Adambeforelondon00londrich

J:Ak.iX.

University of California

•

Berkeley

The Peter and Rosell Harvey Memorial Fund

^*^

/fx/.

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BEFORE ADAM

:Tti^><^o.

I

pursued her from tree to

tree.''

flDacmUlan'0 Colonial Xibrary

BEFORE

ADAM

BY

JACK LONDON AUTHOR OF THE CALL OF THE WILD," "THE SEA WOLF," " PEOPLE OF THE ABYSS," " WHITE FANG," ETC., ETC.

WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS BY CHARLES LIVINGSTON BULL

Uontron

MACMILLAN AND NEW

CO.,

YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1907 No.

Limited

ssi

All rights rtserved

Copyright,

1906,

By jack LONDON. Copyright, 1906, 1907,

By

the RIDGWAY COMPANY. Copyright, 1907,

By

the MACMILLAN COMPANY.

Set up and electrotyped.

this Edition

is

Published February, 1907.

intended for circulation only in India

and

the British Colonies

" These Remember

are our ancestors, that as surely as

and

we

their history is our history.

one day swung

down

out of

the trees and walked upright, just as surely, on a far earlier

day, did

we

crawl up out of the sea and achieve our

adventure on land."

first

ILLUSTRATIONS **I pursued her from tree to tree**.

.

.

Frontispiece FAGS

**

The

next instant, with clashing tusks, the boar drove

......

past underneath**

" He

sprang up the

upward way**

"The

Fire-

Man

bluff, snarling as

.

.

peered up

.

at

him and

he clawed his .

.

circled

.

85

" Well we knew

them, running

the grass-eating animals

'

in packs, the terror

*

.

.

.

of

.105

"It was Red-Eye*'

**

too,

Large

143

were Fire-Men, we thought**

trees

71

around

the tree**

*'We,

29

are about us, and

hang gray filaments

of moss "

from .

their .

.

.167

branches .

•233

^

I*-J

— \ X.sT^. A^ ^^

V «^

><>

v-'^X^. N^V"

^

*-

-c

C^ 5>c =>^

111

^=^^^> ^

*^^

ii

CHAPTER

PICTURES! before

Pictures!

I

learned, did I

I

wonder whence

came the multitudes of thronged

my

dreams;

the like of which

a-day

I

were pictures

for they

had never seen

making of my dreams

that

pictures

wake-

in real

They tormented my

life.

Often,

Pictures!

childhood,

a procession of nightmares

me

was

dif-

kind, a creature unnatural

and

and a

little

later convincing

ferent

from

my

that I

accursed.

In

my

days only did

happiness.

— and

My all

the

!

I

any measure of

marked the

nights

such fear

no man of

I attain

make bold

men who walk

to state that

the earth with

me ever suffer fear of like kind and my fear is the fear of long ago, the rampant of the

in the

reign of fear

degree.

For

fear that

was

Younger World, and

Younger World.

youth

In short, the fear that

reigned supreme in that period

Mid-Pleistocene.

in the

known

as the

BEFORE ADAM

2

What do

mean

I

necessary before

of my dreams.

I

can

I

write this,

Otherwise,

all

could you

little

know

I

know

so well.

the beings and happenings

of that other w^orld

rise

phantasmagoria, and

I

would be rhymeless and

up before me

know

in vast

that to you they

reasonless.

What to you the friendship of Lop-Ear, warm lure of the Swift One, the lust and atavism

of Red-Eye

rence and ^^y

is

you of the substance

tell

of the meaning of the things

As

explanation

see

I

?

?

A

screaming

no more.

And

the the

incohe-

a screaming

incoherence,

likewise,

the doings of the Fire People and

the Tree

Peo-

and the gib-

ple,

bering

councils

of

For you know

the horde.

not the peace of the cool caves in the

cliffs,

the cir-

cus of the drinking-places at

the

end of the day.

You have

never

felt

the

BEFORE ADAM bite of the

morning wind

the taste of

is

It

would be

— I

in

As

you

to

make

made mine, through my

as I

a boy I

was very It

was

From my

different.

nor

your mouth.

in

better, I dare say, for

my waking hours.

was

in the tree-tops,

young bark sweet

your approach, childhood.

3

boys

like other

in

my

sleep that

earliest recollection

my sleep was a period of terror. Rarely were my dreams tinctured with happiness. As a rule, they were stuffed with fear

— and

so strange and alien that

had no ponderable

No

quality.

waking

me

in

life

my

fear that

it

I

with a fear

experienced in

my

resembled the fear that possessed

sleep.

It

that transcended

For instance,

all

I

rather, to

whom

domain.

Yet

I

was of

my

was a

a quality

and kind

experiences. city boy, a city child,

the country

was an unexplored

never dreamed of

did a house ever occur in any of

cities;

my

nor

dreams.

my human kind of my sleep. I,

Nor, for that matter, did any of ever break through the wall

who had

seen trees only in parks and illustrated

books, wandered in

nable forests.

And

my

sleep through intermi-

further, these

dream

trees

BEFORE ADAM

4

my vision.

were not a mere blur on sharp and

distinct.

I

was on terms of practised

intimacy with them. twig

Well do ing

the leaves

me

remember the

I

that

life

saw every branch and

I

saw and knew every

I

;

I

saw an oak

different leaf.

first

time

tree.

As

and branches and

my wak-

in

looked at

I

gnarls,

with distressing vividness that

it

came

to

had seen

I

same kind of tree many and countless times

that in

my

on

in

time

So

sleep.

my I

life,

was not

I

surprised,

saw them,

before,

night, in

still

later

to recognize instantly, the first trees

such as the spruce, the

yew, the birch, and the laurel. all

They were

I

had seen them

and was seeing them even then, every

my

sleep.

This, as you have already discerned, violates the

first

law of dreaming, namely, that

dreams one

waking

life,

sees only

anything of which life.

My

life.

In

violated this law.

were

what he has seen

in his

or combinations of the things he has

seen in his waking

ing

in one's

I

all

dreams

had knowledge

dream

lives apart,

my

But

life

and

my I

dreams

never saw

in

my wak-

my waking

with not one thing in

life

common

;

BEFORE ADAM save myself.

somehow

5

was the connecting

I

link that

lived both lives.

my

Early in

came from

childhood

learned that nuts

I

the grocer, berries from the fruit

man

but before ever that knowledge was mine, in

my

dreams

them and

picked nuts from trees, or gathered

I

ate

them from the ground underneath same way

trees,

and

vines

and bushes.

in the

from

I ate berries

This was beyond any ex-

perience of mine. I shall

never forget the

berries served

on the

there leaped up in

wherein eating

me

my

fill

my mind

I

raised

it

to

them,

memories of dreams

taste.

sand times

in

.?

my

I

filled

Nor was I

I

I

set before

my

spoon,

knew

just

disappointed.

had tasted a thou-

sleep.

Long

before I had heard of the

existence of snakes, I sleep.

mother

my mouth

was the same tang that

my

saw blue-

had never seen

I

My

of them.

how they would

in

I

yet, at the sight of

a dish of the berries.

Snakes

time

had wandered through swampy land

I

but before

It

table.

and

blueberries before,

first

was tormented by them

They lurked

for

me

in the forest

BEFORE ADAM leaped up, striking,

glades;

squirmed

under

my

feet;

through the dry grass or across

off

naked patches of rock; or pursued me

into the

tree-tops, encircling the trunks with their great

shining bodies, driving

or

farther

me

higher and higher

and farther out on swaying

.

and

crackling branches, the

ground a dizzy tance

Snakes

dis-

beneath

me.

— with

their

!

forked tongues, their

beady eyes and their I

glit-

termg

and

their rattling

hissing

not already

know

on that day of my

them

— did

far too well

circus

first

saw the snake-charmer

They were

scales,

lift

when

them up

I ?

old friends of mine, enemies rather,

that peopled

my

nights with fear.

Ah, those endless haunted gloom

!

forests,

For what

and

their horror-

eternities

have

wandered through them, a timid, hunted

I

crea-

ture, starting at the least sound, frightened of

my own

shadow, keyed-up, ever

ant, ready

on the instant

\

alert

to dash

and

away

vigil-

in,

mad

;

BEFORE ADAM my

flight for

manner of and

it

was

For

life.

I

fierce life that

7

was the prey of

all

dwelt in the forest,

in ecstasies of fear that I fled before

the hunting monsters.

When circus.

I

I

was

came home from

sick

it

from peanuts and pink lemonade. you.

As we entered the animal

roaring shook the

from

air.

my father's and

the entrance. all

My

father caught

first

— but

not

Let

me

hoarse

tent, a

my hand

I tore

with people,

loose

down

fell

was screaming with

the time I

tell

dashed wildly back through

I collided

and

my

years old I went to

five

me and

soothed me.

pointed to the crowd of people, the roaring, and cheered

terror.

me

all

He

careless of

with assurances

of safety. Nevertheless,

it

was

in fear

and trembling,

and with much encouragement on I

at last

approached the

knew him on terrible

one

!

