The First Days of Man / As Narrated Quite Simply for Young Readers

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The Author desires to express his thanks to Dr. William K. Gregory, of the American Museum of Natural History, as well as to the other Museum authorities, for their courtesy and assistance in the matter of illustrations, and in the preparation of the text. The book does not pretend, of course, to be a strictly scientific work. Many liberties have been taken, in order to render the subject interesting to the youthful mind. Man's early inventions did not come about so simply as is pictured in the various chapters. But the development of civilisation is a romance, and only by so treating it can we hope to enlist the interest of the young reader. It is sufficient that the story rests upon a foundation of fact.

PREFACE FOR PARENTS

Every child, between the ages of five and fifteen, seeks by constant questioning to grasp the fundamental facts upon which our whole fabric of present-day knowledge is based. These facts, painfully gathered by the human race during its many centuries of development, must of necessity be absorbed by the child within the short space of some ten or twelve years. It is a prodigious task, and one in which the growing mind should be afforded every possible assistance. Two courses are usually adopted by parents; one, to dismiss the child's questions with the stock phrase, "You are not old enough to understand," the other, to place in his hands some so-called book of knowledge, containing, it is true, a great mass of information which the child should possess, but usually so badly presented, so jumbled together, that no one fact has any bearing on another, and thus the child is left to turn from "Why the ocean is salt?" to "What is a lightning rod?" without the least understanding of the principles and laws which underly these and all other facts, and link them together in a composite whole.

The writer has followed, with his own children, a method of presenting the steps in the gradual development of man which has produced most gratifying results. Instead of treating each fact, each laboriously accumulated bit of human knowledge, as a mere isolated patch in a crazy-quilt of information, he has attempted to arrange them in logical sequence, to form an interesting pattern, so that as the child's fund of knowledge increases, he feels a deeper and deeper interest in fitting each newly acquired fact into its proper place in his mental picture of things.

The result is that the child is constantly building a structure which he understands. His mass of accumulated knowledge is not heaped together hap-hazard, like a pile of blocks, but each occupies its proper and logical place in a slowly developing whole. He derives pleasure from what would otherwise be hard work, just as he would derive pleasure from fitting together the pieces of a puzzle picture; he finds himself progressing toward some understandable end, and without knowing it, he has not only gathered his facts, and catalogued them, but he has begun to think about them, and their relation to each other, in short, he has begun the process of logical thought, which is the first and greatest step in all education.

In this process of storing away in his brain the accumulated knowledge of the ages, the child's mind passes, with inconceivable rapidity, along the same route that the composite minds of his ancestors travelled, during their centuries of development. The impulse that causes him to want to hunt, to fish, to build brush huts, to camp out in the woods, to use his hands as well as his brain, is an inheritance from the past, when his primitive ancestors did these things. He should be helped to trace the route they followed with intelligence and understanding, he should be encouraged to know the woods and all the great world of out of doors, to make and use the primitive weapons, utensils, toys, his ancestors made and used, to come into closer contact with the fundamental laws of nature, and thus to lay a groundwork for wholesome and practical thinking which cannot be gained in the classroom, or the city streets.

As has been said, the writer has tested the methods outlined above. The chapters in "The Earth's Story" are merely the things he has told his own children. It is of interest to note that one of these, a boy of seven, on first going to school, easily outstripped in a single month a dozen or more children who had been at school almost a year, and was able to enter a grade a full year ahead of them. The child in question is not in the least precocious, but having understood the knowledge he has gained, he is able to make use of it, he has a definite mental perspective, a sure grasp on things, which makes study of any kind easy for him, and progression correspondingly rapid.

Too much emphasis cannot be laid upon the fact that methods of thinking are more important, than the particular things we think about. Right thinking is the cornerstone of all mental development. In the writer's opinion it is the great lack in modern education.

Frederic Arnold Kummer.

Catonsville, Maryland.

CHAPTER I
HOW MOTHER NATURE MADE THE EARTH READY FOR MAN

In the beginning, millions of years ago, before there were any men, or animals, or trees, or flowers, the Earth was just a great round ball of fire, bright and dazzling, like the Sun.

Instead of being solid, as it is now, it was a huge cloud of white-hot gases, whirling through space.

We all know how solids can be turned into liquids, and liquids into gases, by Heat, for we have only to heat a solid piece of ice to turn it into a liquid, water, and if we keep on heating the water, it will turn into a gas, which we call steam. It was the same way with all the solid things on the Earth; Heat had turned them all to gases, like steam.

Then God called Mother Nature to Him and told her to get the Earth ready for Man to live on.

So Mother Nature sent Heat away to melt up some other worlds, and called for his brother, Cold. And Cold came rushing up, his great white wings glittering with frost.

"What can I do for you, Mother Nature?" he asked.

"Blow on the Earth with all your might, Cold," said Mother Nature, "and get it ready for Man to live on." Then she flew away, and as she went she took a piece of the Earth-cloud and rolled it into a ball, and set it spinning in space about the Earth, so that it might cool down later and be the Moon.

When Mother Nature had gone, Cold, who was the spirit of the great outer darkness in which the Sun and Stars move, hovered about the Earth and blew on it with all his might, and as his icy breath swept over the fiery Earth, the hot gases began to get cooler and cooler, and at last they turned back to liquids again. And after that, they got cooler still and began to turn to solids, just as hot melted taffy gets hard and solid when it cools.

It took Cold a very long time to cool the Earth, millions of years, but he did not mind, for he had nothing else to do. So he blew and blew, and after a while a hard solid crust began to form all over the Earth, very rough and uneven, with high hills and mountains sticking up here and there, and between them great wide valleys and plains, all of solid rock.

When Mother Nature came back to look at the Earth, Cold asked her how she liked it.

"You have done very well, Cold," she said, "but it isn't fit for Man to live on yet, for it is too hot, and there isn't any water. Blow some more, and make Rain."

