THE LOST SALMON RUN

small, not the mighty water it is today; but the pink salmon crowded its throat jut as they do now, and the tillicums caught and salted and smoked the fish just as they have done this year, just as they will always do. But it was yet winter, and the rains were slanting and the fogs drifting, when the wife of the Great Tyee stood before him and said:

“ ‘Before the salmon run I shall give to you a great gift. Will you honor me most if it is the gift of a boy-child or a girl-child ?’ The Great Tyee loved the woman. He was stem with his people, hard with his tribe; he ruled his council fires with a will of stone. His medicine men said he had no human heart in his body; his warriors said he had no human blood in his veins.' But he clasped this wo- man’s hands, and his eyes, his lips, his voice, were gentle as her own, as he replied:

“ ‘Give to me a girl-child--a little girl- child—that she may grow to be like you, and, in her turn, give to her husband children.’

“But when the tribes-people heard of his choice they arose in great anger. They sur- rounded him in a deep, indignant circle. ‘You are a slave to the woman,’ they declared, ‘and now you desire to make yourself a slave to a woman-baby. We want an heir—a man-child to be our Great Tyee in years to come. When you are old and weary of tribal affairs, when

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