hey worked together. If one man stopped when
it was his turn to sing, the other did not know what to do. Besides
marking the time, the song helped the men to measure the force of each
blow. It helped them to strike off tiny flakes so as not to break the
point. So, at length, the Cave-men began to think that the song they
sang was a charm.

While the men struck off large flint flakes, Fleetfoot played not far
away. He played while they hafted long narrow flakes for knives, but
when they began to chip spearheads, he came and watched them at their
work. He listened to the song of Scarface and Straightshaft, while
they shaped a fine spearhead.

At length the spearhead was ready for the finishing touches. So
Straightshaft dropped his hammer-stone and picked up a queer little
tool. He called it a flaker, and he used it to press off tiny flakes
from the beautiful point.

[Illustration: _Straightshaft using a flaker._]

When Straightshaft had finished, he dropped the flaker and Fleetfoot
picked it up. And he asked Straightshaft if he might use it to press
off little flakes.

Straightshaft let him try, but Fleetfoot was not strong enough to
press off hard flint flakes. So he listened to the story that Scarface
told of the young man who first made a flaker.

Holding up a little bone flaker, Scarface turned to the men and said:
"When I was a boy, no one pressed off flakes of flint. No one had a
flaker. We hammered off flint flakes.

"One summer when there were plenty of salmon, the neighboring clans
had a great feast. Nimble-finger came. I saw him. I heard him speak.
The third day of the feast I saw him flake flint."

[Illustration: _A flaker._]

As Scarface went on he told how Nimble-finger invented the flaker. He
did it one day when he was making a bone handle for a knife. When he
was scraping a bone with a flint scraper he happened to press off a
flint flake.

Nimble-finger did not know how it happened. He tried again and again.
At last he pressed off another flake; and this time he knew that he
did it by pressing the point of the bone against one edge of the
flint.

Nimble-finger never finished that bone-handled hunting knife. But he
showed the people how to make a flaker. He became an inventor; for he
gave the world a tool it had never had before.

When the people returned from the feast many forgot about the flaker.
Others longed for delicate spear points like those Nimble-finger made.
So, at length, they tr