So Cold blew again, on the great white clouds of steam that came rolling up from the hot Earth, and his icy breath cooled the steam and turned it into Rain, just as the steam from a teakettle will turn to little drops of water if you cool it suddenly. And the Rain fell back on the Earth, year after year, until at last it filled up the great wide plains and valleys between the hills and turned them into rivers, and lakes and oceans. But they were boiling hot.

"How do you like it now, Mother Nature?" asked Cold.

"It still isn't fit for anything to live on," said Mother Nature. "You must cool it some more. And tell Rain to make some earth for things to grow in. They can't grow in solid rock."

So Cold blew again, harder than ever, and as the cool Rain fell he said:

"Rain, will you please make some earth for things to grow in?"

"Very well," said Rain. "I will."

So Rain fell for days and months and years on the hot rocks, and cracked and softened them, and each little raindrop as it rushed down the sides of the mountains, carried a bit of soft, crumbling rock down into the valleys, and after a very long time, all these bits of rock-dust which Rain had washed down from the hills formed great wide beds of mud covering the rocky surface of the plains many feet deep.

At the same time that Rain was washing the soft rock down into the valleys to form mud, he also carried down many bits of harder rock, yellow and white, and other colours, like glass. These rocks would not form mud, because they were too hard, but instead they became smooth round pebbles of all sizes, with millions of tiny bits, called sand, and the rivers carried them down to the ocean, and made beautiful clean beaches, as you can see whenever you go to the seashore. And Rain washed many other things out of the rocks and carried them down into the ocean, such as salt. There are great beds of rock-salt all over the Earth, and Rain melted them, and washed the salt into the ocean, and that is why the ocean is salt.

When Mother Nature, who was very busy, came to look at the Earth she smiled, because it pleased her.

"You have done very well, Cold and Rain," she said. "All the rivers and lakes and oceans are full of nice warm water, and all the valleys and plains are covered with soft warm mud, ready for things to grow in. I think I had better speak to the Sun."

So Mother Nature said to the Sun:

"Sun, the Earth is ready for you now. Please make something grow." Then she went away to look after some other worlds she was fixing up.

The Sun looked down at the Earth and smiled as he saw the nice rich beds of mud, and the great wide Ocean.

"Are you ready, Ocean?" he asked.

"Yes," said the Ocean. "I am warm and salt and full of Rain."

"Good. We shall need plenty of Rain," said the Sun. Then he turned to the Air.

"Are you moist and warm, Air?" he asked. "Yes," said the Air. "I am very moist and warm."

"Good," said the Sun. Then he turned to the beds of mud.

"Mud," he said, "you are ugly and black, but you are also full of nice rich chemicals and all sorts of substances we need to make things grow. With the help of Air, and Rain, I am going to cover you with a beautiful carpet of green, so that you will not be ugly any longer."

So the Sun turned his blazing rays on the soft mud and warmed it, and then a wonderful thing happened. Tiny living things, like plants, formed out of the chemicals in the Mud and the Water, and the Air, began to spring up, just as God had long ago planned. They were very small and weak at first, but after a while they grew stronger and stronger, until they had spread all over the Earth, wherever there was mud or dirt for them to grow in. And later on, because the Air was so moist and warm, the way it is in the tropics, and because the Sun was so hot, and there was plenty of Rain, the plants on the Earth grew to be very large and strong. There were ferns, like the little ones we see in flower-pots, as big as trees, and all sorts of tall, rank grasses, and vines, even at the North and South Poles, for in those days, before the Earth had cooled down the way it has now, the Poles were warm, too.

For hundreds and hundreds of thousands of years these great ferns and other plants grew, and died, and fell back into the mud, and as they rotted they made more earth, for other plants to grow in, so that the earth-covering on top of the rocks grew thicker and thicker. In some places the leaves and trunks of these fern-trees got mashed down on each other in thick layers, and became harder and harder, until they turned to coal. Often, in coal mines, the miners will break open a lump of coal and find printed in its surface the exact pattern of the leaf of one of these great fern-trees, just as it fell, millions of years ago.

While all this was going on, Mother Nature, having a little time to spare, came back to take a look at the Earth. It was one of the smallest worlds she had to look after, so she could not give it all her time.

"It is doing very nicely indeed," she said to the Sun. "In eight or ten million years it may be ready for Man. But we must have some fish and other things first. Won't you please attend to it for me, Sun? I am very busy just now looking after some new-born stars in the Milky Way."

"Certainly," said the Sun. "I will attend to it at once." So he turned to the Ocean.

"Ocean," he said, "wouldn't you like to have some fish swimming about in you?"

"Indeed I should," said the Ocean. "I am very big, and I have plenty of room for all the fish you can make."

"Good," said the Sun. "Do you see those tiny spongy growths along the edge of the mud – those funny little things like jelly-fish. I have noticed that some of them haven't quite made up their minds yet whether to be plants, or fish. They have begun to wriggle and squirm about in the mud, and a plant, you know, is supposed to take root and stay in one place. Don't you think we ought to help them to make up their minds?"

"Yes," said the Ocean. "What do you want me to do?"

"Well, suppose you gently wash them loose from the shore, and let them drift for a while in your nice warm salt water. Maybe they will get to like it."

"I'll try it," said the Ocean.

So he did, and after a time the tiny creatures got to like the water so much that they lived in it all the time, instead of just squirming about in the mud. And as thousands of years went by, some of them grew little shell-houses to live in, and some of them fastened themselves to rocks, like oysters, and waited for food to drift right into their mouths, but others grew fins and tails, so that they could swim about in search of something to eat. It took a very long time of course, but after a while, as they grew and grew, and changed and changed, the Ocean came to be full of all sorts of fish, large and small. And the Ocean was very proud of them.

CHAPTER II
THE FISH THAT GOT STUCK IN THE MUD

When Mother Nature came back to take a look at things she was delighted to see how well they were going.

"The trees and plants and grass are doing nicely," she said, "and so are the fish. Now we must get some animals on land, and you, Ocean, must attend to it for me."

