Page:Tlingit Myths and Texts.djvu/115

killing many people. Finally they set out to see it, anchored off the mouth of the bay, and killed it with spears and arrows. They took the skin from its head. Then they went throughout Alaska, killing off the monsters of the sea and land that had troubled people and making others less harmful. The natives say, if it had not been for those boys, they would be there yet. They made some of these monsters promise that they would not kill people. The wolves, which were very destructive in those days, became less harmful through them. Although people in Alaska are afraid of wolves, you have not heard of anyone being killed by them.

There was one person called Teak! i s! resembling an eagle, who flew around and was very powerful. He would say to the bears and other game animals, " You are going to be killed." Because he kept warning the animals, human beings were starving, so the brothers came to him and made him promise not to injure people or forewarn the other animals.

Afterward the brothers left their mother at that place and went up to Laxayi k, where they had heard of a bad person called One-legged- man (Le-laqlociO- His proper name, however, is Man-that-dries-fish- for-the-eagle (Teak !-q!e di-At-q!An-qa), and he is very fond of spear ing salmon. First the boys came to the prints of his one foot going up beside the river, and after a while they saw him coming down toward them spearing salmon. His shirt was the skin of a brown bear and had strength as well as he.

Afterward Lq! aya/k! caught a salmon, took all of the meat out, and got into its skin. Next day, at the time when they knew One-legged- man Was about to come up, Lq! aya/k! put it on again and laid himself in a salmon hole in the creek. The big man, who was just coming along, saw a fine salmon go into the hole and said, " What a fine look ing salmon." He thought that he could not get it, but, after he had stood watching it for a while, it swam up toward him, and he speared it. Just as he was dragging it ashore, however, Lq! aya/k! cut the cord to his spear point with a knife he had taken along and swam back into the water hole. Then the big man looked at his spear and said to himself, "My fine spear is gone;" but after he had observed closer he said, "This is not broken. It is cut. I suppose it is Lq!aya/k! s doing." After that he went on up the stream while the brothers cooked salmon for their meal.

By a by they saw One-legged-man coming down again carrying a feather tied on the end of a long stick. He would point this feather at different trees and then smell of it. Finally he pointed it at the tree in which Lq! aya/k! and his brothers were then sitting and said, "Lq! aya/k! is in that tree." Then he spoke out saying, "Give me my spear." Lq! aya/k! kept saying to his brothers, "Shall I go out and fight him?" But they answered, "No, no, don't go yet." He