ear. Taffy sat down too, with her toes in
the water and her chin in her hand, and thought very hard. Then she
said--

'I say, Daddy, it's an awful nuisance that you and I don't know how to
write, isn't it? If we did we could send a message for the new spear.'

'Taffy,' said Tegumai, 'how often have I told you not to use slang?
"Awful" isn't a pretty word,--but it _would_ be a convenience, now you
mention it, if we could write home.'

Just then a Stranger-man came along the river, but he belonged to a far
tribe, the Tewaras, and he did not understand one word of Tegumai's
language. He stood on the bank and smiled at Taffy, because he had a
little girl-daughter of his own at home. Tegumai drew a hank of
deer-sinews from his mendy-bag and began to mend his spear.

'Come here,' said Taffy. 'Do you know where my Mummy lives?' And the
Stranger-man said 'Um!'--being, as you know, a Tewara.

'Silly!' said Taffy, and she stamped her foot, because she saw a shoal
of very big carp going up the river just when her Daddy couldn't use his
spear.

'Don't bother grown-ups,' said Tegumai, so busy with his spear-mending
that he did not turn round.

'I aren't,' said Taffy. 'I only want him to do what I want him to do,
and he won't understand.'

'Then don't bother me,' said Tegumai, and he went on pulling and
straining at the deer-sinews with his mouth full of loose ends. The
Stranger-man--a genuine Tewara he was--sat down on the grass, and Taffy
showed him what her Daddy was doing. The Stranger-man thought, 'This is
a very wonderful child. She stamps her foot at me and she makes faces.
She must be the daughter of that noble Chief who is so great that he
won't take any notice of me.' So he smiled more politely than ever.

'Now,' said Taffy, 'I want you to go to my Mummy, because your legs are
longer than mine, and you won't fall into the beaver-swamp, and ask for
Daddy's other spear--the one with the black handle that hangs over our
fireplace.'

The Stranger-man (_and_ he was a Tewara) thought, 'This is a very, very
wonderful child. She waves her arms and she shouts at me, but I don't
understand a word of what she says. But if I don't do what she wants, I
greatly fear that that haughty Chief, Man-who-turns-his-back-on-callers,
will be angry.' He got up and twisted a big flat piece of bark off a
birch-tree and gave it to Taffy. He did this, Best Beloved, to show that
his heart was as white as the birch-bark and that he meant no