In the Morning of Time

NDING

bear children, left to the tribe. It looked as if but one more stroke such as that which had just befallen them must wipe them out of existence. And that, had ruthless Nature suffered it, would have been a damage she might

more plainly beasts. Had the tribe of the Little Hills but known it, these Ape-men were much like their own ancestors except for the

, but strove––each for himself, fortunately––to seize the caves. As they raged against each other no less desperately than against their human adversaries, the issue of the war was never in doubt. The Hillmen stood together solidly, fought with all their cunning o

olves of gigantic stature, and hunting in such huge packs that many outlying sections of the tribe were cut off and devoured before the Hillmen could combine to withstand them. Fortunately, the different packs had no combined action,

swept off ravaging to the south-westward. The People of the Little Hills were free once more to come out into the sun. But there was no more game to hunt, neither in the forest, nor on the upland slo

d to have been a painfully disguised blessing. Had they remained as before, scattered all over their d

flat faces with gaping, upturned nostrils. Young and vigorous, she fought like a tigress till stunned by a blow on the head, which was not before both her assailants were streaming with blood from the jabs of her sharp digging-stick. Her cries had aroused the tribe, however, and her captors, appreciating in her a 44 shapeliness and fairness beyond any

Angrily beating back the hotheads who would have rushed down to avenge their kin and inevitably to share their fate, his shouts, bellowed sonorously from his deep and hairy chest, called up the whole tribe to the defense of the bottle-neck pass which led into the amphitheater. At a word, passed on breathlessly from mouth to mouth, the old men and the

ok and gathered in confused masses along the foot of the slope, jabbering shrilly to each other and making insolent gestures toward the silent company at the top. The hair of t

nd leg, and a leanness of flank that gave them a look of breed. Their skins, very hairy in the case of the mature men, were of a reddish-tan color, paling to pink and cream in the children and younger women. They had ample foreheads under the wild thatch of their hair, and high, well-br

Some of them even squatted down on the turf and scratched themselves like monkeys, glaring malignantly but stupidly at the little array of their opponents, and snorting through their hideous upturned nos

en he himself, half a head taller than all but one or two of his followers, with magnificent chest and shoulders, and a dark, lionlike mane thick-streaked with gre

irled it by the hair and hurled it two-thirds of the way up the slope. As it fell and rebounded, two young women sprang from the ranks, their thick locks streaming like a cloud behind them, and dashed

st the spur to concerted action that they were needing. They rightly judged there were more of those desirable beings in the crowd behind that ta

of contact the enemy were crushed back, the stone-headed clubs and flint-tipped spears working havoc in the reeking masses. But, as the Chief had foreseen it would be, that forward rush was a mistake, exposing the

ding swing of the stone clubs, the long, lightning thrust of the flint-headed spears. But the Bow-legs, their little pig-eyes red with lust for their prey, fought with a sort

a fate which would have dishonored the tribe. And the women indeed, in this battle were no less formidable than the men themselves, for they fought with the swift venom of the she-wolf, the cunning fury of the mad

om the ranks behind stepped eagerly into the gaps. At the extreme left, where the walls of the pass, lower and less abrupt than on the right, invited an attack as fierce as that upon the center, the defense was led by a warrior named Gr?m, who seemed no less re

that one end of the head was like a sledge-hammer and the other like a pick. Grasping this neat weapon nearly half-way up the handle, he made miraculous play with it, now smashing with the hammer front, now tapping with the pick, now suddenly swinging it o

as not so tall as the Chief, by perhaps half a handbreadth, and for all his huge muscles of arm and breast he was altogether of a slimmer build; wherefore the Chief, while vastly respecting his counsels, was not suspicious of his rivalry. Moreover, up to the time of the invasion of the wolves, he had always dwelt in a remote cave, quite on the

and his four children––three sons and a daughter. It was while he was absent on a hunting expedition that th