The

the instant.

And on my

the memories of

shining on

lion's

my

tall grass,

his part, that

Ah,

cage.

beast

!

I

The

inner vision flashed

dreams,

— the midday sun

the wild bull grazing quietly,

the sudden parting of the grass before the swift

BEFORE ADAM rush of the tawny one, his leap to the bull's

back, the crashing and the bellowing, and the

crunch crunch of bones ; or again, the cool quiet of the water-hole, the wild horse up to his knees

and drinking

and then the tawny one

softly,

always the tawny one

!

— the

—

leap, the scream-

ing and the splashing of the horse, and the crunch

and yet again, the sombre

crunch of bones; twilight

and the sad

silence of the

and then the great full-throated a

trump of doom, and

swift

shrieking and chattering

among

am trembling with

many

shrieking and chattering

At the

sight

of him,

fear

the trees, and

am

one of the

among

the trees.

and

became enraged.

I

my

danced up

the insane

it

helpless,

bars of his cage, teeth at him,

roar, sudden, like

upon

I, too,

end of day,

within the I gritted

and down, screaming an

incoherent

mockery and

making

antic

faces.

He

re-

sponded, rushing against the bars

"

and

'^^'^^^HiiW^'^'^

'

?

^ 'f

BEFORE ADAM roaring back at

me

9

Ah,

impotent wrath.

his

he knew me, too, and the sounds

made were

I

the sounds of old time and intelligible to him.

My ill,"

said

parents were frightened.

my

said

my

father.

"He

mother. I

is

is

hysterical,"

never told them, and they

Already had

never knew.

**The child

I

developed reticence

concerning this quality of mine, this semi-disassociation of personality as I think I fied in calling I

am

justi-

it.

saw the snake-charmer, and no more of the

circus did I see that night.

I

was taken home,

nervous and overwrought, sick with sion of

my

real life

by that other

the invalife

my

of

dreams. I I

have mentioned

my reticence. Only once did

confide the strangeness of it

was a boy old.

— my chum;

all

and we were eight years

From my dreams

I

reconstructed for

pictures of that vanished world in believe I once lived.

He

to another.

I told

which

him of the

him I

do

terrors

of that early time, of Lop-Ear and the pranks

we

played, of the gibbering councils, and of the

Fire People and their squatting places.

BEFORE ADAM

10

He

me

laughed at me, and jeered, and told

tales of ghosts

and of the dead that walk

But mostly did he laugh

night.

fancy.

I told

harder.

I

my

at

tales to

feeble

him more, and he laughed the

swore

in all earnestness that these

things were so, and he began to look

upon me

amazing garblings of my

Also, he gave

queerly.

at

our playmates, until

began to look

all

upon me queerly. It

was a

lesson.

I

bitter experience,

was

different

from

but

my

I

my

learned

kind.

I

was

abnormal with something they could not understand,

and the

telling of

which would cause only

When

misunderstanding.

the stories of ghosts

and goblins went around, smiled grimly to myself. of fear, and

—

knew

that

I

I

kept

quiet.

I

thought of my nights

mine were the

real things

real as life itself, not attenuated vapors

and

surmised shadows.

For me no

terrors resided in the thought of

bugaboos and wicked ogres.

The

fall

through

leafy branches

and the dizzy heights; the snakes

that struck at

me

as I

in chattering flight;

dodged and leaped away

the wild dogs that hunted

BEFORE ADAM me

across

II

open

the

spaces to the tim

ber

— these were concrete

terrors

and

actual,

hap-

penings and not imaginings, things of

the Hving flesh

and

of sweat and blood.

Ogres and bugaboos

and

I

had been happy

bed-fellows, comparer

these

terrors

their

bed with

out

my

now, as

that

me

through-

childhood, and that I write this, full

still

bed with me,

of years.

!

CHAPTER HAVE

I

human

a

even,

I

my own had

and

kind.

As

dreaming, that

by haunting

I

I

poignantly the

a very

my

This thought obsessed

my

life

for years

if

only

be saved

had

thought

dreaming, and

this I

my

take

two

as evidence of a point of contact

disassociated

—

human and

dence of the merging of

two

child,

little

should be saved from

iterate that I

my

became

I

could find but one man,

if I

terrors.

could find that one

midst of

fact

never saw

should be surrounded no more

every night of

must

felt

I

a feeling, in the midst of the horror

only one human,

I

dreams this

early,

of my dreaming, that

me

Of

being.

aware very

lack of

my

said that in

II

parts

of

me.

it

I

in the

as an evi-

personalities,

between the

My

dream

personality lived in the long ago, before ever

man,

as

we know him, came to be

;

and

and wake-a-day personality projected 12

my other itself,

to

BEFORE ADAM

13

the extent of the knowledge of man's existence,

my

into the substance of

dreams.

Perhaps the psychologists of the book find fault with

my way

of using the phrase,

"disassociation of personality."

use of

way

it,

yet

am

will

compelled to use

I it

in default of a better phrase.

I

know in

their

my own

take shelter

behind the inadequacy of the English language.

And now to the explanation

of my use, or misuse,

of the phrase. It

was not

till

I

was

a

young man,

at college,

that I got any clew to the significance of

dreams, and to the cause of them.

Up

my

to that

time they had been meaningless and without

apparent causation.

But

at college I discovered

evolution and psychology, and learned the ex-

planation of various strange mental states and

For instance, there was the

experiences.

through-space dream

—

the

experience, one practically

experience, to

This, ory.

who

It

all

falling-

commonest dream

known, by

first-hand

men.

my professor told

me, was a

racial

mem-

dated back to our remote ancestors

lived

in

trees.

With them, being

tree-

BEFORE ADAM

14

was an ever-

dwellers, the liability of falling

present menace. all

Many

lost their lives that

of them experienced terrible

selves

by clutching branches

falls,

way;

saving them-

as they fell

toward

the ground.

Now

a terrible

fall,

averted in such fashion,

was productive of shock.

Such shock was pro-

ductive of molecular changes in the cerebral cells.

These molecular changes were trans-

mitted to the cerebral in

short,

and

I,

cells

of progeny, became,

Thus, when you

memories.

racial

asleep or dozing off to sleep, fall through

space and awake to sickening consciousness just

we

before

strike,

what happened

we

remembering

are merely

to our arboreal ancestors,

and

which has been stamped by cerebral changes into the heredity of the race.

There there

is

instinct

is

nothing strange in

this,

any more than

anything strange in an is

merely a habit that

the stuff of our heredity, that

instinct.

stamped into

is

is

all.

noted, in passing, that in this falling is

so familiar to you and

never strike bottom.

To

me and strike

An

It will

be

dream which all

of us,

we

bottom would

BEFORE ADAM

Those of our arboreal ancestors

be destruction.

who

15

struck bottom died forthwith.

shock of their

fall

was communicated

True, the to the cere-

bral cells, but they died immediately, before they

You and

could have progeny. I

from those that did not

why you and

I,

in

strike

I are

descended

bottom; that

is

our dreams, never strike

bottom. I

And now we come sonality.

We

when we

are wide

to disassociation of per-

never have this sense of falling

Our wake-a-day no experience of it. Then awake.

—

personality has

and here the argument

—

it

must

be another and distinct personality that

falls

when we

are asleep,

of such falling

is

irresistible

and that has had experience

— that has,

in short, a

memory

of past-day race experiences, just as ourwake-a-

day personality has a memory of our wake-aday experiences. It

gan

was

at this stage in

to see the light.

my

And

reasoning that I be-

quickly the light burst

upon me with dazzling

brightness, illuminating

and explaining

had been weird and un-

all

that

canny and unnaturally impossible

in

my dream

BEFORE ADAM

i6

my sleep

In

experiences.

it

was not

my wake-a-

day personality that took charge of me;

it

was

another and distinct personality, possessing a

new

and

totally different

the point of

my

fund of experiences, and, to

dreaming, possessing memories

of those totally different experiences.

What was itself lived

this

personality

a wake-a-day

life

?

on

When had

it

this planet in

order to collect this fund of strange experiences

These were questions that

He

answered. I

my dreams themselves

lived in the long ago,

world was young,

when

in that period that

the Mid-Pleistocene.

call

?

He

fell

the

we

from

the trees but did not strike bottom.

He

gibbered with fear at the roaring

of the lions.

He was pursued by

beasts of prey, struck at by deadly

snakes.

He

chattered with his kind

BEFORE ADAM and he received rough usage

in council,

hands of the Fire People fled before

But, racial

in the

why

memories are not ours

we have

a vague

Why

is

swer to

a

two-headed

this

is

that

with calf.?

it

answer your question. this other-personality

complete racial

is

I

a

?

another question.

