distance away where a Medicine Man lived, and they took presents to the
Medicine Man and begged him to come to cure the old chief’s sickness:
and the Medicine Man came. He was a very old man, and he had a great
name for skill in curing diseases. He brought with him his wand of
magic wood and a bone rattle, but no medicines, though it was said of
him that he could make more powerful medicines than any that the women
made. He went into the old chief’s hut, and sat by him for a long time
without speaking. Then he got up and walked solemnly round the bed from
left to right three times, making signs with his wand and shaking his
rattle. Tig and some of the others were waiting and listening outside
the hut, and only the old chief’s sons and some of the older men were
allowed inside. Then the Medicine Man said that an evil spirit was
troubling Old Chief, and unless he could scare it away, the chief
would die. The Medicine Man began to chant a song, shaking his rattle
and beating on the ground with his wand; and the old chief lay groaning
in pain, and the people cried and groaned also. At last the Medicine
Man said that no more could be done that night; but that on the morrow
he would work a stronger spell against the evil spirit. But in the
night Old Chief died.
Then in the morning the news spread about that the old chief was dead;
and the women who had attended him in his sickness stood around the
hut moaning and wailing, and went crying up and down the village. And
all the people mourned for him. Then after two days they carried his
body to the top of a hill beyond the village, and built a funeral pyre
of faggots and burned his body in the fire. This was done according
to the rule of the Medicine Men, of whom there were three present to
take part in the funeral. They gathered the ashes together and put
them into an urn and then carried the urn to a place that they had
chosen. In the meantime the people had built up another great fire;
and they brought an ox, and killed it and roasted it in the fire, and
made a great feast on the hill-top beside the fire, and all the people
sat down and feasted at the funeral feast of the old chief. Then the
Medicine Men bade the people approach to lay the gifts in the grave.
They brought food from the feast and set it in little vessels beside
the urn, because they believed that the chief’s spirit would need food
for refreshment in the spirit world; and they brought his spear and his
axe and his bow and arrows and his shield, and laid them in the grave;
and they brought his favourite dog and killed it there, and laid its
body beside the urn, so that it might attend its master in the world
of spirits. Then when this was done, the Medicine Men made the people
bring stones to raise a cairn over the urn. First they laid large flat
stones, building them like a little chamber about the urn; then they
laid six large blocks in a circle all round, and set others within
the circle and piled them up into a great heap. These stones they
brought from the river bed in the valley and carried them up across
the hill-side to build the cairn. The building of the cairn was a work
of several days; and every day until the work was finished, the women
mourned and wailed in the village at sunset.
At last, on the day that the cairn was finished, the men of the village
met together in council to choose one to be chief in the place of
Caerig. Then Arsan, the old man, stood up and said:
“Garff is the man among us who is fittest to be our chief; for he is an
able man and skilful, whether for hunting or for battle; and he is a
man wise in council and the master of many cattle. Shall we not do well
to choose him to be our chief?”
And the men said, “We shall do well.”
Then Garff stood up and said, “It is too much honour that you do me,
friends, for I am a plain man and little skilled in speaking. But if
you choose me to be your leader, I will strive to do my best for the
good of all, whether in the hunt or in battle.”
So they chose Garff to be chief, and from that day he was the head man
among the people and took the chief place at the councils. And when any
strangers from other villages came with messages, they were taken to
Garff’s hut to deliver their message and to seek his protection.
[Illustration]
_Chapter the Twenty-seventh_
_How Tig chose a Wife from among the Lake People_
AFTER his first visit to the Lake Village Tig went sometimes to see
his friends there, always taking care to carry with him a present of
game of his own killing, a hare or some birds, for Eira and her mother;
for he was glad that they should see what a clever hunter he was; and
Eira showed him how well she could cook the meat that he brought, and
was pleased when he praised her cookery. Dobran and Gaithel took him
out fishing, but Tig did not care much for this. However, one day they
promised to show him better sport, for a party was going up into their
hunting-grounds to hunt deer in a manner of their own.
They all started very early in the morning and marched up into the
hills. Then the men spread their party out into a long line, curved
like the letter C, and swept across the hill-side with their dogs.
