Part 6

It might have been possible for Laughing Boy to slide down the opposite side of the boulder and steal away unnoticed. Who can say? It may have been a fear of the long journey back to the cave people alone that deterred him. Anyway, he clung to the rock and waited. A long drink from his water bag relieved his thirst and he, too, fell asleep. But there was no drinking for poor Web Toe. He had only his marvelous tom-tom in place of a water bag, and his lips grew parched and he longed to scream from fear and thirst.

After a long time darkness came and at last the moon arose, and still the two boys neither moved nor spoke. The cubs awoke and stretched themselves and moved about, and at last the black bear arose also and led them away to some hidden spring known only to herself.

Then, very cautiously, Web Toe slid to the ground and called to Laughing Boy, who joined him, and together, with great fear in their hearts, they turned their faces homeward.

And all that fearful, weary way Web Toe thought of new dangers and of cool springs and Laughing Boy’s emptied water bag. Never again would he go honey-hunting or any other sort of hunting in the dry season without water at his side. And when at last they reached the dwelling place of the tribe Web Toe ran to the spring and threw himself into the water and drank until he was near water-logged.

And so Web Toe became the great waterman of the tribe—another great waterman, who spoke always words of warning of the terrible things that may befall boys and girls and men and women, who journey far from the spring without a bag of water.

Stories he told the people of the tribe on his return with Laughing Boy of how, sick of thirst, he had faced the black bear and driven her before him. But he had nothing to prove his words, for Laughing Boy returned also empty-handed.

It was adventures like this that taught the Cave People and all the other tribes to travel close to the water’s edge. And so it was that when the Foolish One made the first clay pot, the people praised him and called him Wise.

The clay pot was the accident of a fool. Many great discoveries have been the accidents of other fools. For wise people do always everything as nearly as possible as their fathers have done and new things are only learned through departures into new ways.

The Foolish One had discovered the use of fire by playing with a burning branch ignited by the lightning in the forest. A fool bestrode the first wild horse and rode upon its back. Nearly always it was the fools who did things first. Wise Men were too wise—they had seen too many fools die of their folly.

The fingers of the Foolish One were never idle. He made many things and he pulled as many to pieces again. The people of the tribe had grown very skillful in weaving baskets from tough grasses. They even made hats to keep out the sun and later they wove willows into rude roofs, which they patched with clay from the river banks to keep out the rain.

The baskets which they made were almost water-tight and the Foolish One made many baskets. Each time he worked harder and wove these baskets more tightly, but they all leaked when he filled them with water from the spring.

One day he made a basket shaped like a bowl and lined it with clay; then he wove the grasses upward like the neck of a large bottle, dipping his fingers inside to plaster it with more clay, for he wanted to surprise the folk with a basket that would carry water without leaking. But when all was done he forgot his plans and went swimming in a pool, and when next he saw the basket he tossed it into the fire, so sure was he that it would leak as all baskets leaked.

And there, in the red flames, beheld by all the members of the tribe, lay the marvelous basket with its clay lining. And soon the grasses of the basket burned away and when the fire died down the Foolish One saw the clay lining lying among the coals. It was round and firm and almost perfect in shape. He peered into it and running to the river, filled it with water. And, marvel of marvels! the clay had grown hard in the fire and the first jug the tribe had ever made or seen or dreamed of, held water, from which there leaked not one single drop.

For a long time the Cave People made their jugs by lining baskets with clay and burning off the grasses, leaving the jugs unmarred, till they learned newer and better ways of making pottery.

X _The_ ARROW THROWERS

For many years the Bow and Arrow Folks had been the most ferocious as well as the most skillful of all the tribes that dwelt in the heart of the luxuriant lands along the banks of the Father of Rivers. Every other tribe had long since learned to hate and fear them beyond any other living creatures.

The Bow and Arrow Folks might wander whithersoever they wished, might drive the Hairy Folk and the Tree Dwellers and the Cave People from the places that had known them, might bring death and destruction in their train, provided only that they traveled and fought in numbers and bore wide quivers filled with very many of their magical stinging darts.

Up to the appearance of the Dart or Arrow Throwers, with their marvelous weapons, the Cave People had always been able to meet their human foes on terms nearly approaching equality. The Hairy People and the Tree Dwellers, and even the man-eaters, had all to come to close quarters in their life and death contests. Then there was much to the advantage of the Cave People, who were of heavier build and who possessed greater strength and speed of limb than any of their man enemies. None of these was able to shoot a dart across the river into the breast of an enemy.

But the Arrow People were more fearful than the great saber-tooth himself. One could dig pits, covered with branches of leaves in the hope that they might stumble into these and hence be dispatched to the long sleep; it was quite as likely as not that the Arrow People would not approach near enough to fall into them.

