"No; just out there on the water. His house was built far out from shore, on a sort of wooden pier, with a long narrow pathway, on piles, leading to land. There was a whole village of such houses, built of logs, with piazzas all around, and carefully barred up on the land side to keep out the bears and wolves and hyenas."
"Hyenas! Oh, Grandmère! how can you?" exclaimed Gustave.
"Yes, hyenas. This was long ago, I said; and the boy's name was Palai. He was brave and hardy from his babyhood, and even when he could only creep, his mother had to tie a string to him, and fasten him to the house, or he would have crept on land or into the water, for he would not stay quiet a moment. When he could run about, his father showed him how to make a knife out of stone, and many an hour's hard work Palai had rubbing his knife on a great stone slab which lay in the middle of the house on purpose to sharpen things on. His father gave him a hollow bone of a deer to make a knife-handle, and then Palai was allowed to go on shore, and watch the cows and sheep at pasture. He was expected to keep off bears and wolves—yes, and hyenas, Gustave—with no weapons but a wooden club and this stone knife, which, by-the-way, was nothing like your knives, but more like a carpenter's chisel, as its sharp edge was at the end instead of the side. In summer Palai enjoyed his pasture-watching, and busied himself making more knives and spears, and pretty beads from bones and colored stones found along the lake.
"These were Palai's pleasant hours; but in winter, when the cattle were driven close to the lake, and Palai and other boys had to spend long cold nights watching for wild animals, it was not so pleasant. Palai's grandma—yes, Gustave, he had a grandma—used to tell him of the fearful beasts she had heard of in her youth, some of which her grandfather had seen. He had seen a bird so large that its legs alone were taller than he, and one of its eggs held as much as a hundred and forty hen's eggs. This was a Dinornis, and Palai wished he could have gone bird nesting after such eggs. Then there was a great dragon—the Labyrinthodont—which had been seen by Palai's grandma's great-grandfather; and the Dinotherium, a beast twice as large as an elephant, and many other fearful creatures. Palai never said 'Oh, grandma!' when she related these wonders. He had seen the huge bones of some of these creatures lying among the caves and rocks on the hills, and he wished constantly to meet and kill some great animal, for he was very brave. 'Never mind, Palai,' his grandmother said, 'these great beasts may have left this country, but there is always something great to be done, if one is brave.' When Palai was about fourteen, his father allowed him to go hunting with him to kill a cave-bear—an animal nearly twice as large as the bears we see now.
"Palai and his father each carried a club, tied to the waist by deer-skin strings, a knife, and a long wooden spear with a stone head. It was a great honor for a boy to be allowed to hunt the cave-bear; only very brave men attacked this beast, so Palai felt proud."
PALAI AND JURASSA.—Drawn by F. S. Church.
"But he knew the danger, and that he might never come home again, so he gave presents to all his friends and relations to remember him by. To his mother he gave a new distaff and stone spinning weights which he had made; to his grandmother he gave a wolf-skin to make a warm robe; and to his friend Jurassa—a nice little girl who lived in the next house—he gave a long string of pretty beads, which he had cut and polished just for her.
"'I won't forget you, Palai,' said Jurassa. 'But do something brave.'
"'I will,' said Palai.