Note 169 — LEGENDS. (continued 3)

The author has expressed the opinion elsewhere318 that we need not suppose from this passage that the story-teller wishes to commiserate the Tseʻtláni on the inferiority of their diet; he may merely intend to show that his gens had not the same taboo as the elder gentes. The modern Navahoes do not eat ducks or snakes. Taboo is perhaps again alluded to in par. 394, where it is said that the Tháʻpaha ate ducks and fish. The Navahoes do not eat fish, and fear fish in many ways. A white woman, for mischief, emptied over a young Navaho man a pan of water in which fish had been soaked. He changed all his clothes and purified himself by bathing. Navahoes have been known to refuse candies that were shaped like fish.