Then they closed in, and beat the woods until the hunters on one side
started a herd of deer. The deer dashed across the woodland valley and
tried to escape on the other side, but the men of the further line
turned them back and drove them into the woods again.
So the hunters kept the deer moving forward, always within the line,
until they drove them to a narrow place near the end of the valley,
where there was a big trap, a high double fence among the trees, made
in the shape of a long V. The hunters closed in on the deer and drove
them in at the broad open end of the fence, and then drove them on and
on until the deer were enclosed in the narrow end, where the ground was
soft and boggy, so that they could not leap out.
Then some of the hunters climbed over the fence, and speared or clubbed
the poor animals that were standing up to their knees in the soft soil,
panting and terror-stricken. In this manner in one day the hunters got
eleven head of deer; but Tig thought it was not such fine sport as
stalking a stag on the hills, though at the time of the drive, when
they were heading the deer down through the woods, it was exciting work.
Then they carried home the deer that they had killed, and they all
spent two or three days in feasting.
Another day when Tig and Gaithel were in the woods, they came to a
valley where a stream flowed quietly along and the trees grew on the
banks near the water’s edge.
“This is the beavers’ valley,” said Gaithel, “they have their village
here. They are our brothers, for they build their houses beside the
water even as we do; but we hunt them and kill them although we do
call them our brothers.”
The beavers’ home was in a pond. They had made the pond by laying a dam
of logs across the stream to hold back the water; and there they had
built their huts with round tops of interlaced branches that showed
above the water. Tig saw where they had cut down many tall trees on the
banks and gnawed them into logs with their strong teeth.
“Do you set traps for the beavers?” Tig asked.
“Yes, we trap them; we bait the traps with fresh wood--fresh sweet bark
is what they like. Sometimes we hunt them in the winter, when their
ponds are frozen over. We go and batter at the huts with clubs. Then
the beavers rush out of their huts under the ice and make for holes
that they have in the banks; but we try to head them off from these by
banging on the ice, and make them come up to breathe at holes in the
ice. They must come up after a time to get breath. Then we stand at
the holes and try to spear them. We often scatter dry husks over the
holes: the stuff floats on the water, and then the beavers cannot see
us waiting by the holes, and we catch them if we are quick.”
“Have you many beavers about here?” Tig asked.
“There are not so many as there were once. My grandfather can remember
when there used to be nine or ten beavers’ dams in these valleys where
there are only three or four now.”
“They are getting scarce in our woods too,” said Tig, “we have hunted
them so much.”
The next day Tig went home to his own village and got some of his
neighbours to help him build a new hut and bring into it the necessary
things. Then he went again to the Lake Village, taking presents for
Eira’s father and mother, and he asked Eira to be his wife. Then they
were married according to the custom of her people, and there was a
great feast at the wedding, and the men ran races, and they all danced
many dances. And afterwards Tig took Eira home to the new hut in his
own village.
[Illustration]
_Chapter the Twenty-eighth_
_DICK AND HIS FRIENDS: The Boys’ Bows and Arrows_
WHEN the boys went out after this reading, they got their bows and
arrows. By this time the bows were finished. Dick had given to each of
the others two arrows out of his set that came from London. These were
well made with blunt metal heads fitting like caps. Besides these Joe
had made himself six arrows, and the other two four each. For heads
they had nails, filed down flat on two sides to make them fit into
the shaft, and sharpened at the point. The great difficulty had been
to get straight sticks, and though they agreed that it was not a real
hunter’s way of doing it, they had cut lengths from a thin piece of
hard-wood board, with a fine saw, and then trimmed and sand-papered
these to make them round and smooth. To fix in the heads they made
a cut, deep enough to take the nail, and then wrapped it with fine
string and glued this well over. When they had fixed the feathers, the
arrows were complete, and each marked his own. Dick had a V for his
mark, Joe a cut between two dots, and David a dot between two cuts. The
gardener made them a target out of bands of straw, and they practised
at it a good deal. But one day they made up their minds to try to
shoot something that might be called “game,” and they went off to the
heath. Each took a different way, but they agreed to meet at the hut
afterwards, with whatever they should have bagged.
