g time looking at the mammoth and talking about how big he was. And
some told of other mammoths that had got stuck in swamps and of how
they had found them.

Thorn sat down on the side of a hill and watched the people coming.
The arms and faces of the men and women were painted in stripes of red
or yellow. All the cave men that Thorn knew were there, and many that
he did not know. Before long his own family came.

Soon after that the men began to cut great pieces of meat from the
mammoth. They gave them to the women to roast. The women made fires
and put stones in them to get hot. They dug holes in the ground and
rolled into them some of the hot stones. Next they threw meat upon the
hot stones and rolled more hot stones upon it. Then they covered the
holes with dirt and built fires upon them. While the meat was
roasting, the women went over to watch the men playing.

The men were talking together in a crowd. A man named Crowfoot stood
out and shouted, "I can climb a tree faster than any man here!"

"No, no!" shouted five or six men who jumped up and ran to trees.

"Go!" called a man.

They all jumped as high as they could and then climbed very fast, hand
over hand, feet and legs pushing as if a wounded bear were after them.
Crowfoot reached the top first.

Everybody shouted, "Crowfoot! Crowfoot!"

Then a man with big arms stood out and said, "I am best man in throwing
the spear!"

A dozen men snatched spears and ran out. Everybody stood where he
could see. The men with spears stood far back from a tree. One threw.
His spear struck the tree, but fell. Everybody laughed. The next man
threw.

His spear missed the tree. Everybody yelled and roared. Strongarm
threw. His spear struck and stood in the tree shaking.

"Strongarm!" shouted the people.

Other men threw, whose spears stood in the tree. Then those men ran
and pulled out their spears and stood farther back and threw again.
Each man threw many times. Strongarm's spear stood oftenest in the
tree from the longest distance.

[Illustration: Throwing a spear]

"Strongarm's eye is best!" the others shouted. "His arm is strongest!"

After that a young man cried, "I have flying feet! Who will run with
me?"

"I will!"

"I will!"

And young men ran out and stood beside him, and all the people watched.

The race started. The young men ran lightly, like deer. They skimmed
the ground like swallows. Some of them ran all the way sid