"What can I do?" the Ocean asked. "I haven't any animals to put on the land."

"Then you must put some fish there, and I will see that they are turned into animals."

"But fish can't live on the land," said the Ocean. "They haven't any lungs to breathe air with. They can only breathe in the water."

"I know that," said Mother Nature, smiling. "You just do as I tell you, and leave the rest to me."

"What do you want me to do?" asked the Ocean.

"Tell the Wind to blow a great storm, and wash some of your fish up into the salt marshes. And after that, have your waves build a wall of sand along the edge of the marshes, so that the fish and the water you have washed in cannot get out again."

"I will do it," said the Ocean, "but I do not see any sense in it."

"You will, when I have finished," Mother Nature said.

So the Ocean spoke to the Wind, and told him to blow his hardest, and the Wind howled and shrieked with joy and drove the waves before him, and they danced and rolled up into the great wide marshes and carried thousands and thousands of fish with them. Then other waves came, carrying sand, and with the sand they built a wall all along the edge of the marshes, so that the water in the marshes could not get out again, but stayed there, spread out like a great shallow inland sea.

Then Mother Nature said to the Sun:

"Sun, dry up the marshes, and see what happens."

So the Sun blazed down on the marshes and began to dry them up. It took him thousands of years to do it, for they were very large, but he did not mind that, for he had nothing to do but shine.

The fish that had been carried into the marshes had a great time, at first, swimming about in the shallow water quite as much at home as they had been in the Ocean. But after a while, as the marshes began to dry up, some of the fish got caught in the mud on the edges, and they couldn't breathe, with their heads out of water, so they flopped their fins in the mud, and tried to breathe the air, and at last, by pushing with their fins, they managed to get back into the deeper water again. Every time this happened, their fins got a little tougher and stronger, from pushing themselves along in the mud, and their lungs got a little more used to breathing air, instead of water, and by the time thousands of years had gone by, and the water in the marshes was nearly all dried up, the great-great-great-grandchildren of the first fish had got so used to breathing air that they did not mind it a bit, and their fins had got so used to rubbing along on the mud that they weren't fins any longer, but had changed to short, strong little webbed feet.

Mother Nature came and looked at them, and laughed.

"You see, Ocean," she said, "I knew what I was about. Your fish have turned into reptiles. They can live on land as well as in the water, and they have legs and feet."

"How did you do it?" the Ocean asked.

"I did not do it. There is a wonderful law, made by God, which takes care of all such things. No matter what sort of a life any creature is in the habit of living, if you make him live another kind of life, he will change himself to suit it. Your fish couldn't breathe air, when they first tried it, but as soon as they had to breathe it, this law I speak of helped them, so that their lungs began to change, and before long, they had grown a new pair of lungs, fitted to breathe air. It was the same way with their feet; the tender fins they used to swim about in the water with weren't hard and tough enough to scrape against the mud and rocks, so they have grown tougher and stronger fins, like little legs, to get about with. You may be sure that God knew what He was about when He planned the Universe, and made its laws. You just watch these reptiles we have made, and see what happens to them. I'll be back in a million years or so, and see how things are getting along. We'll be ready for Man pretty soon." Then Mother Nature went away to look after some comets that had gotten lost and were dashing madly through space, trying to find out where they belonged.

The Ocean watched the reptiles in the great salt marsh, and saw many wonderful things. As the water in the marsh got lower and lower, being dried up by the Sun, the mud in the marsh got harder and firmer, and the reptiles in it, who lived partly on land and partly in the water, found after a while that there wasn't enough water left for them all to live in, so thousands of them crept inland, away from the sea, and made their homes in the great fern forests, or among the rocks on the bare hillsides and plains. And no matter what sort of a life they lived, they changed to suit it.

Some made their homes in the soft earth along the edges of the marsh, squirming along on their stomachs, and as they did not need feet and legs to squirm with, their feet and legs got smaller and smaller, until they did not have any at all, and they became snakes. Some dug holes in the hard ground with their feet, to make homes for themselves, and from digging and digging, their feet became very strong, with hard, sharp nails on them. And those that lived under the ground all the time, feeding on the roots of plants, lost their eyes and became blind, because they no longer needed eyes to see with, in their dark burrows, just like the moles we see digging under our lawns to-day. Some, like the frogs and the turtles, stayed in the marshes. The frogs made holes in the mud to live in, but the turtles grew hard shells on their backs, so that they could carry their homes about with them, and sleep on the open ground without any fear that other animals could harm them. Some of the reptiles, who liked the water best, crawled out of the marshes into the rivers, and became crocodiles, and alligators, while those that went inland forgot all about the water, and instead of scales, or shiny skins, like the reptiles, they grew hair on their bodies, to protect them and keep them warm. Some, who took to living in the trees, grew sharp claws, and long legs, to climb with, while others, who did not care for climbing, but ran around on their four feet all day, found that after a time their feet grew very hard and strong, and because they did not use their toes any more, they gradually lost them, and grew hoofs, like the horse, or the deer. And some, who liked the trees better than the ground, because there were always plenty of berries and fruits to be found there, stayed in the tree-tops all the time, and never came to the ground. Their front fins had gradually become larger, from flopping them in the air all the time, and at last, after many thousands of years, these fins became wings, and the trees in the forest were full of birds.

The kinds of food the new animals ate had a great deal to do with their shapes and sizes. Some, like the deer, the huge elephants we call mammoths, and the giraffes, who came later, grew very fond of the fresh green leaves of the trees, and ate them most of the time. The giraffe got into the habit of reaching up so far for the tender leaves that his neck grew longer and longer, until now he has the longest neck of any animal in the world.

Some animals, instead of eating leaves, or fruit, learned to eat other animals, and so their teeth and claws got very large and sharp, and their bodies very quick and strong, like the lions and tigers, so that they could jump upon the creatures they ate and tear them to pieces.

