<h2 id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX<br/> <span class="medium">THE INDIAN AND PHYSICAL LABOR FOR GIRLS AND WOMEN</span></h2>
<p class="drop"><span class="upper">In</span> the preceding chapter I have given the Indian’s life,
habit, thought, towards physical labor for himself
and his sons. He holds the same attitude toward it
for his daughter and his wife. And not only does he
so hold it, but the wife and daughter regard it in
exactly the same way. The out-door life of the Indian
girl and woman makes her healthy, vigorous, muscular,
and strong. She glories in her physical vigor and
strength, and wonders why her white sister is not equal
to her in physical capacity. When I tell her that the
white women pity her because, forsooth, “she has to
do so much hard work, while the lazy men sit by,
smoking, and doing nothing,” she looks at me in
vacant amazement. Once when I was talking in this
way one of them said: “Are your white women all
fools? Tell them we not only don’t need their pity,
but we despise them for their habits of life that lead
them to pity us. The Creator made us with the
capacity and power for work. He knows that all beings
must work if they would be healthy. We would
be healthy, and therefore we do His will in working
at our appointed tasks. We are glad and proud to
do them. And as for the men: let them dare to interfere
in our work and they will soon see what they
will see. We brook no interference or help from
them.”</p>
<div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG id="i_112" src="images/i_112.jpg" alt="" /> <p class="caption">HOPI WOMEN BUILDING A HOUSE AT ORAIBI, ARIZONA.</p> </div>
<p>So their children (girls as well as boys) are all
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">112</span>
brought up from the earliest years to work, and to work
hard. Boys are sent out to herd sheep, horses, and
cattle; to watch the corn and see that nothing disturbs
it. And the girls, as soon as they can toddle, become
“little mothers” to their younger brothers and sisters.
As they grow older they grind all the corn, gather
all the wild grass and other seeds, make all the basketry
and pottery, and prepare all the food for the household.
To grind corn in the Indian fashion, with flat rock
and metate, is no easy task for a strong man of the
white race, yet I have known a girl of fifteen to keep
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">113</span>
at work at the metate for ten hours a day for several
days in succession, in order that there might be plenty
of flour when guests came to the Snake Dance.</p>
<p>On one of my visits to the Hopi village of Oraibi
I found the women at work building a house. This
is their occupation. All labor among Hopis is divided
between the sexes in accordance with long-established
custom, and I think it is so divided in all aboriginal
peoples. The men undertook the protection of the
home (were the warriors) and the hunting of animals
for food. They also make the robes and moccasins.
Those tribes that lost their nomad character and
became sedentary added care of the fields and the
stock to the work of their men. The women practically
undertook all the rest. The building of the
home, its care, the general gathering of seeds, and the
preparation of all foods belong to them.</p>
<p>And as a rule, they do their chosen or appointed or
hereditary work cheerfully. They know nothing of
the aches and pains of their weaker white sisters;
they are as strong as men, so they have no fear of
physical labor. Not only this, but they enjoy it; they
go to it with pleasure, as all healthy bodies do. How
often have I stood and watched a healthy, vigorous
man swing a hammer at the forge, or in a mine or a
trench. How easily it was done, how gladly, how
unconscious of effort! To the healthy woman, with
reasonable strength, labor is also a pleasure. To feel
one’s self accomplishing something, and able to do it
without undue fatigue or exhaustion, what a delight
it is!</p>
<p>The woman who honors us by coming to our house
weekly to do the heavy work, often reminds me of a
panther. She fairly “leaps” upon her work with an
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">114</span>
exuberance of strength and spirit that is a perfect
delight, in this age of woman’s physical disability
and disinclination to do physical labor.</p>
<div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG id="i_114" src="images/i_114.jpg" alt="" /> <p class="caption">NAVAHO MAIDENS CARRYING WATER OVER THE DESERT.</p> </div>
<p>So it is with Indian women. They sing in unison
when a dozen of them get together at the grinding-trough;