And my own anAnd so I freak.

have

and these

memories

am a freak. But let me be more

cause

be-

I

The commonest

that these

other-personality that falls

may answer

I

is it

as well, seeing that

through space while we sleep

And

day that he

them.

hear you objecting,

I

at the

race

explicit.

memory

BEFORE ADAM

i8

we have

the faUing-through-space dream.

is

This other-personality only

memory

has

it

is

very vague.

About the

that of falling.

But many

is

of us have sharper, more distinct other-personalities.

Many

of us have the flying dream, the

pursuing-monster dream, color dreams, suffocation dreams,

and the

reptile

and vermin dreams.

In short, v^hile this other-personality in all of us, in

some of us

while in others of us

Some

It is all a

it is

almost obliterated,

is

more pronounced.

it

others.

question of varying degree of posses-

sion of the other-personality.

degree of possession personality

is

And

enormous.

in this

— a freak of

do believe that

other-personality

mine

is

In myself, the

My

other-

almost equal in power with

personality.

said, a freak I

vestigial

of us have stronger and completer race

memories than

own

is

— that has

it

is

I

am,

as I

heredity.

the possession of this

— but not in

matter

my

some few

so strong a one as

others given rise to

belief in personal reincarnation experiences.

It is

very plausible to such people, a most convincing hypothesis.

When

they have visions of scenes

BEFORE ADAM they have never seen in the acts

and events dating back

explanation

19

flesh,

memories of

in time, the simplest

that they have lived before.

is

But they make the mistake of ignoring

own

They do

duality.

ity,

not recognize their other-

They think

personality.

their

their

it is

own

personal-

that they have only one personality;

and

from such a premise they can conclude only that they have lived previous

But they are wrong. I

lives.

It is

not reincarnation.

have visions of myself roaming through the

forests of the

Younger World

myself that

see but one that

I

part of me, as are parts of

mine

is

me

and yet

;

is

my

father and

less

remote.

progeny of a developed

line

fingers

not

only remotely a

my

grandfather

This other-self of

an ancestor, a progenitor of

tors in the early line of

it is

my

my

progeni-

race, himself the

that long before his time

and

and

toes

climbed up

into the trees. I

I

must again,

am,

in this

Not alone do

mous

at the risk of boring, repeat that

one thing, to be considered a freak. I

possess racial

memory to an enor-

extent, but I possess the

memories of one

BEFORE ADAM

20

and far-removed progenitor.

particular

yet, while this

is

most unusual, there

over-remarkable about

my

Follov7

memory.

is

nothing

is

a racial

it.

reasoning.

An

instinct

Then you and

Very good.

And

I

and

all

of us receive these memories from our fathers

and mothers, fathers

as they received

and mothers.

them from

Therefore there must be a

medium whereby these memories from generation is

are transmitted

This medium

to generation.

what Weismann terms the "germplasm." the memories of the whole evolution

It carries

These memories are dim and con-

of the race. fused,

and many of them are

age

of memories —

atavistic

mine.

real

day, and

are, to

I

am

and

And now,

more

and such a

strain

a freak of heredity, an atavistic

call

me what you

will

alive, eating three

what

freight-

scientific,

be

than other strains;

nightmare —

am,

But some

lost.

germplasm carry an excessive

strains of

is

their

are

before

you going I

take up

to

my

;

but here

I

hearty meals a

do about tale, I

it ?

want

to

anticipate the doubting

Thomases of psychology,

who

and who would otherwise

are prone to scoff,

BEFORE ADAM surely say that the coherence of

21

my

dreams

is

due to overstudy and the subconscious pro-

my

jection of

dreams.

knowledge of evolution into

In the

first

zealous student. I

place, I

have never been a

graduated

I

last

of

my

class.

and — there — more confess

cared more for athletics,

reason

I

should

not

my

is

no for

it

biUiards.

Further, I

was

youth details

I

had no knowledge of evolution

at college, I

whereas

had already

in

lived in

my my

of that other, long-ago

until

childhood and

dreams

all

the

I will say,

life.

however, that these details were mixed and incoherent until lution.

I

came

to

know

the science of evo-

Evolution was the key.

It

gave the

explanation, gave sanity to the pranks of this atavistic brain of

mine

that,

modern and normal,

harked back to a past so remote as to be con-

temporaneous with the raw beginnings of mankind.

For

in this past I

know him,

know of, man,

did not exist.

It

was

as

we

to-day

in the period

of his becoming that I must have lived and had

my

being.

CHAPTER

THE

III

commonest dream of my

early

childhood was something like this

seemed that I lay

I

It

:

was very small and that

curled up in a sort of nest of twigs and

Some-

boughs. times

I

was

my

on

lying

back.

In this position

seemed

it

that

spent

I

many

hours,

watching the play of sunlight

on

the

foliage

overhead and the stirring of the

by the wind.

leaves

nest itself

when

Often

moved back and the

wind was

feeling

as

forth

strong.

But always, while in the nest, I

the

so lying

was mastered

of tremendous space be22

BEFORE ADAM neath me.

I

never saw

never peered over

I

it,

23

the edge of the nest to see ; but

I

knew and feared

that space that lurked just beneath

me and

maw

of some

that ever threatened

me Hke

a

all-devouring monster.

This dream, in which

which was more

like a condition

than an expe-

dreamed very often

rience of action, I early childhood.

was quiescent and

I

my

in

But suddenly, there would

rush into the very midst of

it

strange forms and

ferocious happenings, the thunder

and crashing

of storm, or unfamiliar landscapes such as in

my

wake-a-day

life

was confusion

result

had never

I

^d

comprehend nothing of

seen.

nightmare.

I

There was no

it.

The could logic

of sequence.

You see, I did One moment I was World I

was

in

a

lying in

not a

dream

consecutively.

wee babe of the Younger

my tree

nest

;

the next

moment

grown man of the Younger World locked

combat with the hideous Red-Eye; and the

next

moment

I

was creeping

carefully

down

to

the water-hole in the heat of the day.

Events,

years apart in their occurrence in the

Younger

BEFORE ADAM

24

World, occurred with

me

within the space of

several minutes, or seconds.

was

It

not a

a jumble, but this jumble I shall

all

upon you.

inflict

It

was not

young man and had dreamed many thousand that

times,

became

everything

clear

and

straightened

Then

plain.

and actions

events

together

Thus was

order.

I

able

— or

it.

The

at the

time

it

and

out

was that

proper

reconstruct the

was

my

time

at the

other-self lived

distinction does not matter;

for I,

modern man, have gone back and

too, the

that early Hfe in the

I

to piece

their

in

to

vanished Younger World as I lived in it

it

was able

got the clew of time, and

in

was

until I

company of my

lived

other-

self.

For your convenience, since no sociological screed,

I

this

is

to

be

frame together

shall

the diflPerent events into a comprehensive story.

For there

is

a certain thread of continuity and

happening that runs through

There

is

instance.

my

friendship

Also, there

is

all

with

the dreams.

Lop-Ear,

for

the enmity of Red-

Eye, and the love of the Swift One.

Taking

BEFORE ADAM it

all

in

story I

Possibly

the earliest

— and

lowing: I

sure you will agree.

my

do not remember much of

I

her

a fairly coherent and interesting

all,

am

25

recollection

certainly the sharpest

It

seemed

I

—

mother.

have

I is

was lying on the ground.

was somewhat older than during the

days, but

still

them and making

warmly and

shone

comfortable.

I

Around me, on

was all

growths,

fern-like

nest

about in the

rolled

I

my

rasping noises in

crooning,

sun

helpless.

playing with

dry leaves,

of

the fol-

I

The

throat.

was happy, and

a

little

open space.

sides,

were

bushes

in

and

and

and

overhead

all

about were the trunks and branches of forest trees.

Suddenly listened.

I

I sat

made no movement.

I

noises died

heard a sound.

down

in

my

throat,

The sound drew grunt of a pig. Then

and

upright and

The

petrified.

closer.

like the

I

the sounds caused by the

through

the

brush.

Next

one

was

It

began to hear

moving of I

Httle

I sat as

a

saw the

agitated by the passage of the body.

body ferns

Then

the

BEFORE ADAM

26

ferns parted,

snout, It

his

I

and white

was

ously.

and

saw gleaming

tusks.

He

a wild boar.

He

eyes, a long

peered at

me

curi-

grunted once or twice and shifted

weight from one fore-leg to the other, at the

same time moving

his

head from side to side

and swaying the

ferns.

one

petri-

as

Still I sat

fied,

my

eyes unblink-

ing as I stared at him, fear eating at It

my heart.

seemed that

movelessness lence on

my

this

and part

si-

was

what was expected of me.

