 in the afternoon.

All the costuming was done at the spring--body painting, putting on of
ceremonial garments and arranging of hair.

The fathers of the Flute maidens brushed and arranged their hair for
them and put on their blankets. If a girl had no father, her uncle did
this for her. There were two Flute Maids and a Flute Boy (See Figure 6)
who walked between them, in each of the two fraternities. Even this
ceremonial costuming was accompanied by solemn singing.

When all was ready the priests sat on the edge of the pool with their
legs hanging over, and the two maids and the boy sat behind them on a
terrace of the bank. The Blue Flute fraternity occupied one side of the
pool and the Drab Flute fraternity another. Many songs were sung to the
strange, plaintive accompaniment of the flute players. After a while an
old priest waded into the pool and walked around it in ever-narrowing
circles till he reached the center, where he sank into the water and
disappeared for a dramatically long moment and came up with a number of
ceremonial objects in his hands, including a gourd bottle filled with
water from the depths of the spring.

It was late a