Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-11-17

III lHe loN Hight Oh the pIifIitSil
springtime, in silence broken only by
me tramp of padded hoofs and by the
lap of water against the mire, man
searching for berries saw a woman
running to escape him, ran after her
caught her and carried her away.
The man vanished and for the first
time in her haunted life the woman
felt the loneliness of the solitude that
had been her best condition, and q
pang like the yearning of hunger
awoke in her.
She wandered along the hedges,
through the wet fields. under the dark
sky. searching for the one who had
mastered her; and when, after a long
quest, she saw him, she ran to him
With inarticulate cries. He gave no
acorns, emfwy rofg Cyga z&pcmf inf W
answering sign; but. wheYi he sat
down to est his fistful of acorns. she
sat down beside him. and when he
ldy down II sleep she, too, lay down.
So the law of life gave the woman 10
the man.
At first he tolerated her; then, when
She served him and was useful to
him. he made her his habit Her rel
diiNt NGdhiiSSo 5ihS Hci IhitN Iiit
monitions Of their need of food His
Indifference to her dependence on
him gave him superiority. His silent
acceptance of her presence aroused
in her duh brain a feeling akin to
tenderness. and in that feeling, hum
bic and submissive, she withdrew
when he had beaten her
Heck. the name given to the woman
by the man, was Il name like the
growl of bear: but Daah. her name
fer him, was an appeal soft as a
caress. They had a word for hunger:
Nah, and a quick danger signal:
Heuh' The rest they told in gestures
While the man hunted, the woman
waded in the river, and grinning,
caught the slippery fishes; and kneel-
ing, with arms outstretched, drew in
the slick carried by the current. Into
round bones she forced slick splinters,
To be used as knives. She scraped the
skins of animals, stretched them to
dry, pierced them ON their edges. and
with fine strips of leather, laced them
on herself and on the man to serve
as shields from the cold and, from the
claws of animals. She heaped stones
JtIoit iIt emu eiitt VI dtIl anu
stood fearless by the man when he
cast them at the wolves In the den
she heaped leaves gathered from the
trees and bits of fleece dropped by
beasts. She had a bisons horn from
which TO drink, and in the skull of
an elephant she gathered rain water.
In her way she kept house, but she
had no cooking. Man had not con-
quered fire.
In the cliff midway between foot
and summit where the continuous
rains and busy rills had laid bare the
calcareous sediment, she found cave
Of depth sufficient to hold her bed.
The place was toward the west and
toward the south, shut in from cold
and storm. In that reareat Hook felt
safe from danger To scale the cliff
from below was impossible, and to
reach it from above even the man
and the woman were forced To cling
to the roots laid bare by the incess-
ant work of the water. Before her
Cen Hook scraped the cliff and formed
a terrace. where the wind played with
the terrace the woman brought forth
of fern leaves and the fleece of beasts
she laid him when she went to catch
fish and gather slick.
She loved the sunlight because it
warmed the limp brown legs and the
hungry mouth of her puppet; and
when the clouds flew fast and the
pale disk of the star sailed through
The seud. she held the. writhing body
upward at arms length. Behind her
sloping brow no thought had formed,
Iut from the depths of her maternal
soul vague supplieations wavered
toward the sphere that warmed the
wondrous product of her being.
One day when she returned from the
plain the noise of her descent was
drowned by the whirr of wings. From
under the shelf of the cliff the wind
rushed up tn meet her. and as she
loesed her hold upon the roots and
dropped to the terrace an eagle bear
ing the child scared toward the sky.
She saw the drops of blood on the
little breast. the hanging head, the
mouth open in a voiceless cry.
Passing the eyric where the eagiets
waited open mouthed for their mother,
- N7Nh'N@tia WI 10 way w Wal III tiit
nest fell on earth's marvel; the first
tear. @
During four moons the woman re-
membered. At sight of the gulf that
had received the eagle, the double
tufts of her red brows quivered But
the flying gray and the deep riffs
drowned her grief. She had forgot
ten, but hatred ragged in her dark soul.
and when she found a birds nest she
broke the eggs.
One evening in the autumn when
they returned from the forest to de-
scend to the terrace, they heard growls
and saw a bear elinging to the roots.
letting himself down. Hiding on the
brink of the cliff they saw him drop,
enter the shallow den, nose the walls
and, after repeated revolutions, lie
down. So the man and the woman
returned to the forest.
When the transporting cold drove
the beasts to cover. earth held for
the man and woman no lasting refuge
Driven from hedge to hedge and from
tree to tree they fled from the beasts.
Ready for attack, club in hand, the
man went first, and. running to keep
pace, the woman followed bearing in
her skin sack acorns. the drinking
horn hitc ~ ell -