ptly
dismissed. He eyed the shaking shoulders gloomily for some seconds;
and then, as the throbbing in the outraged knuckle subsided, a grin of
sympathetic comprehension spread over his own face. He picked up the
bow, sprang to his feet, and strolled over to the edge of a thicket of
young cane.

The girl, lifting her head, peered at him cautiously through her hair.
Her laughter was forgotten on the instant, because she guessed that
his fertile brain was on the trail of some new experiment.

Arriving at the cane-thicket, Grom broke himself half a dozen
well-hardened, tapering stems, from two to three feet in length, and
about as thick at their smaller ends as A-ya's little finger.

These seemed to suggest to him the possibility of better results than
anything he could get from those erratic pebbles.

By this time quite a number of curious spectators--women and children
mostly, the majority of the men being away hunting, and the rest too
proud to show their curiosity--had gathered to watch Grom's
experiments. They were puzzled to make out what it was he was busying
himself with. But as he was a great chief, and held in deeper awe than
even Bawr himself, they did not presume to come very near; and they
had therefore not perceived, or at least they had not apprehended,
those two trifling mishaps of his. As for Grom, he paid his audience
no attention whatever. Now that he had possessed himself of those
slender straight shafts of cane, all else was forgotten. He felt, as
he looked at them and poised them, that in some vital way they
belonged to this fascinating implement which A-ya had invented for
him.

Selecting one of the shafts, he slowly applied the bigger end of it to
the bow-string, and stood for a long time pondering it, drawing it a
little way and easing it back without releasing it. Then he called to
mind that his spears always threw better when they were hurled heavy
end first. So he turned the little shaft and applied the small end to
the bow-string. Then he pulled the string tentatively, and let it go.
The arrow, all unguided, shot straight up into the air, turned over,
fell sharply, and buried its head in a bit of soft ground. Grom felt
that this was progress. The spectators opened their mouths in wonder,
but durst not venture any comment when Grom was at his mysteries.

Plucking the shaft from the earth, Grom once more laid it to the
bow-string. As he pulled the string, the shaft wobbled crazily. With a