Joe went off to a place near the edge of the wood, where there were
generally rabbits playing about, and his plan was to creep up near
enough to get a shot at once, if he could do so without scaring them,
but if not, to hide among the bushes and wait for them coming out of
their burrows.
David crept through the furze looking out for birds. He saw an old
blackbird hopping about under the bushes, and he shot at it; but it
flew away with a great deal of noise, as if laughing at David, who had
to spend a long time getting back his arrow from among a lot of prickly
brambles. There were numbers of yellow-hammers perching about on the
furze bushes and crying out: _A very, very little bit of bread and no
chee-e-e-ese_, and a pair of bold little stone-chats that kept flying
round calling _a-tick, a-tick_, but David did not want to shoot at
them. Then a family of green woodpeckers, father and mother and four
young ones, came flying across from the woods; and David was so keen on
watching them that he forgot he was a hunter; so when he got to the hut
he was empty-handed. He was the first in, but after a while Joe came,
and he also had got nothing.
“I nearly shot a starling,” he said; “there was a flock of them running
about on the grass, and I shot right into the middle of them. I wish
I had got one, for it says in that book of mine that a starling is
the best bird to get when you are learning to stuff, as it is easy to
skin--I say, it would be fun to shoot a rabbit and skin it, and try to
cure the skin!”
Just then Dick came in. He had his pockets stuffed out, and the others
wanted to know what he had got. He said they were to make a fire and
then he would show them; so they went out and collected sticks and
made a fire in the fireplace outside the hut. Then Dick brought out of
his pocket six potatoes, and said that was all his game. “I never saw
anything to shoot at,” he said, “but the men in a field over there are
taking up potatoes and they gave me these for twopence, and would have
let me have more if I could have stowed them away. I thought we could
roast them in the ashes.”
But Dick had something else to show. He had found some pieces of wool,
torn off sheep’s fleeces, hanging to the thorn bushes on the heath, and
had gathered them all up.
“To-morrow I shall go and try to get some more,” he said, “and when I
have got enough, I shall make a spindle, if I can find out exactly what
it ought to be like, and see if I can spin some yarn: and if I can spin
the yarn, I shall rig up a loom and have a try at weaving a piece of
cloth. There isn’t much chance of being able to do it right, of course,
but it is good fun trying.”
_Chapter the Twenty-ninth_
_THE STORY OF TIG: How the Lake People brought Tidings of War_
ONE day when Tig was sitting at the door of his hut trimming sticks for
arrows, he heard the dogs barking, so he went to the gate and looked
out. He saw three men coming up the hill, and when they came nearer he
saw that they were some of the Lake Village people, friends of his. He
went out to meet them, and brought them into the village and took them
to his father’s hut, because they said they had brought an important
message.
But first, Gofa and some of the other women brought food and set it
before the visitors, and they ate and drank. Then when Garff had
called together the elder men of the village, he asked the leader of
the party to give his message.
Then the man, whose name was Dileas, stood up and said:
“For many months past, O chief, our folk have been sorely molested
by the people that dwell to the southward of our borders, across
the waters of the big river. Their men have trespassed upon our
hunting-grounds, and when we have resisted them, they have fought and
several of our men have been slain. And now of late they have taken to
hunting openly upon our side of the water, coming up the river in their
canoes, in bands, and daring us to drive them back.
“Yet have we worse than this to tell. For nine days ago a party of
their men attacked our cowherds, who were tending the cattle on the
hill-side; and they drove off the cattle and slew one of the cowherds
that was an old man, and carried off two young men to their village.
But a young man who escaped, being a swift runner, fled home and
brought us these tidings. And on the next day our chief sent me and
these two, my companions, to the people across the big river, to make
complaint of the matter. And we saw their chief, sitting with the old
men of the tribe; and we spoke civilly to them, saying that doubtless
the wrong was done by some of their young men that were headstrong
and perhaps ignorant; and that if they would restore our cattle and
release our brothers and make payment for the death of the other, and
would swear by their gods to trouble us no more, then we would not seek
vengeance for blood, but would be at peace with them and keep faith.