I

was not

to cry

out in the face of fear. It

was

a dictate of instinct.

and waited

for I

The

curiosity

they gleamed cruelly.

me

so I sat there

knew not what.

thrust the ferns aside

open.

And

and stepped

went out of

He

The boar into

the

his eyes,

and

tossed his head at

threateningly and advanced a step.

he did again, and yet again.

This

BEFORE ADAM Then

...

screamed

I

cannot describe

it,

And

it

rible cry.

but

it

or shrieked

was

a shrill

seems that

and

too,

it,

—

I

ter-

at this

of the proceedings, was the thing ex-

stage

From

pected of me.

answering

My

cry.

not far

away came an

sounds seemed momen-

tarily to disconcert the boar,

and

27

and while he halted

shifted his weight with indecision,

upon

tion burst

She was

an appari-

us.

like a large

my

orang-utan,

mother,

or like a chimpanzee, and yet, in sharp and definite

She was heavier

ways, quite different.

of build than they, and had

arms were not so long, and her She wore no clothes

And

I

can

tell

— only

less

legs

hair.

were

Her

stouter.

her natural hair.

you she was a fury when she was

excited.

And

like a fury she

She was

gritting

dashed upon the scene.

her teeth,

making

frightful

grimaces, snarling, uttering sharp and continu-

ous cries that sounded Hke "kh-ah! kh-ah!"

So sudden and formidable was her appearance that

the

boar involuntarily bunched himself

together on the defensive and bristled as she

BEFORE ADAM

28

swerved

toward

toward me. of him.

she

swerved

She had quite taken the breath out

knew

I

Then

him.

just

what

of time she had gained.

do

to I

in that

moment

leaped to meet her,

catching her about the waist and holding on

hand and

foot

—

yes,

by

on by them as readily as feel in

my

my feet I could hold by my hands. I could ;

tense grip the pull of the hair as her

moved beneath with her

skin and her muscles efforts.

As

I say, I

she

instant

leaped to meet her, and on the

leaped

up

straight

into

the

air,

catching an overhanging branch with her hands.

The

next instant, with clashing tusks, the boar

drove past underneath. his

surprise

He had

recovered from

and sprung forward, emitting a

squeal that was almost a trumpeting. rate

it

was a

call,

for

it

At any

was followed by the

rushing of bodies through the ferns and brush

from

all directions.

From

every side wild hogs dashed into the

open space

— a score of them.

swung over the top of

a thick

from the ground, and,

still

But

Hmb,

my

mother

a dozen feet

holding on to her,

The

next instant, with clashing tusks, the boar drove past underneath."

BEFORE ADAM we perched

31

there

She was

in safety.

She

very excited.

and

chattered

screamed, and scolded

down

at the bristhng,

tooth -gnashing circle

had

that

gath-

ered beneath. trembling, at the

my

too,

down

peered

angry beasts and

my

did

I,

best

mother's

From

to imitate cries.

the

distance

came

similar cries, only pitched deeper,

These

into a sort of roaring bass.

grew momentarily louder, and soon I

saw him approaching,

by

all

father

the evidence of the times, I

to conclude that he

He was

was

my

—

at least,

am

driven

father.

not an extremely prepossessing father,

as fathers go.

ape,

my

He seemed

half man, and half

and yet not ape, and not yet man.

to describe

him.

There

is

I fail

nothing like him

BEFORE ADAM

32

to-day on the earth, under the earth, nor in

He was

the earth.

a large

and he must have weighed

man all

in

of a hundred

and

thirty

flat,

and the eyebrows over-hung the

The

pounds.

His face was broad and eyes.

eyes themselves were small, deep-set,

close together. all.

day,

his

It

He had

practically

and

no nose

at

was squat and broad, apparently with-

out any bridge, while the nostrils were like two holes in the face, opening outward instead of

down.

The

forehead slanted back from the eyes, and

the hair began right at the eyes and ran up ever

the head.

The head

itself

was preposterously

small and was supported on an equally preposterous, thick, short neck.

There was an elemental economy about body

—

The

chest

as

was there about was deep,

it

is

all

our

his

bodies.

true, cavernously

deep; but there were no full-swelHng muscles,

no wide-spreading shoulders, no clean-limbed straightness, It

no generous symmetry of

outline.

my

father's,

represented strength, that body of

strength without beauty; ferocious, primordial

BEFORE ADAM made

strength,

33

and gripe and rend

to clutch

and destroy.

and the

legs, lean

and

and stringy-muscled.

In

His hips were thin; hairy, wer'6 crooked

my

fact,

They were

legs

father's

were more

like

arms.

twisted and gnarly, and with scarcely

the semblance of the full meaty calf such as

graces your leg

and mine.

could not walk on the

was because a

was

it

hand than a

foot.

flat

I

remember he

of his foot.

a prehensile foot,

The

This

more

like

great toe, instead of

being in line with the other toes, opposed them, like a

toes

thumb, and

opposition to the other

was what enabled him This was

his foot.

the

its

flat

But

why

to get a grip with

he could not walk on

of his foot.

appearance was no more unusual

his

than the manner of his coming, there to

my

me as we perched above the angry He came through the trees, leaping to Hmb and from tree to tree; and he

mother and wild pigs.

from limb

came

swiftly.

a-day Hfe, as

I I

can see him now, in

my

wake-

write this, swinging along through

the trees, a four-handed, hairy creature, howling

BEFORE ADAM

34

now and

with rage, pausing

chest with his clenched

again to beat his leaping ten-and-

fist,

branch with one

fifteen-foot gaps, catching a

hand and swinging on across another gap

to

catch with his other hand and go on, never hesitating, never at a loss as to

as I

my

in

watched him

latent

and

power

felt

I

my own

being,

themselves

that

swing axes and Hfe that

secretly

not

and

fell

was

in

in those

fell trees,

some day

me was

father did, and

it

and ambitiously of

and

feel

they, too, will

And

trees.

muscles

boys watch

Little

?

swing axes and

their fathers

my

also the guarantee of the

in that being

And why

of mine.

what

I felt in

very muscles themselves, the surge and

bough;

The

on

of desire to go leaping from bough to

thrill

in

to proceed

way.

his arboreal

And

how

so with me.

constituted to do

whispered to aerial

me

paths and

forest flights.

At

last

my

tremely angry. his

He was

father joined us. I

remember the

out-thrust of

protruding underhp as he glared

wild pigs.

He

ex-

down

at the

snarled something Hke a dog,

BEFORE ADAM remember

and

I

like

fangs,

35

that his eye-teeth were large,

and that they impressed

me

tre-

mendously.

His conduct served only the more to infuriate the pigs.

He

broke off twigs and small branches

and flung them down upon our enemies.

He

even hung by one hand, tantalizingly just beyond reach,

and

mocked them

as

they gnashed their tusks

impo-

with

tent rage.

Not con-

tent with this, he

broke off a stout branch, and, holding on with one

hand and

foot,

jabbed the infuriated

beasts in

the sides

'^

and whacked

them

across

their

noses.

;

BEFORE ADAM

36

Needless to

state,

my

mother and

enjoyed

I

the sport.

But one end,

my

led the

my

tires

father,

way

of

good things, and

all

chuckHng maliciously the while,

Now

across the trees.

ambitions ebbed away, and

holding tightly to

swung through

my

mother

space.

it

was that

became

I

timid,

as she climbed

and

remember when the

I

She had made

branch broke with her weight. a wide leap,

in the

and with the snap of the wood

I

was overwhelmed with the sickening consciousness of falling through space, the pair of us.

The

forest

and the sunshine on the rustHng

leaves vanished

ghmpse of my

from

my

father

eyes.

next

moment

I

had a fading

abruptly arresting his

progress to look, and then

The

I

was blackness.

all

was awake,

in

my

bed, sweating, trembHng, nauseated.

dow was

up, and a cool air

the room.

And

The

The

win-

was blowing through

night-lamp was burning calmly.

because of this

did not get us, that else I

sheeted

I

take

we

it

that the wild pigs

never fetched bottom

should not be here now, a thousand cen-

turies after, to

remember the

event.

BEFORE ADAM And now put moment. Walk

my

yourself in

with

childhood, bed with

37

place for a

me a bit in my tender me a night and imagine

yourself dreaming such incomprehensible hor-

Remember

rors. I

I

was an inexperienced

had never seen a wild boar

matter

The

my Hfe.

in

child.

For that

had never seen a domesticated

I

nearest approach to one that I had seen

was

And

yet

breakfast bacon sizzling in

its

here, real as Hfe, wild boars

my

and

dreams,

swung through the

I,

with

fat.

dashed through

fantastic

parents,

lofty tree-spaces.

Do you wonder that I was frightened oppressed by my nightmare-ridden nights was accursed. to

pig.

