The hero is apt to come into conflict with his brother, or one of his brothers, and the long and desperate struggle resulting, which often involved the universe in repeated destructions, constitutes one of the leading topics of the myth-makers.

The duel is not generally--not at all, I believe, when we can get at the genuine native form of the myth--between a morally good and an evil spirit, though, undoubtedly, the one is more friendly and favorable to the welfare of man than the other.
The better of the two, the true hero-god, is in the end triumphant, though the national temperament represented this variously.

At any rate, his people are not deserted by him, and though absent, and perhaps for a while driven away by his potent adversary, he is sure to come back some time or other.
The place of his birth is nearly always located in the East; from that quarter he first came when he appeared as a man among men; toward that point he returned when he disappeared; and there he still lives, awaiting the appointed time for his reappearance.
Whenever the personal appearance of this hero-god is described, it is, strangely enough, represented to be that of one of the white race, a man of fair complexion, with long, flowing beard, with abundant hair, and clothed in ample and loose robes.

This extraordinary fact naturally suggests the gravest suspicion that these stories were made up after the whites had reached the American shores, and nearly all historians have summarily rejected their authenticity, on this account.

But a most careful scrutiny of their sources positively refutes this opinion.