Because the Earth was so warm and comfortable, and there was plenty to eat, some of the animals grew to be very large. There were mammoth elephants, two or three times as large as the elephants we see in the circus to-day, with shaggy hair, and long curving tusks to fight with. And there were animals like lizards, some of them almost as big as whales, and others with long necks, and wings like a bat, that flew about over the marshes, eating smaller animals, or the leaves of plants and trees. As the Earth became cooler, many of these early sorts of animals died out, became extinct, as we call it, and we only know that they once lived, because sometimes we find the bones or skeletons of them lying in beds of clay or rock.

All these changes the Ocean watched while Mother Nature was away, and the laws that God had made to govern the Universe filled him with wonder. Even in his own kingdom of the sea he saw strange things – flying fish, and others that grew swords at the ends of their noses, to spear their enemies with. And he even saw, at the very bottom of the sea, where it is always dark, fish that grew little electric lights like the lights of a firefly, by which they were able to see their way about in the darkness.

When the new animals had spread all over the edge of the Earth, Mother Nature came back to see how everything was going.

"Splendid," she said, when she had looked things over. "The plants, and the fish, and the animals are all doing very nicely indeed. Now we are ready for Man."

CHAPTER III
THE APE THAT WALKED LIKE A MAN

When Mother Nature told the Sun that the Earth was at last ready for Man, the Sun did not quite understand her.

"What kind of creature is this Man you are always talking about?" he asked.

"Wait and see," Mother Nature replied, "and while you are waiting, just keep your eye on that funny little animal running about there in the woods – the one with the long arms and legs and tail. I'll be back after a while and tell you more about him." Then she went away.

The Sun looked down at the creature Mother Nature had pointed out to him, and saw a queer little animal, covered with hair, and looking somethink like a very small monkey. This animal liked the fruits and nuts of the trees, and spent most of his time in the tree-tops, but sometimes he would go down to the ground, and run about through the thick jungle forests on all four feet, like a squirrel. But when he wanted food, or when some of the fierce flesh-eating animals attacked him, he would quickly climb up into a tall tree.

The trees in those early forests grew very close together, and the little monkey animals found that they could swing from limb to limb with their arms, and thus travel for miles, from one tree to another, without going down to the ground at all. When they first took to living in the trees they had smooth skins like their parents the reptiles, but as thousands of years passed, hair grew out all over them, to protect them and keep them warm during the chilly rains.

For a long time the Sun watched these creatures, while Mother Nature was away, and he saw them slowly change. For one thing they grew larger and stronger all the time, and came to look more and more like the monkeys and apes we find in the jungle country even to-day. But still they were not apes, but from them, both the apes and Man, are descended.

From their habit of swinging from limb to limb, or from strong vines, like a trapeze performer in a circus, these ape-like animals got more and more in the habit of standing upright, balancing themselves on their hind feet on one limb, while they held on with their fore feet to another limb higher up. But still whenever they went down to the ground they ran about on all fours.

If these ape-like creatures had kept on living in the same sort of a place, where the food grew in high trees, and the forest beneath was filled with savage animals ready to eat them up, they would have kept right on being apes. Indeed, most of them have stayed that way, for we find their descendants living in the jungles of the tropics to-day, not very different from the way they were so many hundreds of thousands of years ago. But about that time Mother Nature stopped by to see how things on the Earth were getting along.

"What are those creatures doing that I spoke to you about?" she asked the Sun.

"Nothing, that I can see," the Sun replied, "except playing about in the tree tops, and eating nuts and fruit."

"That won't do at all," said Mother Nature. "We must get them up into the hills, where things will be different. I see some splendid big valleys over there on the mountain side, where there aren't many wild beasts to eat them, and where the trees and bushes are low, and full of nuts and fruit. It is the very place for them."

"How are you going to get them there?" asked the Sun.

"I think I will have Wind blow up a storm, and set the jungle on fire with Lightning. Then, when the fire drives them up the mountain side, some of them will surely wander into the valleys."

So the Wind blew up a great storm, and the Lightning flashed and set the jungle on fire, and all the beasts ran before the flames, afraid. Some went in one direction and some in another, but a few of the ape-like animals ran into the hills, and here they found a wide, peaceful valley, with a stream running through it, and plenty of food about for them to eat, so they took refuge there.

It was not so warm in the mountain country as it had been in the jungle below, because the higher up in the air we go, the cooler it gets, and we often see snow on the tops of high mountains, even in the middle of summer. And where it is cooler, the trees do not grow so thick and tall and close together as they do in the hot jungle. So the trees and bushes in the valley which the ape-like creatures had found were smaller, and easier to climb than the ones they had been used to, and on many of them the fruit and nuts hung so close to the ground that they could easily be picked without climbing at all. There were no savage animals in the valley, either, for the fierce flesh-eating beasts preferred to stay down in the jungle, where there was always plenty for them to eat.

The ape creatures had an easy time of it in their new home. When they saw that no enemies came to eat them up, and that there was plenty of food all about, fruit, and nuts, and sweet-tasting roots that grew underground, they began to get out of the habit of spending all their time in the trees. But they still ran about on all fours, like the other animals.

When Mother Nature came along she was very much pleased.

"They are beginning to change already," she said. "See how much larger and stronger they are. But I think I might as well take away their tails."

"Why?" said the Sun. "It seems to me their tails are very useful things. Some of the monkeys down in the jungle are beginning to use them to help themselves in climbing about in the trees."

"That is all very well for monkeys," smiled Mother Nature. "They need them, for they are going to be monkeys and live in trees all the rest of their lives. But these animals are different. They do not need to climb trees so much now, for there is plenty of food near the ground, and very few enemies about from whom they must escape."

"But," objected the Sun, "a time may come when there will not be any food near the ground, and who knows when some hungry beasts may wander into the valley and eat all your new creatures up?"

