A word to the linguist.  The dialect spoken by the actors is that of Cochiti for the Queres, that of San Juan for the Tehuas.  In order to avoid the complicated orthography latterly adopted by scientists for Indian dialects, I have written Indian words and phrases as they would be pronounced in continental languages.  The letter [=a] is used to denote the sound of a in “hare.”

To those who have so kindly assisted me,—­in particular to Rev. E. W. Meany of Santa Fe, and to Dr. Norton B. Strong, of the United States Army,—­I herewith tender my heartfelt thanks.

Ad.  F. Bandelier

Santa Fe, new Mexico.

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PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

The aim of our good and lamented friend in writing this book was to place before the public, in novelistic garb, an account of the life and activities of the Pueblo Indians before the coming of white men.  The information on which it is based was the result of his personal observations during many years of study among the sedentary tribes of New Mexico and in Spanish archives pertaining thereto in connection with his researches for the Archaeological Institute of America.  He spent months in continuous study at the Tehua pueblo of San Juan and the Queres pueblo of Cochiti, and the regard in which he was held by the simple folk of those and other native villages was sincerely affectionate.  Bandelier’s labors in his chosen field were commenced at a time when a battle with hardship was a part of the daily routine, and his method of performing the tasks before him was of the kind that produced important results often at the expense of great suffering, which on more than one occasion almost shut out his life.

Because not understood, The Delight Makers was not received at first with enthusiastic favor.  It seemed unlike the great student of technical problems deliberately to write a book the layman might read with interest and profit; but his object once comprehended, the volume was received in the spirit in which the venture was initiated and for a long while search for a copy has often been in vain.

Bandelier has come unto his own.  More than one serious student of the ethno-history of our Southwest has frankly declared that the basis of future investigation of the kind that Bandelier inaugurated will always be the writings of that eminent man.  Had he been permitted to live and labor, nothing would have given him greater satisfaction than the knowledge that the people among whom he spent so many years are of those who fully appreciate the breadth of his learning and who have been instrumental in the creation, by proclamation of the President, of the “Bandelier National Monument,” for the purpose of preserving for future generations some of the archaeological remains he was the first to observe and describe.