Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 2.djvu/309

Rh big man, good fighter;' and Coyote he say, 'Yes, and when I get hurt I don't complain,' and keep on cutting at artery. Four knives break, and Coyote have just one left, but heart nearly drop (from its place), and monster nearly dead—sway from side to side.

"Well, when just little bit more to cut, Coyote says, 'Push all bones of our people to openings of monster's body, and when comes last stroke I push all out, and then they come to life again.' So when comes last stroke, and heart fall, Coyote push, and all bones and all animals rush out, except muskrat. Muskrat little slow, and tail gets caught in monster's mouth, but muskrat pull pretty hard and tail comes out slow, but all hairs are stripped off, and thus has been muskrat's tail ever since.

"When animals all get outside, and bones Coyote push out came to life, all begin to wander off, because nice day, and they feel good to be outside. But Coyote calls to them, 'Come back all together for last wonder. For now, my friends, from present time through all the years to come, there shall be a new race of people on this earth—called Human Beings; so I cut up this dead Iltswowich, and from head I make the Flatheads; from feet, the Blackfeet; from other parts I make the other tribes of men.' So he cut up the monster into pieces, and cast the pieces to the north and east and south and west, and from the pieces came all the tribes on the earth. But after this was done, Kots-kots, the fox, the partner of the Coyote, looks over the valley of the Clearwater, and saw that all parts of the earth had men but this. Then he speak up and say, 'See, here is all this beautiful Clearwater Valley and you have made no people to inhabit it.' Coyote look around and see monster all gone; then he sees his hands all blood from dividing up the monster (and from its heart), and he say, 'Bring me some water.' They bring water and Coyote wash hand, and as he wash