"What you say is very true, Sun," replied Mother Nature. "Those things of which you speak are very likely to happen. But I am going to take away their tails just the same, for it would never do to have them turn into monkeys, like the creatures down in the jungles. These animals are going to be different. For one thing, they must learn to walk about on their hind feet, instead of running on all fours, like the other beasts. And to teach them that, I have got to keep them out of the tree-tops. If they haven't sense enough to find some way to get food, and protect themselves from their enemies, they will surely starve, or be eaten up. But I am certain they will get along."

So the ape creatures lived happily in their wide valley, picking the fruit and nuts from the low bushes and trees, and sleeping safely in grassy beds on the ground, and because Mother Nature did not think they needed tails, she took them away, just as her great laws had taken away the feet of the snake, and the eyes of the mole, when they were no longer needed. As the years went by, and new generations of apes were born, their tails were smaller and smaller, and finally, when a very long time indeed had passed, they were born without any tails at all.

The Sun watched, for hundreds and thousands of years, and he saw that after a while the whole valley came to be full of the new creatures without tails. At first they ran about on all fours, picking food, or climbing the trees, the way they had always done, but because there were so many of them to be fed, it often happened that food on the bushes became scarce near the ground, and the ape creatures had to stand up on their hind legs in order to reach it. After a while, from standing up on their hind legs so much, they got used to it, and came to like it, and walked about that way most of the time.

The Sun saw this strange sight of an animal walking about, upright, on its hind legs, instead of running about on all fours, as all the other animals did, and because he had never seen such a sight before, it surprised him very much indeed.

"Is he a Man, Mother Nature?" he asked.

"No," Mother Nature told him. "He is not a Man yet."

"Why not?" said the Sun.

"Because he has not yet learned to think. He is just like all the other animals so far. But I am going to make him think very soon, and when he does, he will begin to be a Man."

"How are you going to make him think?" the Sun asked.

"I am going to make him hungry."

"Will that make him think?"

"Yes. If he needs food to keep himself alive, and doesn't find it right at his hand, he will have to think of a way to get it, or starve. And I don't believe he will let himself starve. You see, Sun, I have tried the same thing over and over, on a great many other worlds, and the laws that God has made always work."

Then Mother Nature sent for Cold and had a talk with him.

"Cold," she said, "I want you to get to work and cool the Earth off a little more quickly. Those animals down there are much too comfortable."

"Very well," said Cold, flapping his great frosty wings. "Just watch me make them shiver and shake."

Then Mother Nature went away, but as she went, she gave the Earth a little push, very gently, so as not to disturb things too much. And the Earth, which had been spinning around perfectly straight and upright, like a huge top, now leaned over a little, as it went swinging around the Sun.

"What did you do that for, Mother Nature?" asked the Sun.

"I did it, Sun, to make the Seasons. From now on, instead of it being warm all the time, there will be Winter and Summer on the Earth."

"How will tipping the Earth over like that make Winter and Summer?" the Sun asked.

"It is very simple. As long as the Earth swung around you in an upright position, your rays struck upon it just the same way the whole year round. Now that I have pushed it over a little, so that it no longer stands upright, don't you see that for half the year you will shine more strongly on the lower part of the Earth, which is turned toward you, and less strongly on the upper part, which I have tilted away from you. That will make Summer on the lower part of the Earth, where you are shining brightest, and Winter on the upper part, where you are shining least."

"I see," said the Sun, looking down at the Earth. "I can't reach the part that is turned away from me so well."

"Exactly. But six months from now, when the Earth has swung halfway around you, and is on the opposite side of you, the part that is now turned away from you will be turned toward you, and it will be Summer there, while the part that is having Summer now, will then be having Winter."

"It is very interesting," said the Sun, "but I still don't see what you did it for."

"I did it to help make my Man think," said Mother Nature, as she went away.

CHAPTER IV
THE HUNGRY APE AND THE BUNCH OF WILD FRUIT

In the valley where the Ape-Men lived the weather began to get colder and colder, year after year, and they were having a hard time to find enough to eat. There were thousands and thousands of them, now, and there were not enough roots, and berries, and nuts, and birds' eggs to go around, so the Ape-Men were often hungry.

One morning a young ape went out to try to find something for breakfast. He had not eaten a thing since the afternoon before, and then all he had was a handful of dry shrivelled berries, and he was almost starving.

He went all through the valley, hoping to find some of the sweet golden fruit that used to be so plentiful, but he could not find any, for the other apes had picked it all.

At last, climbing over the steep rocks at the upper end of the valley, he came across a tree which bore the kind of fruit he liked so much. At first he thought it was empty, but soon, to his delight, he discovered three large and beautiful bunches far out on the end of a slender limb.

His first impulse was to climb out on the limb and gather the fruit, but when he got about halfway out, the slender limb began to crack, and looking down he saw that it hung over the edge of a high, steep cliff, and that if he fell, he would be dashed to pieces. So he got back off the limb in a hurry, and came down to the ground.

The next thing he did was very stupid, but he had not yet begun to think. He took a stone and threw it at the fruit, as he had often done before, and knocked one of the bunches down. It fell over the edge of the cliff and was dashed to bits on the rocks below, far out of his reach.

By this time the ape had tried all the things he knew, and as he could not think of anything else to do, he sat down and gazed at the fruit for a long time in silence. There were tears in his eyes, for he was very hungry, but he could think of no way to get the fruit.

Mother Nature, who was watching the efforts of her Ape-Man, pointed him out to the Sun.

"You see, Sun," she said, "now that the cold has made food so scarce, my children in the valley are getting very hungry. That poor creature down there actually has tears in his eyes."

"He may be hungry," said the Sun, "but I don't see that it has made him think, the way you said it would."

"He is doing his best," said Mother Nature. "You see, he hasn't much of a brain to think with, but what little he has is trying very hard to find a way to get that bunch of fruit for his breakfast."

The Sun laughed.

