AT THE GRAVEL PIT
As they walked along, the old man pointed to a place in the hillside
and said, "That is the gravel bed. From it we dig all the stone for
our axes and spear heads."
Thorn looked and saw a big hollow in a gravel hill. The hill was made
of sand and clay and pebbles and bowlders. The rain had washed some of
the sand and clay away, and the stones had fallen down and now lay in
piles on the ground.
"Men come from far away for our stone," the old man went on. "It is
good stone for axes. They bring us shells and amber and meat and skins
for our stone. Some of them take the stone to their homes and make
their own axes; others buy our axes."
At the gravel bed, men were at work. One man had a big digging stick.
He put it under a rock and pushed it out of the ground. Another man
had the shoulder bone of a bear. He pushed it under some pebbles and
lifted them and threw them upon an ox skin on the ground. Then he
gathered up the corners of the skin, took it on his back, and carried
it down to the stone yard.
As Thorn watched the men getting out stone for their axes and spear
heads, he said to his grandfather, "Who made the axes for the cave men
before you made them?"
"Oh, ever since the old days," said Flint, "there has been an ax maker.
Some men can chip stone well and easily. Others can never learn to do
it in their whole lives. So the men who can chip stone do it; and they
are the ax makers. The other men use the axes, and they are the
hunters.
"My grandfather told me," said Flint, as he walked slowly down the
hill, "that in the old days the cave men did not have stone axes and
spears. They hunted with sticks; they threw a stick like your mother's
digging stick; and they struck with a stick like your father's hunting
club. And they used the sharp stones they chipped only for knives and
scrapers. But one day, a man thought about tying a sharp stone to a
stick! There, you see, was the first spear!"
[Illustration: Forest scene]
"That was a great day for the cave men!" Flint went on, while his grim
face lighted up. "For with a stone weapon they could hunt the swift
wild animals, and so get more food."
Then he stamped his foot and said, "And they could kill enemies
better!" And he clenched his fist, while his face grew hard.
The next day, men from the stone yard went out to make a fish trap.
They drove sticks across the river bed where the water was low. Then
from stick to stick they tied string made of skin. Rushes grew by the
river. They took these and wove them in and out of the strings until
the trap reached clear across the river. The water could go through
the rushes, but the fish could not; and the men speared them or caught
them with their hands.
[Illustration: Spear]