ir skin and masses of long, very dark hair. Armed with a spear, she fought sava

e, when his arms and the club were outstretched full length, he glanced upwards in spite of himself. Instantly the club was clutched by furious

held the whole horde at bay. Then the Hillmen swarmed forward irresistibly, battered down the foremost of the foe, and dragged the fallen warrior back behind the lines to recover. In half a minute he was once more at the front, fighting wi

way as a bank is eaten by the waves. But now from a high ledge on the right, where the wall of the pass was a sheer perpendicular, came two shrill whistles. It was a signal which the Chief, now bleeding from many wounds, had been waiting for. He roared a command, and his ranks,

ads; but from the right, for 52 a few moments, only a rain of pebbles a

huge slab of rock and earth and débris crashed down upon the packed hordes in the neck of the pass. A long shout of triumph went up from the Hillmen. The outer ranks of the invaders stood for a second or two petrified with horror. Then they turned and fled, screaming, down the slope. On their heels the Hillmen pursued, slaughtering, till the brook-bed was choked with the dead. Of that filthy horde hardly a sc

heir cave-mouths, took counsel. Their dead had all been reverently buried, under heaps of stones, on the bare and wind-swept shoulder of the down

. The Chief, sitting on a rock which raised him above the rest, spoke only a word now and then, but gave ear to all, glancing from speaker to speaker wit

ell silent. He rose, yet stiff from his wounds, and, tow

behind their darkness they see many things that we cannot see. They have seen that all these disasters which have lately come upon us have come out of the east. They see that there must be a reason. They see that other 54 terrible dangers must also be coming out of the east, and that we Peop

te openly, yet were angry and afraid at the idea of leaving their familiar dwellings. But Gr?m, who had tu

"not only because he is our mightiest in war, but be

of the dissidents he cared nothing, having mad

the journey. And as we go far, and know not where we go, we must gather much food to carry wit

55 go and find a place for us, and come again quic

dangerous wanderings might be spared to t

s morning-red,

in sharp agitation and clutched her dark hair to her bosom in two great handfuls. At this a huge youth, who had be

ed. "He deserts us in our n

m with blazing eyes. Gr?m gave him an indifferent glance, and turned away

are foolish. Gr?m is a true

bered that from so perilous a venture it was most unlikely his rival would ever return. He gave a crafty side-glance at the girl, and sat down

bject before him as seemed to justify the long risk. There was all a boy's eagerness in his deep eyes, under their shaggy brows, as he slipped noiselessly out of the bottle-neck, picked his way lightly over the well-gnawed bones o

d to avoid dark coverts whence tiger or leopard might spring upon him. He was in a region which he had often hunted over, and where

run back, in the hope of detecting his pursuer. But when he found no one, he concluded that it was m

the limit of his former explorations. It was a wide, swift water, but too shallow and turbulent for swimming, and he forded it with some diffic

ry of fear came from the bunch of woods which he had just quitted. The voice was a woman's. He ran back. The next second the tre

e other two halted irresolutely. But as Gr?m's tall figure came bounding down upon them, their indecision vanish

as the young girl 58 A-ya. His eyes softened, for he had heard how it was she who had saved him in the battle, fighting so furiously over him when he was down––she in whose blood he had found his shoulders bathed. Yet up to that

t looking up. "You go to such great dangers.

he asked, with a self-c

the battle!" answe

I should now have been sleepin

er felt toward a woman before. His wives had been good wives and dutiful, and he had been content with the

id the girl again. "Also, I was af

wrath surged thr

said he fiercely. And, snatching the girl to her feet, h

, "did you follow me

ry, and send me back," she ans

m, his indifference quite forgotten. "But

climbed to the upper branches, dusk fell quickly about them, some great beast roared thunderously