"How stupid your Ape-Man is," he said. "There is a splendid big stick lying in the grass right under the tree, with a hook at the end of it where a limb has been broken off. All the foolish creature has to do is to take the stick in his hands, pull the bunch of fruit toward him with it, and he will have his breakfast. It is very simple and easy."

"It may seem easy to you, Sun," said Mother Nature, "but it isn't easy at all to a poor creature who has never thought before in all his life. It has taken millions of years to bring this Ape-Man from the mud and slime of the Ocean, to where he is now, but all that was not so hard, as it is to make him pick up that stick and gather that bunch of fruit. If he does it, he will have had an idea for the first time in his life; he will have begun to think, and from now on he will not be an animal any longer, but a Man."

"Couldn't we help him in some way?" asked the Sun.

Mother Nature looked down at the Ape-Man sitting beneath the tree.

"Suppose you shine very brightly on the stick, Sun," she said. "It may make him notice it."

So the Sun shone very brightly on the stick, but the Ape-Man did not move, but sat gazing at the fruit.

"Wait," said Mother Nature. "I will try something else. There is a snake lying among the roots of the tree. I will make him crawl over the stick and move it a little. Then perhaps the Ape-Man will notice it."

So Mother Nature called the Wind to her, and told him to blow gently against the tree and cause some dead limbs and twigs to fall. The Wind blew, and snapped off some little twigs, and one of them fell near the snake and woke it up. Then the snake squirmed off, and in doing so he moved the stick a little, so that the Ape-Man, whose eyes were very sharp, noticed it as it glistened in the sun. He got up from where he was sitting, and went over to the stick and gazed at it stupidly for quite a while.

"Goodness, how slow he is," said the Sun. "Hasn't the creature any brains at all?"

"Not much," replied Mother Nature, "but I think he has an idea at last – just a faint little idea moving about in his brain like a shadow. See, he is going to pick up the stick."

The Sun looked, and saw the Ape-Man take the stick from the ground. He held it in his hand for several moments, looking at it. Then he looked at the bunch of fruit, and after that, he looked back at the stick again. When he had done this two or three times, he took the stick, and going to the edge of the cliff, poked awkwardly at one of the remaining bunches of fruit.

"He had better look out," said the Sun, "or he will knock that one down and lose it too."

He had no sooner spoken, than the heavy bunch of fruit fell from the limb and dashed to the rocks far below. The Ape-Man gave a long cry of anger and disappointment. Then he began poking at the third and last bunch. But this time he was more careful. After a few moments the hook at the end of the stick caught around the limb, and when the Ape-Man pulled on it, he saw that the fruit began to move toward him. He chattered with joy, at this, and pulled harder and harder, and at last the slender branch bent until the bunch of fruit was right in his hands. Then the Ape-Man dropped the stick, and sitting down on the grass ate the fruit as quickly as he could. After that he threw himself down in the grass and went to sleep.

The Sun, who had been watching him carefully, laughed.

"Such a little thing, to make so much fuss about," he said.

"It may seem a little thing to you, Sun," said Mother Nature, "but it is really the biggest thing you have ever seen in your life. For the first time, you have seen the birth of a Man. He is very slow and clumsy and stupid, now, but after a while his children and his children's children are going to become so strong and cunning and powerful by means of their little brains, that they will rule the Earth, and all the other animals will be afraid of them, and bow down to them. And they will harness the Wind, and the Rivers, and the Lightning, and cause Heat and Cold to do their bidding, and they will defy the Ocean, and conquer the Air, and make even you, Sun, work for them and serve them."

"Ha-Ha!" laughed the Sun. "Those little Ape-Men make me work for them! I don't believe it."

"Wait and see," said Mother Nature. "I know what I am talking about, for I have seen the same thing happen, many times, in other worlds that you know nothing about. And Man will do all these things I tell you of, because God has given him a brain and taught him to think.

"How has God taught him to think?" said the Sun. "It was the fruit, and the snake, and the Wind, and you and I who taught him."

Mother Nature looked at the Sun and frowned.

"Don't you know, you foolish Sun, that God made the fruit, and the snake, and the Wind, and the Earth, and you, and everything else in the Universe, and that if it were not for His laws, you wouldn't be here at all. You had better go on shining, and not make foolish remarks about things you do not understand." Then Mother Nature went away.

The Ape-Man, asleep in the sun, woke up after a time, and feeling thirsty he went down to the stream in the valley to get a drink. But he took the stick he had used to get the fruit, with him. It was a nice stick, straight and strong, like a spear, except for the short hooked limb at the end of it, and the Ape-Man liked it, because it had helped him get something to eat.

When he went back that night to the place in the grass where he usually slept, some of the other Ape-People crowded about him, chattering in surprise at seeing him carrying the stick, for this was something none of them had ever done before. One of the crowd tried to take the stick away from him, but he drew back and hit the other over the head with it and knocked him down. After that the others were afraid of him, and let him alone. And although the Ape-People had no language, and did not know how to speak as we do, they used different kinds of cries and grunts, when they were angry, or cold, or afraid. When anything frightened them, they uttered a cry that sounded like "Adh!", and because they said this whenever the Ape-Man with the club came among them, it grew to be a sort of name for him, and he shouted it out to terrify them, when he made his way through the woods.

After a while, others of the apes got clubs too, and used them to fight with, but except the stones they sometimes threw, Adh's stick was the very first weapon used by Man.

Mother Nature was satisfied with her new Man, so far as he had gone, but she knew that he would have to suffer, if he was to learn, and although she did not like to make him suffer, she had to do it.

"You can blow all you like, Cold," she said. "I want my people to suffer. Pain is not a pleasant thing, but it is only through pain that they will ever learn."

CHAPTER V
THE CAVE AND THE FISH

A cold wind blew through the valley where the Ape-Men lived, and the trees and bushes were brown and bare of fruit. The rays of the Sun, which used to come down straight and hot all day, now shone slantwise, because the Earth had been tipped over, and they seemed to have very little warmth. The days, too, were shorter, and the nights were longer, and cold. All the Ape-Men were obliged to huddle together in their beds of grass to keep warm. They did not know that Mother Nature had tipped over the Earth to make Winter and Summer, but they were very uncomfortable, and they did not like it.

