retch of the road, as well as the most interesting. It is here
the Mokis, or Hopi, have their reservation in the very heart of Navajo
Land; and there will be no quarrel over possession of this land. It lies
a sea of yellow sand with high rampant islands--600, 1,000, 1,500 feet
above the plains--of yellow _tufa_ and white gypsum rock, sides as sheer
as a wall, the top a flat plateau but for the crest where perch the Moki
villages. Up the narrow acclivities leading to these mesa crests the
Mokis must bring all provisions, all water, their ponies and donkeys. If
they could live on atmosphere, on views of a painted world at their feet
receding to the very drop over the sky-line, with tones and half-tones
and subtle suggestions of opaline snow peaks swimming in the lilac haze
hundreds of miles away, you would not wonder at their choosing these
eerie eagle nests for their cities; for the coloring below is as
gorgeous and brilliant as in the Grand Canyon. But you see their little
farm patches among the sand billows below, the peach trees almost
uprooted by the violence of the wind, literally and truly, a stone
placed where the corn has been planted to prevent seed and plantlet from
being blown away. Or if the Navajo still raided the Moki, you could
understand them toiling like beasts of burden carrying water up to these
hilltops; but the day of raid and foray is forever past.

It was on our way back over this trail that we learned one good reason
why the dwellers of this land must keep to the high rock crests.
Crossing the high mesa, we had felt the wind begin to blow, when like
Drummond's Habitant Skipper, "it blew and then it blew some more." By
the time we reached the sandy plain below, such a hurricane had broken
as I have seen only once before, and that was off the coast of Labrador,
when for six hours we could not see the sea for the foam. The billows of
sand literally lifted. You could not see the sandy plain for a dust fine
as flour that wiped out every landmark three feet ahead of your horses'
noses. The wheels sank hub deep in sand. Of trail, not a sign was left;
and you heard the same angry roar as in a hurricane at sea. But like the
eternal rocks, dim and serene and high above the turmoil, stood the
First Mesa village of Moki Land. Perhaps after all, these little squat
Pueblo Indians knew what they were doing when they built so high above
the dust storms. Twice the rear wheels lifted for a glorious upset; but
we vee