he herds graze in common. On the
outskirts of the village, men and boys are threshing, that is--they are
chasing ponies round and round inside a kraal, with a flag stuck up to
show which way the wind blows, one man forking chaff with the wind,
another scraping the grain outside the circle.

Glance inside the houses. The upstairs is evidently the living-room; for
the fireplace is here, and the pot is on. Off the living-room are corn
and meal bins, and you can see the _metate_ or stone on which the corn
is ground by the women as in the days of Old Testament record. Though
there is a new Mission church dating from the uprising in the forties,
and an old Mission church dating almost from 1540, you can see from the
roof dozens of _estufas_, where the men are practicing for their dances
and masked theatricals. Tony, the assistant governor, an educated man of
about forty who has traveled with Wild West shows, acts as our guide,
and tells us about the squatters trying to get the Indian land. How
would you like an intruder to sit down in the middle of your farm and
fence off 160 acres? The Indians didn't like it, and cut the fences.
Then the troops were sent out. That was in 1910--a typical "uprising,"
when the white man has both troops and courts on his side. The case has
gone to the courts, and Tony doesn't expect it to be settled very soon.
In fact, Tony likes their own form of government better than the white
man's. All this he tells you in the softest, coolest voice, for Tony is
not only assistant governor: he is constable to keep white men from
bringing in liquor during the festal week. They yearly elect their own
governor. That governor's word is absolutely supreme for his tenure of
office. Is there a dispute over crops, or cattle? The governor's word
settles it without any rigmarole of talk by lawyers.

"Supposing the guilty man doesn't obey the governor?" we ask.

"Then we send our own police, and take him, and put him in the stocks in
the lock-up," and he takes us around and shows us both the stocks and
the lock-up. These stocks clamp down a man's head as well as his hands
and feet. A man with his neck and hands anchored down between his feet
in a black room naturally wouldn't remain disobedient long.

The method of voting is older than the white man's ballot. The Indians
enter the _estufa_. A mark is drawn across the sand. Two men are
nominated. (No--women do not vote; the women rule the house absolutely.
The men r