When the Arrow People came whooping over the hills sending down their rain of arrows into the flesh of the Cave People, Strong Arm had gathered his small band about the big fire where they had crouched low. But even the protecting blaze could not prevail against the invaders. Their darts flew through the smoke and the flame and pinned more than one of the Cave People to the earth.

And when Strong Arm was wounded so that blood dripped red from a hole in his breast the Cave People flung themselves into the brush and made their way on their bellies as silent as snakes, far out beyond the old hollow. With much caution they gathered together about some grey stone boulders that banked the wild berry thicket.

Then it was that some one silently gathered twigs and leaves and dead branches for the making of a fire. And a youth struck a spark from his flint stones and by the light of the flames the Cave People saw and were astonished that it was One Ear who had come back to his own people.

No one of the older members of the tribe had forgotten One Ear nor how he had lost one of his ears when he was only a small boy not many moons from his mother’s breast. It was this way:

One Ear had wandered from the caves and beyond the space where it was safe for the children of the tribe to go alone. No one marked his ramblings and he chattered and scampered about, plucking the red blossoms of the eegari and chasing birds from their nests in happy content. But he had not gone far when he heard the grunt of the wild and hairy hog which was thrusting her short tusk into the soil for tender roots. A litter of small black pigs followed close to their mother’s side and set up a mighty squealing when they beheld in One Ear a possible enemy.

Immediately the old sow turned upon One Ear and bit at his feet and snapped at his legs and tripped him. Then she flew upon him with the wild fury of the forest mother who believes her young to be endangered. One Ear raised his own voice in yells of terror and threw up his arms and rolled into the bushes and sent his small brown feet kicking with mighty show into the face of the foe.

And the uproar increased while the blood poured from the side of the boy’s head whence the wild sow had torn his small ear in her attack. Soon the mother of One Ear and other members of the tribe of Cave People appeared with their long bone weapons in their hands and killed the hog and carried back as many of the young pigs as had not scampered away in the conflict. And there was much feasting in the Hollow that day and a great noise from the wails of One Ear, whose wounds were many times licked and plastered and caressed by his distracted mother.

And so the boy came to be called One Ear. It was impossible to forget one so distinctly different from other members of the tribe of Cave People and so, when One Ear was later captured by the Arrow Folk during a raid made on the people of the Hollow, One Ear was long mourned and thought of by the tribe.

Now he was come back to his own people. And in the light made by the flames of the fire, the Cave People saw that he bore many of the strange darts that the enemy had used with so much skill and accuracy. The Cave People were almost afraid of him, but One Ear at once showed himself friendly and busied himself in helping to build coverings of sticks and brush and leaves to form huts for the tribe.

The night was very dark and the Cave People were worn and weary and very much afraid. They knew very little about the life and the woods and the things that surrounded them. When a man stumbled over a loose stone and slipped and fell, the Cave People believed that some of the tribe’s numerous enemies had wrought the evil.

Little they understood of the causes of the natural events that occurred around and to them. And so they peopled the woods, the Hollow, the night and all things with spirits or evil ghosts that sought to do them harm.

There were terrors everywhere, both the enemies which they could see and the enemies which they could not see. The enemies who dwelt in in the dead tree trunks that lay upon the ground over which they stumbled, the spirits who were hidden in the stones that scratched their feet, the evil magicworkers who entered their stomachs and made them sick and haunted the feet of the unwary to cause them to faint before the blows of the Arrow People and who sent men and women upon the Long Sleep from which their spirits arose to prowl about over the lands.

Primitive men knew nothing about natural laws. They had no ideas about what caused the rain; therefore, they thought someone made it rain. They knew nothing about the melting of snows upon the mountain tops that flowed downward, swelling the Father of Rivers far beyond “his” banks and thus causing the floods; therefore, some evil enemy wrought the disaster.

They knew truly that men and women did not altogether die. All men possessed two selves—the self with whom you might fight and dance, whom you might touch and see and smell in the light of broad day. Then there was also a spirit self, who came to you in dreams and who worked evil or good unto you.

When a child was lost in the wood and devoured by the wild enemies of the tribe, the people knew that it was an evil spirit that had lured his footsteps into the danger.

It is true, too, that they believed in good spirits; the spirits who sent rain when the earth was parched; the kindly magic-makers who delivered an attacking enemy into your hand to his own disaster, who stood beside you unseen during great dangers and thrust forth obstructions in the paths of those who would take you unawares.

But considered in a broad way, from the viewpoint of primitive man, the world was peopled chiefly with enemies who were down upon you at the slightest opening, who might anywhere and in the strangest form imaginable pounce upon you to your own destruction or disaster.

