sagebrush takes on a tinge of green, and even the prickly and repulsive
greasewood clothes itself with a multitude of golden blossoms. Cacti
of various kinds vie with one another in producing the most brilliant
flowers, odorless but gorgeous. But in a few weeks all this brightness
fades and the country resumes the colorless monotonous aspect which
characterizes it.

July and August and sometimes part of September comprise the rainy
season. This period is marked by sudden heavy showers of short duration,
and the sandy soil absorbs sufficient moisture to nourish the grass and
herbage for a time; but most of the water finds its way directly into
deep-cut channels and thence in heavy torrents to the deep canyons of
the San Juan and the Colorado, where it is lost. A small portion of the
rainfall and much of the snow water percolates the soil and the porous
sandstones which compose the region, and issues in small springs along
the edges of the mesas and in the little canyons; but these last only
a few months, and they fail in the time of greatest need--in the hot
summer days when the grass is dry and brittle and the whole country is
parched.

The direct dependence of the savage on nature as he finds it is
nowhere better illustrated than on the Navaho reservation. In the three
essentials of land, water, and vegetation, his country is not an ideal
one. The hard conditions under which he lives have acted directly on his
arts and industries, on his habits and customs, and also on his mind and
his mythology. In one respect only has he an advantage: he is blessed
with a climate which acts in a measure as an offset to the other
conditions and enables him to lead a life which is on the whole not
onerous.