I

tell.

And, worst of

I

was

do not know why, except that

a feeling of guilt, though I

what

all, I

was

guilty.

So

it

knew no

and ?

I

afraid I

had

better of

was, through long

years, that I suflFered in silence, until I

came

to

man's estate and learned the why and wherefore of

my

dreams.

CHAPTER

THERE

is

IV

one puzzling thing about these

prehistoric

memories of mine.

It is

the vagueness of the time element.

know

do not always nor can

I

tell,

the

of

order

I

events;

between some events, whether

one, two, or four or five years have elapsed. I

can only roughly

tell

the passage of time by

judging the changes in the appearance and pur-

my

suits of

fellows.

Also, I can apply the logic of events to the

For instance, there

various happenings.

doubt whatever that

my

by the wild pigs and before

I

made

And

it is

I

may

I

fell in

the days

my boyhood

call

between

my

mother.

must have

have no memory of

have given.

and

were treed

just as conclusive that

these two periods I I

fled

I

no

the acquaintance of Lop-Ear,

who became what chum.

mother and

is

my

left

father than the one

Never, in the years that followed, 38

BEFORE ADAM

39

And from my knowledge

did he reappear.

the times, the only explanation possible

of

lies in

that he perished shortly after the adventure with

That

the wild pigs.

untimely end, there in

vigor,

full

is

it

must have been an

no discussion.

and only sudden and

death could have taken him

off.

But

He was violent I

know

not the manner of his going

—

whether he was

drowned river,

or

in the

was

swallowed by a snake, or went into the stom-

ach of old Saber-Tooth, the

my

beyond

knowledge.

For know that

saw myself, with historic days.

If

I

remember only the things

I

my own eyes, in those premy mother knew my father's

end, she never told me. if

tiger, is

For that matter

I

doubt

she had a vocabulary adequate to convey

such information. in that

Perhaps,

all

day had a vocabulary of

told, the

Folk

thirty or forty

sounds. I

call

them sounds,

rather than words, be-

BEFORE ADAM

40

They had

cause sounds they were primarily.

no

fixed values, to be altered

These

adverbs.

v^ere

latter

by adjectives and tools

of speech

Instead of qualifying nouns

not yet invented.

or verbs by the use of adjectives and adverbs,

we

qualified sounds

in

quantity and pitch,

accelerating.

The

by intonation, by changes by retarding and by

length of time employed in

the utterance of a particular sound

shaded

its

meaning.

We

had no conjugation.

Also,

talked only concrete

we thought

only concrete things.

we depended

largely

simplest abstraction

thinking; and one, he fellows.

the

We

tense by the context.

things because

One judged

was

practically

when one

was hard put

to

on pantomime.

The

beyond our

did happen to think

communicate

There were no sounds

for

it.

it

to his

He was

pressing beyond the Hmits of his vocabulary. If he invented sounds for

understand the sounds. fell

back on pantomime,

wherever possible and ing the

it,

his fellows did not

Then

it

was that he

illustrating the

at the

thought

same time repeat-

new sound over and over

again.

BEFORE ADAM Thus language possessed

By

grew.

we were enabled

41

the few sounds

we

to think a short dis-

then came the

tance beyond those sounds;

need for new sounds wherewith to express the

new

Sometimes, however, we thought

thought.

too long a distance in advance of our sounds,

managed grant),

(dim ones

to achieve abstractions

which we

make known

failed utterly to

After

to other folk.

I

language did not grow

all,

fast in that day.

Oh,

believe me,

we were amazingly

But we did know a to-day.

We

up and

flatten

lot

that

simple.

known

not

is

could twitch our ears, prick them

them down

And we could

at will.

We

scratch between our shoulders with ease.

could throw stones with our it

many

And

a time.

my

hips,

and touch, not the

knees straight, bend forward from the

the points of for

my

—

twentieth-century boy

I

tips of

well,

fingers,

— but

I

I

We

out-run

but

And

only wish

could see us.

collections of eggs.

remember

my

elbows, to the ground.

bird-nesting

made no

have done

I

for that matter, I could

keep

as

feet.

the

But we

ate them.

my

story.

BEFORE ADAM

42 First let

me

Very early

my

in

life,

my

of

she

father,

second husband.

took to

herself

There was no

fellow.

a

have few recollections of

I

He was

him, and they are not of the best. light

my

separated from

I

Possibly this was because, after the

mother.

death

of Lop-Ear and our friendship.

tell

a

him.

solidity to

He was too voluble. worries me even now as

His infernal chattering

was too inconsequential

to permit

Monkeys

purpose.

mind me of him.

hated

I

me from

table that I

from

her,

all

to possess

always

re-

That

is

can give of him. the

And

first.

him and

my mother and

was growing older

him

monkeyish.

Whenever he came

pranks.

His mind

it.

in their cages

learned to be afraid of

close to

think of

He was

the best description

He

I

in

quickly

I

his malicious

crept

sight I

But

clung to her.

the time, and

it

was

I

inevi-

should from time to time stray

and stray farther and

And

farther.

these were the opportunities that the Chatterer

waited

for.

no names any name.

(I

may

in those

as well explain that

days;

we bore

were not known by

For the sake of convenience

I

have

!

BEFORE ADAM

43

myself given names to the various Folk

more

is

the most fitting description

I

can find

As

for that precious stepfather of mine.

me,

have named myself "Big-Tooth."

I

was

contact with, and the "Chat-

closely in

terer"

I

for

My

eye-teeth were pronouncedly large.)

But

to return to the Chatterer.

He was

ently terrorized me.

me and

cuffing

persist-

always pinching

me, and on occasion he was not

above biting me.

my

Often

and the way she made But the

He

mother

his fur fly

result of all this

unending family quarrel,

was

interfered,

a joy to see.

was a beautiful and in

which

I

was the

bone of contention.

No,

my

home-life was not happy.

to myself as

Home

!

had no home

I

of the term.

My

a habitation. in a house.

so long as

in the

home was an

I lived

in

my

night

modern sense

association, not

mother's care, not

And my mother

when

smile

Home-life

write the phrase.

I

I

lived

anywhere,

came she was above the

ground.

My

mother

clung to her

was

trees.

old-fashioned. It is true, the

She

still

more pro-

!

BEFORE ADAM

44

members of our horde

gressive

above the

But

river.

Of

in

mother was suspicious

The trees were good enough

and unprogressive. for her.

my

lived in the caves

we had one

course,

particular tree

which we usually roosted, though we often

when

roosted in other trees

nightfall caught us.

In a convenient fork was a sort of rude platform

and branches and creeping

of twigs It

was more

thing

cruder

But

it

a huge bird-nest than any-

like

though

else,

the

in

things.

it

was a thousand times

weaving than

had one feature that

I

any

bird-nest.

have never seen

attached to any bird-nest, namely, a roof.

Oh, not a roof such

Nor

a roof such as

rigines of to-day.

than

man

the as

is

It

as

modern man makes

made by

was

the lowest abo-

infinitely

more clumsy

we know him.

It

was put together

fork of the tree whereon

branches

we

adjacent forks held what I

was a

rested

and brush.

Four or

may term

ridge-poles.

These were merely

an inch or so

in diameter.

in a

Above the

casual, helter-skelter sort of way.

of dead

— of

handiwork of man

clumsiest

pile five

the various

stout

On them

sticks

rested the

BEFORE ADAM

45

These seemed

brush and branches.

There was

been tossed on almost aimlessly.

no attempt that

at thatching.

And

have

to

must confess

I

roof

the

leaked miserably in a heavy rain.

But the Chatterer.

He made

home-life a bur-

den

both

for

my mother

and

— and

by

me

home-life I mean, not the leaky nest in the tree,

but the group-life of the three of

most malicious

in his persecution

was the one purpose fastly for longer

time went by, defence of me.

my

to

than

of me.

five

minutes. less

situation

Also, as

eager in her

what of the continuous

rows raised by the Chatterer, that

become

That

which he held stead-

mother was

I think,

He was

us.

a nuisance to her.

I

must have

At any

rate,

the

went from bad to worse so rapidly

that I should soon, of

my own

volition,

have

BEFORE ADAM

46

home.

left

But the

satisfaction of performing

was denied me.

so independent an act I

was ready

mean

to go, I

was thrown

Before

And

out.

I

this literally.

The

opportunity came to the Chatterer one

day when

I

was alone

My

in the nest.

mother

and the Chatterer had gone away together

He must have

toward the blueberry swamp. planned

whole thing, for

the

I

heard

him

returning alone through the forest, roaring with self-induced

men

rage

of our horde,

stopped with his

now and

Like

he came.

themselves

crouched

up.

it

or

he

his chest

fist.

trembling

my

the

in

Chatterer came directly to the tree ber

angry,

hammer on

again to

realized the helplessness of

and

the

all

when they were angry

make

were trying to

I

as

was an oak

And

tree

— and

As

I

have

nest.

