They are diligent, eager to learn, and very religious, docile, and easily converted to Christianity.
There is a story about a padre who asked a Tarahumare boy, "What is God doing in Heaven ?" The boy said, "The same as the macaw does in the tree." The padre asked, "What does the macaw do in the tree ?" and the boy replied, "He eats the good seeds and lets the bad ones drop." A Mexican asked me if God was going to walk on earth again, and my Tarahumare attendant remarked, "No, he is now afraid to come, because people have too many rifles." When they learn something their ambition runs high, and the boys always want to become generals and presidents of the republic.
The Tarahumares are careful observers of the celestial bodies, and know the Pleiades, the Belt of Orion, and the Morning and the Evening Star.

The Great Dipper is of no special interest to them.

Near Guachochic the Tarahumares plant corn in accordance with the positions of the stars with reference to the sun.

They say if the sun and the stars are not equal the year will be bad; but when the stars last long the year will be good.

In 1891, the sun "travelled slowly," and the stars "travelled quickly," and in June they had already "disappeared." Therefore the Tarahumares predicted that their crops would be below the average, which came true.