It cheered the Cave People greatly when they saw that One Ear had returned to the tribe bringing some of the magical arrows, so effectively employed by the Dart Throwers. They believed that the bone javelin of Strong Arm possessed some of the strength and skill of this mighty cave man; they knew that the dried head of the green snake which had been killed by Big Foot and a great boulder were filled with his valor and his wisdom, for they had seen Run Fast elude the wild boar with this snake head in her hands. If any one thing was sure in all the muddle of strange things and stranger events in this world, it was that weapons or adornments or tools, acquired the characteristics of their owners, and that these characteristics might be transferred to him who was fortunate enough to secure them. The darts or the arrows of the Dart Throwers brought skill to the holders and so the Cave People were cheered when they beheld the darts in the hands of One Ear.

All through the night, as they huddled and shivered in the shadows, the Cave People kept the big fire burning and listened for the Arrow People. It was when the moon rode high in the heavens that the soft wind brought the scent of the enemy approaching with quiet and with caution. With quivering nostrils Strong Arm, who, in spite of the pain he suffered from his wounds, was the first to smell the coming Arrow Throwers, gathered the tribe behind the protection of the giant rocks.

And when they advanced within the circle of light thrown out by the flames of the fire, One Ear drew his great bow to his shoulder and sent arrow after arrow into the gleaming breasts of those who made the attack, until the Arrow people were confounded and afraid and fled away in the night whence they had come.

And for days there was peace and the Cave People encamped themselves near a fresh water hole and built more mud caves and huts of the branches of trees. But evil spirits hovered over Strong Arm and entered into him and gave him fever and sickness and pain from the wound in his breast, until at last he died in the night and his Spirit passed out of his body. So thought the Cave Dwellers.

And they mourned for Strong Arm, both in their hearts and with loud voices, for they knew that his spirit would hover about to see what they said of his words and his deeds and they desired very strongly to please and propitiate the Spirit of Strong Arm, for he had always been a powerful and wise man, able to help those he loved and bring evil to those whom he had hated. And they wanted to win the support and friendship of the Spirit of Strong Arm in order that it might work good in their behalf.

So even Big Foot, who had always feared and envied Strong Arm, spoke loudly in his behalf, saying “Brave, Brave, Strong, Strong,” and he screamed as though he had lost his best friend. This was all done to show the Spirit of Strong Arm in what high esteem Big Foot held him.

The Cave People chopped up the body of Strong Arm and roasted his arms and his legs and his head on the coals so that every member of the tribe might acquire some of the noble virtues of the mighty chief by eating a portion of his body. To Laughing Boy was apportioned the hands of his father, and he ate them, stripping the flesh from the bones so that his own hands might become skillful and quick in killing the enemy. The remainder of the body of Strong Arm was laid in a cavity in the earth, along with his sharp bone javelin, and his stone knife and his flint; and food also, which they knew he would need in the Spirit Land where he had gone. These things they covered with earth and leaves and weighed them down with heavy stones so that neither wild boar, nor any other wild animal might devour the remains of Strong Arm.

And in the night the Spirit of Strong Arm came back to his people in their dreams, telling them many things. Once he appeared in a dream to Quack Quack, with his bone javelin in his hands, and the cry of danger upon his lips and a long arrow thrust in his hair. And Quack Quack and the Cave People knew that this was a warning to them that the Arrow Throwers were again stealing upon them to drive them from their new land, so they gathered up their bone weapons, and the bow and arrows which One Ear had brought, and their knives and their adornments, and wandered toward the North in the hope of escaping.

But the Hairy Folk fell upon them, and the Man-eaters and the Tree People nagged them and stole their food and wrecked disaster at every step, so that there was no peace, only constant fighting and death and terror in all the days.

So the Cave People traveled wearily and furtively, ever farther North, where the fruit grows only in one season and the cold descends over the earth for a long period of the year, and where men are only able to survive by learning new things and new methods of keeping food against the barren days.

Then, more than in all the previous history of their lives, the Cave People began to progress, began to plan, to build, to preserve and store food and finally to bury one tuber in order that it might become the father of many potatoes; to salt their meats so that they would not spoil and finally they discovered that skins used formerly only as a means of adornment, or decoration—skins which had formerly been merely visible proof of a man’s skill and valor in the hunt, were a warm and comfortable protection against the cold days which had come upon them in the strange new land.

Many died and many fell in the long wars that the Cave People fought during their long journey to the North country, but One Ear grew strong and wise and tall in his young manhood. And, because of the things he had learned from the Arrow Throwers, he became a leader of the tribe, which he taught also to hurl the death-tipped darts, both to bring down the beasts of the forests and for the protection of the tribe in battle with its human enemies.

And so the cool climate and the changing seasons drove the Cave People to learn, to discover, to invent. And for the first time they began to consider the earth and to subdue a little of it for their own food and clothing and for their own shelter and security.

