And he cut a strong little shoot off a hazel tree, and shortened it, and split it at the end, and showed them how he supposed the man who made the arrow all that long time ago had fixed it to its shaft.
Then he took out sixpence, and said to Joe, “If you might choose, which would you rather have? The sixpence or the arrow-head?”
And Joe said, “The arrow-head, ever so much rather!”
But Uncle John said, “You mayn’t choose now, so take your sixpence. But I’ll tell you what: if you three boys would like to know more about the pit-dwelling people, and about their houses, and how they hunted and all that, I have a book at home in which there is a lot about these things; and I think it would be a good way of filling up some of your spare time these holidays if we were to have some reading out of the book now and then. You might try your hands at building a hut, to see if you could do it as well as the pit-dwelling people did. And you might make some bows and arrows, and even have a try at chipping out flint arrow-heads. We might have a shooting match with the bows and arrows, with another sixpence for the prize. Or, better still, we might have for a prize this flint arrow-head of mine that Joe is so fond of; and give it to the boy who knows most about what we have been reading, when we come to the end of the holidays.”
They all agreed that that would be rather a good way of amusing themselves, if the book were interesting. But by the time they got home it was too late to begin; so the reading had to be put off until the next day.
On the next day Joe and David went up to Uncle John’s house. As it was a wet afternoon they sat indoors. On the table there was a large brown book; and as soon as they had settled themselves, Uncle John took up the book and began to read.
Chapter the Second
THE STORY OF TIG: Tig’s Birthday and his Home