I

s such as they had never before set eyes upon. Of nights, no matter how high or how well hidden their tree-top refuge might be, they found it n

and 60 Gr?m watched her with daily growing delight. He had never heard or dreamed of a man regarding a woman as he regarded the lithe, fierce creature wh

against the pale blue. From several of the summits rose streamers of murky vapor; and one of these, darker and more abundant than the others, spread abroad at the top on the windless air till it took the shape of a colossal pine-tree. To the girl the sight was p

their roots. It was time for the noonday rest, and these trees seemed to offer a safe retreat. The girl drank, splashed herself with the delicious coolness, flung back her dripping hair, then swung he

from her perch in the lower branches, gave a shriek of warning. Gr?m bounded to his feet, and darted for the tree. But the monster––a gray bear, of a bulk beyond that of the hugest grizzly––was almost upon him, and would have seized him before he could climb out of reach.

o draw himself up. Gr?m struck at him with his club, but from his difficult po

rop down and run," said Gr?m

rl slipped over into the next tree. As they did so another bear even huger than the first, and apparently 6

th piercing anxiety such a

, very fast?

almost forgotten in her pride

e wolves," she

teep rocks where we can fight with some hope. For these beasts are obstinate, and will never

t as swiftly as falling. They snatched up Gr?m's two spears and A-ya's broken one, and ran, down along the brook towa

rs, Gr?m bade her slow down a little till they did no more than hold their own. Fearing lest she should exhaust herself, he ran always a pace behind her, admonishing her how to save her strength and her breath, and

ips, and once or twice she stumbled. With the first pang of fear at his heart, Gr?m closed up beside her, made her lean heavily on his rigid fo

id, "where we can defend ours

ple of furlongs distant. And its walls, partly clothed with shrubbery, partly naked, were so seamed and cleft and creviced that they appeared to promise many convenient retreats. But across the mouth of the valley extended an appalling bar

?m's spirit rose to the emergency. The bears were now almost upon them. He jerked the girl violently to her feet, and spoke to her in a voice that brought her back to herself.

Gr?m, with a confidence he was far from feeling, "the

three feet in width. The runners took it in their stride. But a fierce heat struck up from it. It filled the girl with such horror that her senses failed her utterly. She

hey had stopped, growling and whining, and swaying their

id Gr?m to himself; and added, with a thro

ably hot beneath his feet, he carried his burden a few rods further on, to where the green began ag

of the barrier, but he was reassured to see that the flames filled them with an insuperable fear. They dared not come nearer than the thin edges of the verdure.

safe for the present, and seeing that the girl, recovered from her swoon, was sitting up and staring with awed eyes at t

upcurling tongues of brightness. Their heat, at this distance, was uncomfortable to his naked flesh, but as he stood there wondering and took no further hurt, his confidence grew. At length he dared to stretch out his spear-tip and touch the flames, very respectfully. The green-hide thongs which bound the flint to the wood smoked, shriv

g redly on the blackened wood. Audacious in his consuming curiosity, Gr?m touched it with his finger. It stung smartly, and Gr?m snatched back his finger with an exclamation of alarm. But by that touch the spark itself was extinguished. That was an amazing thing. Sucking his finger, Gr?m stood gazing down

ds, but they do not like to be tou

yet grasp, seethed in his brain. Dimly, but overpoweringly, he realized that he had passed

eam from the girl aroused him. She had sprung to her feet and stood staring behind her, not knowing which way to run because of her fear of the fire. And there,

haft almost to his grip. With all his force he threw, and the flint tip buried itself in the nearest monster's haunch. The long fur blazed, and, in a frenzy of terror, the great beasts went crashing off through the coverts. The fire 68 was speedily whipped out by the branches, but their panic was uncon

going of the sun came a chill breeze drawing down from the ridges. Gr?m rose, led the girl nearer the flames, and reseated himself. As the girl realized the kindly and

tuft of withered grass. The stuff caught at once, blazed up and died out. Then Gr?m rolled the burning spear-butt on the earth till it, too, was quite extinguished. The sparks still winking in the grass he

ng 69 Ones my servants. The tribe shall come he

d his life, she laid her cheek against his knee. He lifted her into the hollow of his great arm, and she lea