XI THE FIRST PRIEST

Although Strong Arm, who was the wisest and strongest and swiftest man among the Cave People had been dead, and in part eaten and in part buried beneath a great pile of earth and stones, the Cave People felt sure that he had not remained dead.

More than one of the members of the tribe had seen him fighting and hunting, eating and dancing, during the dreams that come in the night, and so they believed that a part of Strong Arm, the spirit or ghost part of Strong Arm, still lived. Again and again he had appeared to them in the spirit, or in dreams, to advise them about the things the tribe intended to do.

The Cave People were unable to understand these things and there was nobody to tell them that dreams were not of the world of reality. And so they believed that Strong Arm still lived, and that other dead men and women and children of the tribe still lived in the Spirit World. It was true that the spirits of these dead did not appear in the broad light of day, but the Cave People believed that they haunted their old grounds, invisible to the eyes of their tribesman.

They believed that the spirits of the dead may return to befriend the members of the tribe, or to hinder their enemies, provided, always, that the members of the tribe enlisted their aid and their affections.

Now Big Foot, since there was no longer the wise voice of Strong Arm, nor the mighty strength of the old chief to enforce the good of his people, set himself to become the leader of the Cave People. He slashed his hairy thighs with his flint knife to prove how brave he was, allowing the gashes to become sores in order to prolong the evidence of his courage. He strutted about and waved his poison-tipped arrows when the young men refused to listen to his words. Also he rubbed the noses of all the women of the tribe and sought to caress them, attempting to drive the men of the tribe from the new nests, or caves or huts, which they had built in the far North country so many moon journeys from the old hollow where little Laughing Boy was born.

Big Foot boasted with a loud voice and bullied the children and spoke soft words to the women, while he glared at the young men and urged them into the forest to hunt for food. Always he kept his poisoned darts at his side and he managed to secure for himself the tenderest portion of the young goats which the people had discovered leaping and running wild amid the sharp slopes and crags of the mountains.

So the tribe grew weary of his sorry ruling and there was much fighting and discord, which laid them open to the attacks of their many enemies.

Without doubt Big Foot was possessed of much cunning, for while other men of the tribe were as strong of limb and as fleet of foot, Big Foot was more powerful than they. Longer was his arm because he had learned first how to make and to wield his great bow and arrows almost as well as young One Ear, who had escaped from the Arrow Throwers and returned to his own people, the Cave Dwellers, bringing knowledge of the weapons of these strange enemies.

The Cave Dwellers had paused in their journeyings and battlings northward, on the banks of the lake that shone like white fire When the sun beat down upon its rolling surface. The way was new to them and unknown dangers threatened everywhere and they had utmost need to walk warily, lest a new tribe descend upon them with some new weapon of destruction and turn them back into the dangers they had outstripped.

Instead of holding the people together with wise words and instead of preparing to search out the lands to prepare for the strange evils that lie in wait for primitive man whenever he travels beyond the ways of his experience, Big Foot caused nothing but conflict. It was only his superior skill in the use of the flint-tipped arrows, which the Cave People were acquiring very rapidly, that prevented him from being slain by the members of the tribe.

Then it was that One Ear dreamed a dream. He thought that his spirit had journeyed far into the spirit world where it encountered the spirit of Strong Arm. And Strong Arm had spoken with One Ear, sending words of wisdom to the people of the tribe. He had called Big Foot the enemy of the Cave People. And when he wakened in the morning, One Ear remembered his dream. So he gathered all the people together and told them these things. And no man or woman among them knew that he spoke only of a dream. They believed that the spirit of Strong Arm still lived and that the things in One Ear’s dream had actually occurred.

So the Cave People chattered together and gesticulated and stole the fresh meat Big Foot had hidden in his cave and menaced him from cover by shaking their clubs and growling like angry dogs. Big Foot fled to his branch hut, where he glared at the members of the tribe and waved his long arrows.

The Cave People had long respected the words of Strong Arm and when they heard what he had spoken to One Ear in a dream, they hated Big Foot more fiercely than ever.

At last Big Foot returned to the people of the tribe, many of whom were sitting about a wood fire, and he spoke to them, trying to gain their good will and attempting to show them that none was so swift, so strong or so brave as he. But the people screamed “Strong Arm! Strong Arm!” to remind Big Foot that the old chief had spoken against him.

And Big Foot grew frantic with the rage that came upon him. He seized the club of Strong Arm which had been given to Laughing Boy in order that he might derive from it some of the virtue of bravery which his father, Strong Arm, had possessed. Big Foot spat upon it and crushed it beneath a great stone; then he hurled the shattered fragments far out into the green waters of the lake.