Tyee? We can turn you into a fish, or a tree, or a stone for this;
do you dare disobey the Great Tyee?"

"I dare anything for the cleanliness and purity of my coming child.
I dare even the Sagalie Tyee Himself, but my child must be born to a
spotless life."

The four men were astounded. They consulted together, lighted their
pipes, and sat in council. Never had they, the men of the Sagalie
Tyee, been defied before. Now, for the sake of a little unborn
child, they were ignored, disobeyed, almost despised. The lithe
young copper-colored body still disported itself in the cool
waters; superstition held that should their canoe, or even their
paddle-blades, touch a human being, their marvellous power would be
lost. The handsome young chief swam directly in their course. They
dared not run him down; if so, they would become as other men.
While they yet counselled what to do, there floated from out the
forest a faint, strange, compelling sound. They listened, and
the young chief ceased his stroke as he listened also. The faint
sound drifted out across the waters once more. It was the cry of
a little, little child. Then one of the four men, he that steered
the canoe, the strongest and tallest of them all, arose, and,
standing erect, stretched out his arms towards the rising sun
and chanted, not a curse on the young chief's disobedience, but
a promise of everlasting days and freedom from death.

"Because you have defied all things that come in your path we
promise this to you," he chanted; "you have defied what interferes
with your child's chance for a clean life, you have lived as you
wish your son to live, you have defied us when we would have stopped