the raft as it passes into the
current, and, with many a turn and pitch, whirls on faster and faster.
The death-song rises triumphant above the lash of the waves and that
distant but awful booming that is to be heard in the canon. Every red man
has his face turned toward the foe with a look of defiance, and the tones
of the death-chant have in them something of mockery no less than hate
and vaunting.

The raft is now between the jaws of rock that yawn so hungrily. Beyond
and below are vast walls, shelving toward the floor of the gulf a
thousand feet beneath--their brilliant colors shining in the sun of
morning that sheds as peaceful a light on wood and hill as if there were
no such thing as brother hunting brother in this free land of ours. The
raft is galloping through the foam like a racehorse, and, hardened as the
soldiers are, they cannot repress a shudder as they see the fate that the
savages have chosen for themselves. Now the brink is reached. The raft
tips toward the gulf, and with a cry of triumph the red men are launched
over the cataract, into the bellowing chasm, where the mists weep forever
on the rocks and mosses.

THE BROAD HOUSE

Down in the canon of Chaco, New Mexico, stands a building evidently
coeval with those of the cliff dwellers, that is still in good
preservation and is called the Broad House. When Noqoilpi, the gambling
god, came on earth he strayed into this canon, and, finding the Moquis a
prosperous people, he envied them and resolved to win their property. To
do that he laid off a race-track at the bottom of the ravine and
challenged them to meet him there in games of chance and strength and
skill. They accepted his challenge, and, as he could turn luck to his own
side, he soon won not their property alone, but their women and children,
and, finally, some of the men themselves.

In his greed he had acquired more than he wanted, and as the captives
were a burden to him he offered to make a partial restoration if the
people would build this house for him. They did so and he gave up some of
the men and women. The other gods looked with disapproval on this
performance, however, and they agreed to give the wind god power to
defeat him, for, now that he had secured his house, he had gone to
gambling again. The wind god, in disguise as a Moqui, issued a challenge,
and the animals agreed to help him.

When the contest in tree-pulling took place the wind god pulled up a
large tree while