tribes, and we shall starve.'

"'Your hearts are black and bloodless,' thundered the Great Tyee,
turning upon them fiercely, 'and your eyes are blinded. Do you wish
the tribe to forget how great is the importance of a child that
will some day be a mother herself, and give to your children and
grandchildren a Great Tyee? Are the people to live, to thrive,
to increase, to become more powerful with no mother-women to bear
future sons and daughters? Your minds are dead, your brains are
chilled. Still, even in your ignorance, you are my people: you
and your wishes must be considered. I call together the great
medicine-men, the men of witchcraft, the men of magic. They shall
decide the laws which will follow the bearing of either boy or
girl-child. What say you, oh! mighty men?'

"Messengers were then sent up and down the coast, sent far up the
Fraser River, and to the valley lands inland for many leagues,
gathering as they journeyed all the men of magic that could be
found. Never were so many medicine-men in council before. They
built fires and danced and chanted for many days. They spoke with
the gods of the mountains, with the gods of the sea; then 'the
power' of decision came to them. They were inspired with a choice
to lay before the tribes-people, and the most ancient medicine-man
in all the coast region arose and spoke their resolution:

"'The people of the tribe cannot be allowed to have all things.
They want a boy-child and they want a great salmon-run also. They
cannot have both. The Sagalie Tyee has revealed to us, the great
men of magic, that both these things will make the people arrogant
and selfish. They must choose between the two.'