Note 13 — INTRODUCTION.

“Sacred buckskin” is a term employed by the author, for convenience, to designate those deerskins specially prepared for use in making masks and for other purposes in the Navaho rites. The following are some of the particulars concerning their preparation; perhaps there are others which the author has not learned: The deer which is to furnish the skin must not be shot, or otherwise wounded. It is surrounded by men on foot or horseback, and caused to run around until it falls exhausted; then a bag containing pollen is put over its mouth and nostrils, and held there till the deer is smothered. The dead animal is laid on its back. Lines are marked with pollen, from the centre outwards along the median line of the body and the insides of the limbs. Incisions are made with a stone knife along the pollen lines, from within outwards, until the skin is opened; the flaying may then be completed with a steel knife. When the skin is removed it is laid to the east of the carcass, head to the east, and hairy side down. The fibulæ and ulnæ are cut out and put in the skin in the places where they belong,—i.e., each ulna in the skin of its appropriate fore-leg, each fibula in the skin of its appropriate hind-leg. The hide may then be rolled up and carried off. Both ulnæ are used as scrapers of the skin. If masks are to be made of the skin, the fibulæ are used as awls,—the right fibula in sewing the right sides of the masks, the left fibula in sewing the left sides of the masks. Other rules (very numerous) for making the masks will not be mentioned in this place. Fibulæ and ulnæ other than those belonging to the deer that furnished the skin must not be used on the latter.