But the worst thing of all was, that there was almost nothing to eat. Always before there had been some kind of fruit, or berries, all the year round. Now they were able to find only a few nuts, and the sweet bulbs which grew at the roots of certain plants, and the smaller animals got most of these. Even the nesting birds they sometimes caught and ate had gone where it was warmer. Pretty soon there was nothing to eat at all, and the Ape-Men were starving.

Adh, who had begun to think a little, puzzled about this for a long time, but could not understand it. Of course, if the Ape-People had stored up food, during the Summer, they would have had something to eat, when the cold weather came, but they had never thought of doing such a thing, because there had usually been enough to eat, before. Now they did not know what to do, and as they could no longer find any food in the valley, they gradually wandered off, down toward the low, hot jungle-lands from which they had come. Here they found things to eat, but they also found lions and great sabre-toothed tigers and other fierce beasts to eat them, and as they had long ago forgotten their old trick of living and sleeping and seeking safety from their enemies in the tree-tops, it was not long before they were all eaten up.

When the Sun saw this, he was very much surprised.

"Look, Mother Nature," he said. "Your Ape-People have all been eaten up."

"You are wrong, Sun," replied Mother Nature. "Adh and the ape woman he has taken for his wife are still in the valley. He was the only one who had learned to think, so the others were of no use and I had to get rid of them. Before long the children of Adh and his wife will fill the valley with a race of Men, and from there they will spread all over the Earth."

Adh did not go with the others for two reasons. The first was that they did not like him, because he made them afraid of him, and so they went away without him. The second reason was, that Adh's wife had a tiny baby boy to nurse and take care of, and it was easier, to stay where they were, than to wander off through the jungles. Now that all the others had gone, Adh managed to find enough roots and nuts to keep himself and his little family alive.

Soon after the others had left, it began to rain, and every day the cold rain beat down on Adh and his family and drenched them. Even their grass nest under the boughs of a thick tree, was turned into a pool of mud and water, on which the sun never shone to dry it and keep it warm. Cold and Rain were making the new Ape-Man suffer, as Mother Nature had told them to do. Adh, as he wandered about the valley hunting for a little food, tried very hard to think of a way to keep himself and his family comfortable, but no new ideas came to him. Occasionally he managed to catch a young bird, which he greedily devoured, but they were very scarce and hard to find.

"Look at the stupid creature," laughed the Sun, peeping for a moment through the heavy rain-clouds. "He hasn't sense enough to find a hole in the rocks, where he would be dry and warm."

Mother Nature did not answer. Instead, she waited until she saw Adh climbing over the rocks at the upper end of the valley, searching for the nests of wild birds he sometimes found there. Then she called Cold to her.

"Blow your hardest for a few moments, Cold," she said.

Cold puffed out his cheeks and blew a freezing blast down the valley, and all the falling drops of Rain turned to bits of ice, like hail, which cut Adh's shoulders and arms and back, and hurt him, in spite of his thick coat of hair. To escape from the storm, he ran beneath some overhanging rocks, and suddenly found himself in a little cave, its floor covered with soft dry moss. Here he was quite safe from the hail and rain, and he was very much pleased.

While he was standing in the cave, Adh suddenly had another thought. He wished that his wife and child were with him. And no sooner had he thought of them than he dashed out of the cave, and forgetting all about the hail and rain, he ran to the nest in the grass where they lay trying to keep warm, and brought them as fast as he could back to the nice dry cave. And this cave was Man's very first home.

"You see," said Mother Nature to the Sun, "whenever I want my new Man to think, I send him some kind of trouble. If I hadn't made him hungry, he would never have got the idea of pulling the bunch of fruit out of the tree with his stick, and now, because I made him cold and wet, he has found himself a home."

"What are you going to make him do next?" asked the Sun.

"Wait and see," said Mother Nature. "But don't forget that I have given him a wife and child to think about, now, and he will do more, on their account, than he would ever do, alone, for in his simple way, he loves them."

"What is Love?" asked the Sun.

"It is one of the great laws of the Universe, that God has made, a feeling, or instinct, that causes all His creatures to want a mate to live with, and thus have children. If it were not for this law, there would never be any children, and all the living creatures on the Earth would disappear in a very little while."

"This Love must be a very queer thing," said the Sun. "I do not understand it."

"And yet, Sun, you will see, some day, that it is the most wonderful law that God has made. Without it, Man would never amount to anything at all. From now on my creature Adh is going to think of doing a great many things, because of his wife and child, that he would not think of doing without them."

When Adh got his wife and child into the cave, they were no longer cold and wet, but they were still very hungry, and all day long the Ape-Man wandered through the valley, looking for something to eat. Sometimes, when all he could find was a few dried berries, or a handful of little grains from the tall grasses that grew here and there, he would carry them back to his wife, instead of eating them himself. In the past, before he had any wife, he would never have thought of such a thing as going hungry for the sake of some one else, but now it was different; he thought of his wife and child.

At last there came a day when from morning to night he could not find a single scrap of food. Everything was gone, and he was weak from hunger. He went down to the shore of the little lake that lay in the bottom of the valley, and throwing himself on the ground, drank as much water as he could, to fill his empty stomach. Then he sat up and stared at the cold, grey sky, not knowing what to do. Presently he saw a great bird, like a fish-hawk, swoop down to the surface of the lake, and rise a moment later with a shining fish in its claws. Then, as Adh watched, another hawk flew up and tried to take the fish away from the first one. The two birds screamed and tore at each other, and as they fought, the fish the first one had been carrying fell to the ground close to where Adh was sitting.