—

I

The

remem-

began to climb

he never ceased for a

his infernal row.

situation,

said,

moment from our language

was extremely meagre, and he must have strained it

by the variety of ways

me

in

which he informed

of his undying hatred of

me and

of his in-

BEFORE ADAM and then

tention there

47

have

to

out with

it

me.

As he climbed

Hmb.

horizontal

to the fork, I fled out the great

He

followed me, and out

went, farther and farther.

At

amongst

and

small

the

twigs

last I

I

was out

leaves.

The

Chatterer was ever a coward, and greater always

than any anger he ever worked up was his cau-

He was

tion.

and

leaves

the

afraid to follow twigs.

me

out amongst

For that matter,

greater weight would have crashed

his

him through

the foliage before he could have got to me.

But

it

was not necessary

and well he knew

it,

for

him

to reach

the scoundrel

!

me,

With a

malevolent expression on his face, his beady eyes gleaming with cruel intelligence, he began teetering.

Teetering

!

— and

with

me

out on

the very edge of the bough, clutching at the

twigs that broke continually with

Twenty

feet

beneath

me was

my

weight.

the earth.

Wildly and more wildly he teetered, grinning at

me

end.

and

his

gloating hatred.

Then came

All four holds broke at the I fell,

the

same time,

back-downward, looking up

at him,

BEFORE ADAM

48

my

hands and

feet

still

clutching the broken

Luckily, there were no wild pigs under

twigs.

me, and

my

was broken by the tough and

fall

springy bushes.

my

Usually,

my

destroy

falls

dreams, the

nervous shock being sufficient to bridge the

thousand centuries

wide awake into chance,

I lie

in

my

me

an instant and hurl bed, where,

little

per-

sweating and trembling and hear

the cuckoo clock calling the hour in the hall.

But

this

dream of

many times, and by

my

home

never yet have

Always do

it.

leaving

I

crash,

I

I

have had

been awakened

shrieking,

through the brush and fetch up with a

on

the

and

where

had

the bushes, set

up

I I

bruised fallen.

and whimpering,

ing time to

my

He had

could see the Chatterer.

it

and was keep-

with his teetering.

whimpering.

I

Peering up through

a demoniacal chant of joy

hushed

bump

ground.

Scratched lay

down

I

the safety of the trees, and I

I

quickly

was no longer

knew

in

the danger I

ran of bringing upon myself the hunting animals

by too audible an expression of

my

grief.

BEFORE ADAM remember,

I

became

my

as

interested

sobs died down, that

watching

in

my

tear-wet eyelids.

investigate,

and found that

my fall.

badly damaged by

and

I

strange

the

produced by partially opening and

light-efFects

closing

49

hide, here

Then

was not

I I

began to

I

had

lost

so very

some hair

and there; the sharp and jagged

end of a broken branch had thrust fully an inch into

my

forearm; and

my

borne the brunt of

was aching

my

healing

than

qualities

fall,

jured hip for fully a

Next, as

me I

I

No

these, after

it

has

finer

to-day.

Yet

for I limped with

my

in-

week afterward.

came upon

a feeling of desolation, a consciousness that

return

to

my

I

made up my mind never

mother and the Chatterer.

would go far away through the and

last

man had

lay in the bushes, there

was homeless.

As

all,

bones were broken,

days the flesh of

was a severe

it

But

intolerably.

in those

which had

contact with the ground,

were only petty hurts.

and

right hip,

find

some

for food, I

tree for myself in

knew where

year at least

I

to I

terrible forest,

which

to find

it.

to roost.

For the

had not been beholden

to

BEFORE ADAM

50

my

mother

had furnished me

All she

for food.

was protection and guidance. I

crawled

Once still

softly

looked back and saw the Chatterer

I

and

chanting

pleasant sight.

and

cautious,

my I I

through the bushes.

out

first

knew

I I

teetering.

was not a

It

pretty well

was exceedingly

how

to be

careful on this

journey in the world.

gave no thought as to where

I

had but one purpose, and that was

beyond the reach of the Chatterer. into the trees

was going. to go I

away

climbed

and wandered on amongst them from

for hours, passing

touching the ground.

tree to tree

But

I

and never

did not go in any

particular direction, nor did I travel steadily. It

was

my

my

folk,

nature, as to

was a mere

be

child,

was the nature of

it

inconsequential.

and

I

Besides,

all

I

stopped a great deal to

play by the way.

The

events that befell

me on my

leaving

home

my mind. My dreams do Much has my other-self for-

are very vague in

not cover them. gotten,

and particularly

Nor have

I

at

this

very period.

been able to frame up the various

BEFORE ADAM

dreams so gap between tree I

and

my

my

leaving the

that several times

These

open spaces.

I

home-

my

I

came

to

crossed in great trepi-

dation, descending to the

of

bridge the

to

arrival at the caves.

remember

at the top

as

51

speed.

I

ground and running

remember

that there

were days of rain and days of sunshine, so that I

must have wandered alone for quite a time.

I especially

of

my

sufferings

peased

it.

hunting knoll.

dream of

One

little

They

my

misery in the rain, and

from hunger and how very strong impression

lizards

from

is

ap-

of

on the rocky top of an open

ran under the rocks, and most of

them escaped; but occasionally a stone

I

and caught one.

this knoll

by snakes.

I

I

turned over

was frightened away

They

did not pursue

BEFORE ADAM

52

me. in

They were merely basking on

the sun.

of them that after

I fled as fast as if

I

gnawed

bitter

inherited fear

they had been

bark from young

trees.

remember vaguely the eating of many green

nuts, with soft shells I

my

rocks

me.

Then I

But such was

flat

remember most

stomach-ache.

It

distinctly

kernels.

suff^ering

may have been maybe by

the green nuts, and

do not know.

and milky

But

I

And

from a

by

caused

the lizards.

do know that

I

was

I

for-

tunate in not being devoured during the several

hours colic.

I

was knotted up on the ground with the

CHAPTER V

MY

vision

as I

of the scene

emerged from the

came

abruptly,

forest.

I

found

myself on the edge of a large clear

On On

space. bluffs.

earth

one side of

this space rose

the other side

bank ran

was the

down

steeply

up high

river.

The

to the water, but

here and there, in several places, where at

some

time slides of earth had occurred, there were

These were the drinking-places of

run-ways.

the Folk that lived in the caves.

And

Folk that

may

My

was the main abiding-place of the

this

say,

I

had chanced upon.

This was,

by stretching the word, the

mother and the Chatterer and

I,

I

village.

and a few

other simple bodies, were what might be termed

suburban

residents.

We were part of the horde,

though we lived a distance away from only a short distance, though

what of my wandering,

all

53

it

of a

it.

It

was

had taken me,

week

to arrive.

BEFORE ADAM

54

Had

I

trip in

But I

come

directly, I

an hour.

From

to return.

saw the caves

my

I

straying,

kind.

I

And now,

had

I

alone and a child, for a I

had seen not one of

lived in terror

at the sight of

come with

And

saw many of the Folk.

During that time

week.

open space,

to the drinking-places.

open space

had been

the edge of the forest

in the bluff, the

and the run-ways in the

could have covered the

my

and desolation.

kind,

I

was

over-

gladness, and I ran wildly toward

them.

Then

it

Some one warning fear

was that

a strange thing happened.

of the Folk saw

cry.

On

me and

uttered a

the instant, crying out with

and panic, the Folk

fled

away.

Leaping

and scrambling over the rocks, they plunged into the

mouths of the caves and disappeared

...

but one, a

all

dropped

in

of the bluff.

the cave.

baby, that had been

the excitement close to the base

He was

mother dashed out;

and held on

little

wailing dolefully.

His

he sprang to meet her

tightly as she

scrambled back into

BEFORE ADAM was

I

The populous open

alone.

all

55

had of a sudden become deserted. and whimpered.

forlornly

Why

stand.

was

down

could not under-

had the Folk run away from me

In later time, I

I

I sat

space

when

to learn.

I

came

When

to

know

they saw

me

.?

their ways,

dashing out

of the forest at top speed they concluded that

was being pursued by some hunting animal.

I

By my unceremonious approach

I

had stam-

peded them.

As

sat

I

and watched the cave-mouths

became aware

little

In the hurry and confusion

had happened that

own

caves.

Some

all

nameless. ious cries,

me,

their

The mothers

did not

them by name, because that was an

invention

ones.

had not gained

it

of the young ones had sought

refuge in other caves. call for

their heads out.

were calling back and forth

later they

to one another.

to

Folk were watching

Soon they were thrusting

me.

A

that the

I

we had

The mothers

yet

made.