though the work is hard enough, when long
continued, to exhaust any strong man. I have seen
women kneel and pound acorns all day, lifting a heavy
pestle as high as their heads at every stroke. In the
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">115</span>
case of these women builders at Oraibi: they carried
all the heavy rocks and put them in position, mixed
their own mortar, and were their own paddies, and
in everything, save the placing of the heavy crossbeams
for the roof, to handle which they called upon
some of the men for aid, they did all the work from
beginning to end.</p>
<div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG id="i_115" src="images/i_115.jpg" alt="" /> <p class="caption">INDIAN MAIDENS TAUGHT BY THEIR MOTHER TO BE BASKET WEAVERS.</p> </div>
<p>Now, while I do not especially want to see white
women building a house, I do wish, with all my
heart, that they had the physical strength to do it
or similar arduous labor. I do long for the whole of
my race that the women and girls shall have such
vigorous health and strength that no ordinary labor
could tire them.</p>
<p>“But,” say my white friends,—women and girls,—“we
don’t want to work physically; there is no need
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">116</span>
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">117</span>
for it; we are not strong enough to do it; we exhaust
ourselves, and then do not have energy enough for the
other duties of life; we engage servants to do our
menial labor for us.”</p>
<div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG id="i_116" src="images/i_116.jpg" alt="" /> <p class="caption">COAHUILA BASKET WEAVER WORKING IN THE OPEN AIR.</p> </div>
<p>Indeed! In the first place I want to protest with
all the power I have against the word and idea “menial.”
There is no menial service. All service, rendered
in willing helpfulness and love, is dignified, noble, and
ennobling. He or she who accepts service from
another with the idea that the service is “menial,”
thereby degrades himself, herself, far more than the
person is “degraded” by the performance of the
service. I would rather have my son a good scavenger,
working daily to keep the city pure and clean, than be
an “honored” lawyer, engaged in dishonest cases;
a “successful” politician, tangled up with graft; a
“popular” physician, selfishly deceiving his patients;
or an “eloquent” and “dear” minister, self-righteously
lauding himself and pouring forth inane platitudes
in high-sounding phrases from the pulpit. “Menial
service” is divine compared with these occupations
when they are demoralized.</p>
<p>And the principle of all I have said applies to girls
as well as boys. I would rather that daughters of mine
should be able to scrub the floor, bake bread, do the
family washing and mending, repair the boys’ clothes,
knit, sew, and take care of the kitchen garden and the
flowers, than strum “The Battle of Prague” or “The
Maiden’s Prayer,” without feeling or expression, on
a half-tuned piano. The former occupations are
holy and dignified as compared with the sham exhibition
of the latter. I like to see a girl with an apron
on, strong, healthy, willing, useful, capable, engaged
in useful household work, and if our young men had
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">118</span>
one-tenth part of the sense they ought to have, they
would hunt for such girls to become their wives and the
mothers of their children, rather than for the dainty,
white-faced, wasp-waisted, finger-manicured dolls who
are useful for no other purpose than to be looked at.</p>
<p>I have no desire to make pack-horses or slaves of
intelligent women or girls, but I cannot help asking
the question of them: “Which would you rather be,
strong enough to do any and all so-called menial and
laborious service, and endowed with perfect health,
or be weakly and puny and live the life of ease and
luxury that most women and girls seem to covet?”
And upon the answer to that question should I base
my judgment as to the wisdom, intelligence, and fitness
for the duties of life of the answerer. There is no
dignity in woman superior to the dignity of being able
personally (if necessary) to care for all the physical
needs of her household; there is no charm greater
than the charm of strength combined with gracious,
womanly sweetness exercised for the joy of others;
there is no refinement greater than the refinement of
a gloriously healthy woman radiating physical, mental,
spiritual life upon all those who come within the
sphere of her influence.
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">119</span></p>
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