"The boy was brave and very beautiful. His tribes-people called him
the Tenas Tyee (Little Chief) and they loved him. Of all his wealth
of fish and furs, of game and hykwa (large shell-money) he gave to
the boys who had none; he hunted food for the old people; he tanned
skins and furs for those whose feet were feeble, whose eyes were
fading, whose blood ran thin with age.

"'Let him go!' cried the tribes-people. 'This unclean monster can
only be overcome by cleanliness, this creature of greed can only
be overthrown by generosity. Let him go!' The chiefs and the
medicine-men listened, then consented. 'Go,' they commanded, 'and
fight this thing with your strongest weapons--cleanliness and
generosity.'

"The Tenas Tyee turned to his mother. 'I shall be gone four days,'
he told her, 'and I shall swim all that time. I have tried all my
life to be generous, but the people say I must be clean also to
fight this unclean thing. While I am gone put fresh furs on my bed
every day, even if I am not here to lie on them; if I know my bed,
my body and my heart are all clean I can overcome this serpent.'

"'Your bed shall have fresh furs every morning,' his mother
said simply.

"The Tenas Tyee then stripped himself, and, with no clothing save a
buckskin belt into which he thrust his hunting-knife, he flung his
lithe young body into the sea. But at the end of four days he did
not return. Sometimes his people could see him swimming far out in
mid-channel, endeavoring to find the exact centre of the serpent,