All

were

uttered querulous, anx-

which were recognized by the young

Thus, had I

not

should

my mother

been there calHng

have recognized her voice

BEFORE ADAM

56

amongst the voices of a thousand mothers, and

same way would she have recognized

in the

mine amongst a thousand. This calHng back and forth continued for

some

time, but they were too cautious to

come

out of their caves and descend to the ground. Finally one

did

He was

come.

play a large part in

my

life,

and

destined to

for that matter

he already played a large part in the all

members of the

the

I shall call

tory — so

the

lids

effect

in the

was

whom

pages of this his-

called because of his inflamed eyes,

they produced, seeming to advertise the

The

savagery of him.

was

a monster in

he was a giant.

all

He must

ways.

of his

one of our kind

I

Physically

have weighed one

hundred and seventy pounds. largest

color

red.

He was

I

it

of

lives

being always red, and, by the peculiar

terrible

soul

Red-Eye

He

horde.

He was

ever saw.

Nor

the did

ever see one of the Fire People so large as he,

nor one of the Tree People. in the

newspapers

I

Sometimes, when

happen upon descriptions

of our modern bruisers

and

prizefighters,

I

BEFORE ADAM

57

wonder what chance the best of them would have had against him. I

am

afraid not

much

of a chance.

and a

grip of his iron fingers

With one

he could have

pull,

plucked a muscle, say a biceps, by the roots, out

clear

of their

blow of

loose skulls

like

wicked

his

fist

(or

feet

necks,

crunch of the

He

he could

his

have

A twist could have broken know

I

sweep of

a

that with a single

jaws he could have pierced, at

his

and the spinal marrow

could

from a hairy.

spring

all

twenty

sitting position. It

was

over,

at the back.

feet

horizontally

He was abominably

a matter of pride with us to

be not very hairy.

But he was covered with

on the inside of the arms as well

as the outside,

The

With

hind-hands)

and

back-handed,

same moment, the great vein of the throat

in front

hair

A

could have smashed their

egg-shells.

disembowelled them. their

bodies.

and even the ears themselves.

only places on him where the hair did not

grow were the

soles of his

beneath his eyes. ferocious grinning

He was

hands and

feet

and

frightfully ugly, his

mouth and huge down-hang-

BEFORE ADAM

58

ing under-

vH^^^^^r^^HI

but in har-

fm^Bmjjjm^^^^

his

terrible

jHIhUHJK

This was

the

mony

with

eyes.

And

out of his cave and

ground.

proceeded to reconnoitre.

Ignoring me, he

He

bent forward

from the hips as he walked; and so

ward did he bend, and

being

Red-Eye.

^^^^wjm^

right gingerly he crept

descended to

lip

far for-

so long were his arms,

that with every step he touched the knuckles

of his hands to the ground on either side of

him. tion of

He was awkward

in the semi-erect posi-

walking that he assumed, and he really

touched

his

knuckles to the ground in order to

balance himself.

But oh,

I tell

you he could

BEFORE ADAM run on all-fours

Now

!

this

59

was something

which we were particularly awkward. more,

it

was

Further-

among

a rare individual

at

who

us

balanced himself with his knuckles when walk-

Such an individual was an atavism, and

ing.

Red-Eye was an even greater atavism.

That

what he was

is

in the process of

on the ground.

— an atavism.

changing our

We were

tree-life to

For many generations we had

been going through

this

change, and our bodies

But Red-

and carriage had likewise changed.

Eye had reverted dwelling type.

to the

more primitive

tuality he

was an atavism and

tree-

was born

Perforce, because he

our horde he stayed with us;

in

Hfe

but in ac-

was

his place

elsewhere.

Very circumspect and very

alert,

he moved

here and there about the open space, peering

through the vistas among the trees and trying to catch a all

gHmpse of the hunting animal

suspected had pursued me.

And

did this, taking no notice of me,

crowded

At

last

at the

that

while he the

Folk

cave-mouths and watched.

he evidently decided that there was

BEFORE ADAM

6o

He was

no danger lurking about.

returning

from the head of the run-way, from where he

had taken a peep down

at the drinking-place.

His course brought him near, but

He

not notice me.

way

he did

proceeded casually on

abreast of me,

until

still

his

and then, without

warning and with incredible swiftness, he smote

me

a

on the head.

buffet

backward

fully a

dozen

was knocked

I

feet before I fetched

up against the ground, and

remember,

I

half-

stunned, even as the blow was struck, hearing the

and

uproar of clucking

wild

laughter that arose from the caves. great joke

—

heartily the

Folk appreciated

Thus was Eye paid no was

at least in that

I

and

whimper and sob

ously about me, and

I

right

women

to

my

Redand

me

But they quickly

I

heart's

gathered curi-

recognized them.

I

encountered them the preceding year when

mother had taken

a

it.

further attention to me,

Several of the

was

It

received into the horde.

at hberty to

content.

day;

shrieking

had

my

to the hazelnut canyons.

left

me

alone,

being re-

placed by a dozen curious and teasing young-

BEFORE ADAM They formed

sters.

ing

their

fingers,

time

I

and poking

faces,

was frightened, and

I

for a

endured them, then anger got the best

me and

of

a circle around me, point-

making

and pinching me.

6i

sprang tooth and nail upon the

I

— none other than

most audacious one of them

Lop-Ear

himself.

have so named him be-

I

cause he could prick up only one of his ears.

The

other ear always

movement.

Some

hung limp and without

accident

had

injured

muscles and deprived him of the use of

He

closed with me, and

we went

at

the

it.

for all

it

the world like a couple of small boys fighting.

We

scratched and

bit,

pulled hair, clinched,

and threw each other down.

I

remember

my

college

called a half-Nelson.

This

succeeded in getting on him what in days

I

learned

hold gave

me

did not enjoy

and with the

was

the decided advantage. it

long.

foot

(or

He

it

in order to save myself,

again.

made

my abdomen

threaten to disembowel me.

at

But

I

twisted up one leg,

hind-hand)

savage an onslaught upon

him

I

I

had

so

as to

to release

and then we went

BEFORE ADAM

62

Lop-Ear was

a year older than

several times angrier than he,

he took to his heels.

I

was

in the

end

but

I,

and

chased him across the

I

open and down a run-way

But

to the river.

he was better acquainted with the locality and

ran along the edge of the water and up another

He

run-way.

cut diagonally across the open

space and dashed into a wide-mouthed cave.

Before

I

knew

I

it,

The

into the darkness.

badly frightened. before.

Lop-Ear

I

moment

had never been

I

mockingly

chattered

me

I

at

unseen, tumbled

him was

in a cave out.

me,

and,

me

over.

did not risk a second encounter, however,

and took himself the entrance, and

he did not pass

me

next

after

began to whimper and cry

springing upon

He

had plunged

;

yet

seemed

he

off.

I

was between him and

BEFORE ADAM to

have gone away.

no clew as

This puzzled

regained the outside

I

I

sat

to watch.

He I

listened, but could get

where he was.

to

me, and when

down

I

63

never came out of the entrance, of that

was

certain

;

yet at the end of several minutes

he chuckled at

my

Again

elbow.

I

ran after

him, and again he ran into the cave; but this

time a

stopped at the mouth.

I

He

and watched.

did

not

out, yet, as before, he chuckled at

my

distance

short

come

dropped back

I

elbow and was chased by

me

a third time into

the cave.

This performance was repeated several times.

Then

I

I

searched

I

could not

vainly

come out of

my

fight

into

for

it,

the

him.

understand

Always he went

at

him

followed

into the

was

I

how he

where

curious.

eluded

cave, never

me.

did he

yet always did he arrive there

elbow and mock me.

transform

cave,

itself into a

Thus

did our

game of hide and

seek.

All afternoon, with occasional intervals,

kept

it

we

up, and a playful, friendly spirit arose

BEFORE ADAM

64

between

In the end, he did not run away

us.

from me, and we

sat together

A

around each other.

with our arms he disclosed

later

little

the mystery of the wide-mouthed cave.

ing

me by

the hand he led

me

inside.

HoldIt

con-

nected by a narrow crevice with another cave,

and

was through

it

open

this that

regained the

air.

We

were now good

me

with

in attacking

we behave

When

friends.

young ones gathered around

did

we

them;

the other

to tease, he joined

and so viciously

that before long

I

was

let

alone.

Lop-Ear made me acquainted with the

village.

me

of con-

There was ditions

little

that he could

and customs

vocabulary;

tell

— he had not the necessary

but by observing his actions

learned much, and also he showed

and

me

I

places

things.

He

took

me up

the open space, between the

caves and the river, and into the forest beyond,

where, in a grassy place

made that

a

among

meal of stringy-rooted

we had

the trees,

carrots.

we

After

a good drink at the river and started

up the run-way

to the caves.