“But they gave us only harsh words, saying that our cowherds had fallen
first upon their men, who were but seeking for some of their beasts
that had strayed; that as for the cattle, they had taken them in fair
fight and should keep them; and our brothers they should keep also to
be slaves to them. And their chief boasted and said that his people are
called the Warriors, and that warriors they be; that they are mightier
than we, and are able to drive us into the hills and take away all our
cattle, and take also our women and our young men to be their slaves.
And their chief showed us his axe, the like of which we have never
seen, for it was yellow and shining and of very great sharpness, and
he said that with this axe he hath slain above threescore men. Then he
sent us away, and we departed and came to our own village again, and
brought these woeful tidings to our people.
“And yet worse remains still to be told. For we have deemed it prudent
to send out spies to watch their village, and our spies have brought
us word that the Warriors are going about their streets painted
and arrayed for battle, and that the Medicine Men are making daily
sacrifices to their gods, that their people may prosper in battle; and
by these things we are assured that they will soon make war on us.
“And now, O Chief, we are come to seek help from you and your people;
and we pray you to aid us to fight against the Warriors and drive them
back across the water, lest they, having conquered us and burned our
village, fall next upon your people and do the like to you.”
Then Garff looked round upon the elder men and said:
“Shall we not do amiss if we withhold help from these our friends in
their need? Let us join our arms to theirs and fight side by side with
them against the men who are their enemies and ours.”
And the men all said, “Yes, we will fight.”
Then Garff made an agreement with the Lake Men that they should return
at once to their village, and set spies to watch the fords of the river
and the village of the Warriors; and if an army should be seen to leave
the village, then the Lake People were to light three beacon fires
upon the top of the hill above their village, and he and his men would
come to their aid.
[Illustration: The Beacon]
And Garff sent Tig, with seven young men, to make a camp on the hills
within sight of the Lake People’s hill, that they might watch by day
and night for the signal. Then the three Lake Men departed and went
back to their village.
So Tig and his companions packed their stores and took their arms,
their best bows and all their war-arrows and their shields of
wickerwork covered with hide; and pitched their camp up in the hills.
They watched the hill, day and night, for the alarm-fire; and meantime
they prepared themselves for battle, dyeing and painting their bodies
with red paint and blue paint; also they exercised themselves in
war-games and dances.
Early in the morning of the third day the men on the look-out saw three
columns of smoke rising from the top of the hill far off. So Tig sent
two of the young men who were swift runners to carry the news to
Garff, and he sent Eira, and the other women who had been with them,
home also; and he and his five companions set off to go to the Lake
Village.
[Illustration: A VERY OLD STONE AXE]
_Chapter the Thirtieth_
_How they Fought the Battle in the Wood_
WHEN Garff and his men reached the Lake Village, they found the people
armed and ready. The Chief of the Lake People, whose name was Bran,
came out to meet Garff, and he called him and some of his men into the
council that they might make a plan of war. And he told Garff that his
spies had seen the army of the Warriors muster at daybreak on the river
bank. They had crossed in canoes, and had built a stockade on this side
of the water, and dragged the canoes ashore. They had been seen fixing
long poles to the canoes, which were light ones made of wicker and
hide; and it was thought that they meant to carry some of the canoes
over the hills to the lake, so that one band of their men might attack
the island from the canoes, while another band should try to force the
gangway.
Then one of the old men stood up and said:
“Surely this will be their plan! But how can we meet them better than
here on our island, where the water and our good wall are our defence?
Our fathers met their foes thus and beat them back. What is this talk
that I hear of going forth to battle in the woods? If we leave our
defences, we are lost.”
Then Bran said that it was the wish of some of the younger men to march
out and try to take their enemies by surprise in the woods, and that he
himself was in favour of this plan.
“Surely,” said Garff, “that is the right plan. If you had meant to stay
at home and fight behind walls, you had not needed help from us; and
we, too, might have taken our folks and our cattle and shut ourselves
up in our hill-fort. No, leave some of your older men that can yet bear
arms to stay by the village and defend it if need be. But let the rest
of us go out and fall upon these Warriors suddenly in the woods; and
let some of the young men go and watch the fords, to see that none of
the enemy cross the river elsewhere and take us in the rear; but let us
start without delay.”
So they marched at once; and since Bran was an old man and less skilled
in warfare than Garff, he gave the command of all the men to him, and
he himself marched behind.
