"We are standing, Alex Atcitty and I, on the slope under the great rampart of red rock which runs like a Chinese Wall along the south end of Navajo country. To the east, Mount Taylor rises snowcapped and serene above the blunt shape of Little Haystack Mountain. To the left, eroded sanstone, broken slate, and a half dead piñon whose branches collect tumbleweeds from the gusty wind. It is November of a year of a year of almost unbroken drought. The air smells of autumn, pine resin, dust, and empty places. (...)
what a chapter... ('The very heart of our country' in The Great Taos Bank Robbery and other Indian country affairs) and this is how it ends:
"In the Nightway ceremonial, the singer chants:
In the house made of dawn,
In the house made of sunset light
In the house made of raincloud
With beauty before me, I walk
With beauty behind me, I walk
With beauty all around me, I walk.
If the landmarks of Dinetah have helped form the Navajo religion, it seems equally certain that its beauty has helped form the Navajo character."
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