Think of as many tools and weapons as you can that the
Cave-men found ready to use.
What could they find to make into tools and weapons?
Why did they not use large boards and metals?
Why did they put handles on their tools and weapons?
Think of as many ways as you can of fastening handles
to tools and weapons.
_Making New Weapons_
The Cave-men liked their new home.
They were able to work better when they were warm than when they were
shivering with the cold.
They found more time to improve their tools and weapons.
One day they began to make weapons of the bones they found in the cave.
[Illustration: “_They made them into weapons_”]
Many of the bones were good for clubs.
Others were good for handles of weapons.
After the Cave-men had sorted out the bones that they wanted, they went
to hunt stones along the margin of the stream.
They wanted stones that were good for hammers.
So they hunted for smooth, round stones that were hard to break.
They wanted other stones for knives, spears, and axes.
So they hunted for stones that broke with a sharp edge.
They struck the sharp edges with hammer stones to see if they crumbled
under a heavy blow.
When they found stones that crumbled they threw them away, but they
kept the stones that were tough and strong.
When they had chipped off a few large flakes they carried the rough
stones to the cave.
There they made them into weapons.
They did not chip the hammer stones, but fastened handles to them.
Some handles were long bones that were large at the joint.
Other handles were made of forked branches.
[Illustration: “_They chipped off a few large flakes_”]
[Illustration: “_Some handles were long bones that were large at the
joint_”]
Sharpeyes found a hammer stone with a groove around the center and
fastened a handle to it.
He cut a slender branch of a sapling and bent it around the groove.
Then he twisted the ends and held them close, while he bound them with
rawhide.
The Cave-men liked this hammer so well that they made other hammers
like it.
They made long handles for their knife points, so that they became real
spears.
They put handles on the spearheads in many ways.
Sometimes they bound the spearhead between the split end of a long
stick, and covered the binding with pitch.
[Illustration: “_They put handles on the spearheads in many ways_”]
[Illustration: “_The Cave-men liked this hammer so well that they made
other hammers like it_”]
Sometimes they drove the spearhead into the soft part of a large horn.
Sometimes they drove it into the pith of a branch.
They always tried to bind the handle so that it would stay, for they
sometimes got hurt when a handle came off.
[Illustration: “_Other handles were made of forked branches_”]