He walked over to where it lay, and picked it up, more from curiosity than anything else, for he had never thought of such a thing as eating a fish. For thousands of years his parents before him had eaten nothing but fruit, and roots, and nuts, with occasionally an egg or a young bird, and he had always done just as they had done. He did not know that the flesh of fish, or animals, was good to eat.

As he held the fish in his hands, he smelt the fresh blood from the wound made by the claws of the fish-hawk and it made him hungrier than ever. Half starved as he was, he could have eaten anything, and without thinking any more about it, he tore the fish apart and put a piece of it in his mouth. It tasted strange to him, and he did not like it, but his stomach was very empty, and almost before he knew what he was about, he had eaten the whole fish.

After that, he felt better, and sat on the edge of the lake for a long time, watching the fish swimming about in the shallow water. Then he thought of his wife. She would want something to eat, too. How could he get another fish? He tried for a long time to catch one in his hands, but they were too quick for him.

Then he thought of his club, and taking it in his hands, he did his best to hit one of the fish with it, but every time he failed. Once he struck so hard that the club was splintered against a rock, and the heavy end of it broken off. Adh looked at the piece left in his hands and felt sad, for he loved his club, and always carried it about with him. Pretty soon he noticed, as he felt the broken and splintered end of the stick, that it was very sharp, and he thought to himself, why could he not drive the sharp end into the back of one of the fish, as it lay in the mud. It took him a long time to do this, but by lying among the rushes, and keeping very quiet, he finally succeeded. Reaching down, he seized the fish he had speared in his hands.

"Look!" said Mother Nature to the Sun. "My new Man has made himself a spear."

When Adh gave the fish to his wife, she did not understand what he wanted her to do with it, but finally, by chattering, and making signs, he got her to eat a little of it. The new kind of food made her rather sick, at first, but after a while, as there was nothing else to eat, she made a meal of it, and from then on Adh went to the lake every day and speared a fish or two for their dinner. By the time the cold rainy season was over, and the warm weather had come again, he and his wife had grown quite used to eating fish, and had even got to like it.

Mother Nature watched all this and smiled to herself.

"See how quickly my Ape-Man is learning to think," she said to the Sun. "Already he has found a home, and taught himself to get food from the rivers and lakes, instead of from the trees and bushes, and he has made himself a spear. I knew he was not going to let himself starve."

"What is he going to do next?" asked the Sun, who was getting very much interested in the funny little Ape-Man.

"I think I shall teach him to fight," Mother Nature said.

"To fight? What for?"

"So that he can protect himself against his enemies. When I took away his tail, you said he would either starve, or be eaten up. Well, he hasn't starved, and I can't let him be eaten up. He will have plenty of enemies, before he gets through, and if he doesn't know how to fight, they will destroy him."

"Will this thing you call Love help him to fight?" asked the Sun.

"Yes. He will fight twice as hard, because of his love for his wife and child. If you don't believe it, just wait and see."

CHAPTER VI
ADH'S FIRST FIGHT

Wherever he went, Adh carried about with him a club. He had found himself a new one, now that his first was broken, and this new club was short and heavy, with a great hard knob on the end of it, as big as his two fists. He had broken it from the limb of a tree, and rubbed and polished it on the rocky floor of the cave until it was hard and smooth. Besides the club, he had made himself a long straight spear, with the end of it rubbed to a point against the rocks. He used the spear for getting fish, and had become so skilful that he hardly ever missed them.

One night, when the cold rains were over, and the trees in the valley were covered with fresh new leaves, Adh was sitting on a flat rock in front of his cave, eating a large fish.

He was not thinking of anything, except how good the fish tasted, when suddenly his quick ears heard a sound, and looking up he saw a great beast, like a bear, covered with hair, making its way slowly up the rocky hillside toward him.

It was a huge, clumsy animal, much larger than himself, but it walked on all fours, snuffing the air as though it smelt the fish Adh had been eating. The Ape-Man had never seen such a creature before.

The hair on Adh's neck stood straight up, for he was very much frightened, and his first thought was to run away as fast as his legs would carry him. Then he remembered his wife and child, lying asleep inside the cave, and instead of running away, he picked up some heavy stones and threw them at the oncoming enemy.

One of the stones hit the beast on the shoulder, but instead of stopping, it gave a grunt of rage and came on faster than ever, straight toward the cave.

Adh picked up his club from where it lay on the rock beside him and stood before the door of the cave, chattering and screaming with anger and fear. His wife, awakened by the noise, came out of the cave and stood just behind him, holding the young one in her arms, and also uttering shrill cries.

The creature's black snout, with small fiery red eyes, came slowly forward until Adh could feel its breath on his face. Then, just as the beast started to rear up on its hind legs, Adh raised his club, and springing forward, struck the animal across the nose with all his might.

The Ape-Man was very strong, and his blow was a terrible one. The great beast gave a howl of pain, and rearing up, tried to reach Adh with its huge claws. But Adh's fear had all left him, now. His eyes gleamed, and his mouth foamed with rage. Raising his club he struck again and again, until the beast, with blood streaming from its crushed snout, turned tail and ran away down the rocky hillside. There was a great deep wound in Adh's breast, where the claws of the beast had torn him, but he hardly knew it, in his joy at winning the fight. He pounded his clenched fist on his chest until the sound echoed through the valley, and uttered shrill cries of defiance.

His wife came up to him and stroked and patted him proudly, chattering all the time with pleasure. This made Adh feel very happy, and he pounded his club on the rocks and grunted with delight. He had made this great beast fear him, and the thought filled him with pride.

That night, as he lay on the floor of the cave, a terrible fear came over him. What if the creature should come back again, while he was asleep, and carry him off. He got up, and crouched for a long time in the door of the cave, his club ready in his hands. After a while he grew sleepy and wished that there were something across the cave door to keep the beast out, in case he came back. The thought worried him so much that at last he went out, and getting four or five large stones, rolled them to the mouth of the cave, and after crawling inside, fixed them so that the hole by which he crept in and out was almost blocked. After that he went to sleep without feeling afraid.

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