I see
a difficulty. SO means "come and have dinner," but sho means the
drying-poles where we hang our hides.'

'Horrid old drying-poles!' said Taffy. 'I hate helping to hang heavy,
hot, hairy hides on them. If you drew the snake and egg, and I thought
it meant dinner, and I came in from the wood and found that it meant I
was to help Mummy hang the two hides on the drying-poles, what would I
do?'

'You'd be cross. So'd Mummy. We must make a new picture for sho. We must
draw a spotty snake that hisses sh-sh, and we'll play that the plain
snake only hisses ssss.'

'I couldn't be sure how to put in the spots,' said Taffy. 'And p'raps
if you were in a hurry you might leave them out, and I'd think it was
so when it was sho, and then Mummy would catch me just the same. No! I
think we'd better draw a picture of the horrid high drying-poles their
very selves, and make quite sure. I'll put them in just after the
hissy-snake. Look!' And she drew this. (10.)

'P'raps that's safest. It's very like our drying-poles, anyhow,'
said her Daddy, laughing. 'Now I'll make a new noise with a snake and
drying-pole sound in it. I'll say shi. That's Tegumai for spear, Taffy.'
And he laughed.

'Don't make fun of me,' said Taffy, as she thought of her picture-letter
and the mud in the Stranger-man's hair. 'You draw it, Daddy.'

'We won't have beavers or hills this time, eh?' said her Daddy, 'I'll
just draw a straight line for my spear.' and he drew this. (11.)

'Even Mummy couldn't mistake that for me being killed.'

'Please don't, Daddy. It makes me uncomfy. Do some more noises. We're
getting on beautifully.'

'Er-hm!' said Tegumai, looking up. 'We'll say shu. That means sky.'

Taffy drew the snake and the drying-pole. Then she stopped. 'We must
make a new picture for that end sound, mustn't we?'

'Shu-shu-u-u-u!' said her Daddy. 'Why, it's just like the
round-egg-sound made thin.'

'Then s'pose we draw a thin round egg, and pretend it's a frog that
hasn't eaten anything for years.'

'N-no,' said her Daddy. 'If we drew that in a hurry we might mistake it
for the round egg itself. Shu-shu-shu! 'I tell you what we'll do. We'll
open a little hole at the end of the round egg to show how the O-noise
runs out all thin, ooo-oo-oo. Like this.' And he drew this. (12.)

'Oh, that's lovely! Much better than a thin frog. Go on,' said Taffy,
using her shark's tooth. Her Daddy went on drawing, and his hand shook
with incitement. He went on t