The bear is visibly weakening. His eyes grow dim, his rushes and blows have less steel and lightning in them. The man begins to taunt him, "Oh, you big-chief hootz--I thought you brave man--strong man. You no brave--no strong. You just like baby. Why you no stand up, fight like man?" At last the bear, sick and faint with loss of blood, but game to the end, stands with paws outstretched, swaying like a drunken man. The man comes close, and, bending back to gain force for his blow, thrusts upward and forward with all his strength, striking just under the bear's breast bone and buries the spear-head, splitting the heart in two. Over on his back topples the great beast, his paws feebly twitching, his last breath bringing with it a great rush of blood. The man, as soon as he can recover breath, puts his foot on the bear's neck, singing in quaint minor strain a brief song of triumph. Then he hastens to prop the bear's mouth open with a stick, to let his spirit go forth in peace, and he also places between the dying jaws a piece of dried salmon, that the bear may not lack food when he goes to join the _hoots-kwany_--the bear-people, in that spirit land of forests and mountains to which all brown bears, good and bad, must go. Sam Tahtain was a little man, in striking contrast with his giant brother, Snook, but he entered into his recital with infinite energy, dancing about the floor, striking and thrusting, acting the bear's part and then the man's, shouting and growling out his words; and when he had finished, his own face was bathed in perspiration. His acting was an artless piece of art, very perfect in its way; and it certainly thrilled the Indians who had drawn around in an eager circle as the recitation proceeded, their fervent indrawn exclamations of wonder and admiration supplying the most genuine applause. But I must confess that the antics of the little man, and his evident pride in his own performance, struck me as irresistibly funny; and I could not help recalling a verse I had learned when a boy: "Little man with the wild, wild eye, Man with the long, long hair, Why do you dance about the floor? Why do you beat the air? Why do you howl and mutter so? Why do you shake your fist?" Said the little man, in a deep, deep voice, "I'm an el-o-cu-tion-ist!" But the Indians saw nothing funny in Sam's oratory--it thrilled them through and through. Even old Snook, the hero of the story, ceased his carving, fixing his eyes intently on the speaker, and rewarding him with a fervent "_Kluh-yukeh!_" To exactly translate that exclamation will require a paraphrase--"My, but that was good!" But Tilly thought only of the glory of her granduncle. Her eyes shone with pride, and she whispered to me, "Isn't my gran'fader, Snook, just the bravest man you ever heard of? Why, he isn't afraid of anything."