When they had gone some distance through the forest, and had come to
an open place upon the hill-side, Garff made the men halt and hide
themselves in a thicket at the edge of the wood; and he sent Tig with
two others to spy for the advance of the enemy. Tig and his companions
crept away through the bushes and were gone for some time. At length
they came back swiftly and cautiously, with news that they had seen a
large band of the enemy in the wood below, all fully armed with bows
and slings, and spears and axes and clubs, and carrying four canoes in
their rear. So Garff set all his men in battle-line, and bade them lie
still until the enemy should be well out into the open ground. Then, at
a signal, they were to leap up suddenly and shoot a flight of arrows
and rush upon the Warriors, every one marking his man.
Presently they heard voices and saw the figures of the leaders appear
among the trees. The Warriors were sure of victory, and they had no
thought of the Lake Men coming out to meet them; so they were marching
carelessly along, thinking more of getting their canoes up the hill
than of preparing to fight. They streamed out into the open, led by
their chief who was carrying his axe on his shoulder. Garff waited
till the band were well away from the shelter of the trees, and then
he sprang to his feet with a great shout. At once his men leaped up,
and sent a deadly shower of arrows at the enemy; and every man, as
soon as he had shot, fitted another arrow and shot again. Many of the
Warriors fell, and many were wounded, and they were thrown into great
confusion. But their chief rushed down their ranks shouting to them not
to give way, but to take their shields and advance. Then to gain time
and to save his broken line, he dashed forward alone, holding up his
arm. Garff signed to his men to cease shooting, and the chief of the
Warriors came on shouting:
“Let one of you fight with me! If there be a man among you, let him
come forth and fight with me!”
Then Garff strode out from among his men and went forward to meet the
chief, who stood brandishing his axe, which glittered as he waved it in
the sunlight. And the chief cried out:
[Illustration: The Warrior Chief]
“Ho! Ho! This is my axe! Skull-pecker is his name, for he has pecked
open many a skull--ay, and split them in twain and eaten up the brains.
Come on, come on! He will split thy skull even as the others, and slice
thy flesh and chop up thy bones. Come on, come on!”
But when the chief saw Garff coming out to meet him, he stopped his
boasting, for he saw that he had met as tough a fighter as himself.
Each man had thrown down his shield and each grasped his axe with both
hands. Garff’s weapon was a battle-axe of stone, heavy and strong, but
not so keen as the bronze axe of his enemy and not so deadly, unless he
could get in a sweeping blow. The chief of the Warriors was taller than
Garff, but not stronger, though Garff had the longer arms and was the
more active of the two; also the chief had been wounded in the thigh by
an arrow, and although he had tugged it out, he could not stop the flow
of blood.
For a few seconds they faced one another without moving, and then the
chief made a sudden leap forward and aimed a tremendous blow at Garff’s
head. Garff leaped back to avoid the blow, and then rushed in and aimed
a return stroke as his enemy’s axe swung round, and the chief leaped
back. So they went on, striking and avoiding warily, until Garff began
to give way, leaping backward at each attack and not striking again
in return, for he saw that his enemy was spending his strength, and
he meant to save his own. Never for a second did Garff cease to fix
his eyes on his enemy’s eyes, and the two faced each other savagely.
Then the chief rushed at Garff again in a fury, and struck with all
his might. Garff avoided again, and jabbed upward with his axe-head to
parry the blow, but he was not quick enough, and got a deep cut in the
arm. Then the chief pressed hard upon him, thinking to end him with one
blow; but Garff parried the stroke and gave a mighty spring, and before
his enemy could recover, dealt him a blow on the right shoulder, so
that he dropped his axe and fell prone. Then Garff picked up the bronze
axe of the chief and drove it deep into his skull, then waved his own
axe over his head and gave a great shout.
When the Warriors saw their leader fall, they uttered loud cries, and
some of them rushed forward with spears and axes. But Tig leaped out,
and Garff’s men and the Lake Men with him, and Garff waved the dripping
axe, and they rushed upon the band and put them to flight and chased
them through the woods, every one marking his man. And they killed many
of them there and many by the river-side, and only those escaped who
flung themselves into the river and swam across.