f some half-dozen
forest giants that arch overhead with such superb loftiness. But in
all the world there is no cathedral whose marble or onyx columns can
vie with those straight, clean, brown tree-boles that teem with the sap
and blood of life. There is no fresco that can rival the delicacy of
lace-work they have festooned between you and the far skies. No tiles,
no mosaic or inlaid marbles, are as fascinating as the bare, russet,
fragrant floor outspreading about their feet. They are the acme of
Nature's architecture, and in building them she has outrivalled all her
erstwhile conceptions. She will never originate a more faultless
design, never erect a more perfect edifice. But the divinely moulded
trees and the man-made cathedral have one exquisite characteristic in
common. It is the atmosphere of holiness. Most of us have better
impulses after viewing a stately cathedral, and none of us can stand
amid that majestic forest group without experiencing some elevating
thoughts, some refinement of our coarser nature. Perhaps those who
read this little legend will never again look at those cathedral trees
without thinking of the glorious souls they contain, for according to
the Coast Indians they do harbor human souls, and the world is better
because they once had the speech and the hearts of mighty men.

My tillicum did not use the word "lure" in telling me this legend.
There is no equivalent for the word in the Chinook tongue, but the
gestures of his voiceful hands so expressed the quality of something
between magnetism and charm that I have selected this word "lure" as
best fitting what he wished to convey. Some few yards beyond the
cathedral trees, an overgrown disused trail turns into the dense
wilderness to the right. Only Indian eyes could discern that trail,
and the Indians do not willingly go to that part of the park to the
right of the great group. Nothing in this, nor yet the next world
would tempt a Coast Indian into the compact centres of the wild
portions of the park, for therein, concealed cunningly, is the "lure"
they all believe in. There is not a tribe in the entire district that
does not know of this strange legend. You will hear the tale from
those that gather at Eagle Harbor for the fishing, from the Fraser
River tribes, from the Squamish at the Narrows, from the Mission, from
up the Inlet, even from the tribes at North Bend, but no one will
volunteer to be your guide, for having once come