BEFORE ADAM It

we

was

in the

came

run-way that

Red-Eye

upon

The

again.

65

knew,

I

first

Lop-Ear had shrunk away to

one side and was crouch-

ing low against

bank.

the

Naturally and involuntarily, I

imitated him.

that

cause

looked

I

of his

Then to

it

was

see

the

It

was

fear.

Red-Eye, swaggering down the centre of the run-way and

scowling fiercely with his inflamed eyes. sters

I

noticed that

all

the young-

shrank away from him as we

had done, while the grown-ups regarded

him with wary eyes when he drew

near,

and

stepped aside to give him the centre of the path.

As

twilight

deserted.

came

on, the open space

The Folk were

of the caves.

High up the

Lop-Ear bluff

we

was

seeking the safety

led the

way

to

bed.

climbed, higher than

all

the other caves, to a tiny crevice that could not

be seen from the ground.

Into this Lop-Ear

BEFORE ADAM

66 squeezed.

I

followed with difficulty, so narrow

was the entrance, and found myself rock-chamber.

It

was very low

a couple of feet in height,

by four

in

the night.

— not more than

and possibly three

width and length.

together in each other's

in a small

arms,

feet

Here, cuddled

we

slept

out

CHAPTER

WHILE

VI

more courageous of the

the

youngsters played in and out of the

large-mouthed caves, that

in

early learned

caves were unoccupied.

such

slept

I

them

Only the

night.

at

No

one

crevice-

mouthed caves were used, the narrower the

mouth the

This was from fear of the

better.

preying animals that in those

The

I

morning, after

caves.

They made

my

Two

was

It

Saber-Tooth, the

open space.

night's sleep with

just daylight

tiger,

a rush for

their heels for

walked

when

into

the

of the Folk were already up.

Whether they were

it.

panic-stricken, or whether he

them

was too

close

on

to attempt to scramble

up

the bluff to the crevices, at

a burden to us

learned the advantage of the nar-

row-mouthed old

life

days and nights.

first

Lop-Ear,

made

I

do not know;

but

any rate they dashed into the wide-mouthed 67

BEFORE ADAM

68

cave wherein Lop-Ear and

had played the

I

afternoon before.

What happened telHng, but

conclude that the two

fair to

is

it

was no way of

inside there

Folk slipped through the connecting crevice

This crevice was too small

into the other cave.

and

to allow for the passage of Saber-Tooth,

he came out the way he had gone fied

and angry.

It

in, unsatis-

was evident that

his night's

hunting had been unsuccessful and that he

had expected

make

to

a

meal

He

off of us.

caught sight of the two Folk at the other cave-

mouth and sprang

Of

for them.

course, they

darted through the passageway into the cave.

He emerged

than

angrier

first

and

ever

snarling.

Pandemonium broke of us.

All

amongst the

loose

up and down the great

crowded the crevices and outside

we were

all

chattering

thousand keys.

And we were

— snarling faces; We

this

was an

we

bluff,

ledges,

and shrieking all

rest

making

and in

a

faces

instinct with us.

were as angry as Saber-Tooth, though our

anger was

allied

with

fear.

I

remember

that

BEFORE ADAM I

shrieked and

Not only

made

faces with the best of them.

did they set the example, but I

the urge from within

me

My

they were doing. I

69

to

hair

was convulsed with a

felt

do the same things

was

bristling,

fierce,

and

unreasoning

rage.

For some time old Saber-Tooth continued dashing in and out of

first

the one cave and then

But the two Folk merely slipped

the other.

back and forth through the connecting crevice In the meantime the rest

and eluded him. of us up the

bluflF

had proceeded

to

action.

Every time he appeared outside we pelted him

we merely dropped them we soon began to whiz them down At

with rocks.

on him, but

first

with the added force of our muscles.

This bombardment drew Saber-Tooth's attention to us

and made him angrier than

He abandoned

pursuit of the two

his

and sprang up the

bluflF

toward the

ever.

Folk

rest of us,

clawing at the crumbling rock and snarling as

he clawed his upward way>

At

this

awful sight,

the last one of us sought refuge inside our caves. I

know

this,

because

I

peeped out and saw the

BEFORE ADAM

70

whole

blufF-side

Tooth,

who had

deserted,

save

Saber-

for

footing and was

lost his

slid-

ing and falling down. I called

out the cry of encouragement, and

again the bluff was covered by the screaming

horde and the stones were falling faster than

Saber-Tooth was frantic with rage. Time

ever.

and again he assaulted the gained the

first

bluff.

Once he even

crevice-entrances before he

back, but was unable to force his

way

fell

inside.

With each upward rush he made, waves of fear surged over us.

At

first,

at

such times,

most of us dashed inside; but some remained outside to all

hammer him

with stones, and soon

of us remained outside and kept up the

fusillade.

Never was so masterly a creature so completely baffled.

to be outwitted

He

It

hurt his pride terribly, thus

by the small and tender Folk.

stood on the ground and looked up at us,

snarling, lashing his

that

fell

stone,

up.

near to him.

and

It

tail,

snapping at the stones

Once

just at the right

caught him

full

I

whizzed down a

moment he looked

on the end of

his nose,

He

sprang up the bluff, snarling as he clawed his

upward way."

BEFORE ADAM and he went

up

straight

73

in the air, all four feet

of him, roaring and caterwauHng, what of the hurt and surprise.

He was

knew

beaten and he

Recovering

it.

he stalked out solemnly from under

his dignity,

He

the rain of stones.

stopped

in the

middle

of the open space and looked wistfully and

He

hungrily back at us.

meal, and

we were

to

Hke mockery. angry.

And

all

We

laughed derisively and

Now

of us.

To

He

fight

attack

this

quickly

recovered

besides,

our

Vividly do

I

This was what

had become a game,

and we took huge delight But

did his

missiles

in pelting

not

common were

He

sense,

and

shrewd to hurt.

recollect the vision of

we had thrown.

him. long.

last

ing eye of his, swollen almost shut

the stones

laughter

turned with a roar

bluff again.

The

our

fashion

affected Saber-Tooth.

we wanted.

animals do not

be laughed at makes them

such

in

and charged the

meat, cornered

This sight of him started

laughing.

uproariously,

much

just so

but inaccessible. us

hated to forego the

And

one bulg-

by one of

vividly

do

I

BEFORE ADAM

74 retain the pic-

he stood on

the

of the forest

had

him

ture of

as

edge

whither he

finally

retreated.

He was look-

ing back at

US, his writh

ing lips lifted

clear of the very

roots of his

fangs, his hair bris-

He

ing.

gave one

view among the

And

We

then such

his

huge

his tail lash-

and

snarl

chattering

a

claws had all

of the two Folk

slid

from

went up.

as

holes,

examining the

made on

the crumbling

of us talking at once.

who had been caught

double cave was part-grown, half

in

child

They had come out proudly

and half youth. from

and

trees.

rock of the bluff,

the

last

swarmed out of our

marks

One

tling

their refuge,

and we surrounded them

an admiring crowd.

Then

mother broke through and

the fell

young

in

fellow's

upon him

in a

tremendous rage, boxing

his ears,

pulling his

and shrieking

demon.

She was a

hair,

strapping

big

like a

woman, very

hairy,

and the

thrashing she gave him was a delight to the

BEFORE ADAM

We

horde.

75

roared with laughter, holding on to

one another or

on the ground

rolling

our

in

glee.

In spite of the reign of fear under which the

lived,

We was

Folk were always great laughers.

had the sense of humor. Gargantuan.

was

It

Our merriment never

restrained.

There was nothing half way about

When

it.

was funny we were convulsed with

a thing

appreciation of

and the simplest, crudest

it,

Oh, we were

things were funny to us. laughers, I can

tell

way we

the village.

treated

We

treated all

Saber-Tooth was

animals that invaded

kept our run-ways and drink-

ing-places to ourselves

by making

life

miserable

for the animals that trespassed or strayed

our

immediate

hunting

great

you.

The way we had the

we

territory.

animals

we

Even

the

upon

fiercest

bedevilled

that

they

learned to leave our places alone.

We

were

so

not fighters like them; cowardly, and

it

we were cunning and

was because of our cunning

and cowardice, and our inordinate capacity for fear, that hostile

we

survived in that frightfully

environment of the Younger World.

BEFORE ADAM

76

Lop-Ear,

What

his past history

me, but as

telling

mother all,

was

I figure,

I

a year older than

I.

was he had no way of

never saw anything of his

him

to be an orphan.

After

fathers did not count in our horde.

Mar-

believed

I

riage

was

had

a

way

of

and

quarrelling

Modern man, what Custom was

custom

in

this

separating.

of his divorce institution,

But we had no

does the same thing legally. laws.

and couples

as yet in a rude state,

all

we went

by,

and our

matter was

particular

rather

promiscuous. Nevertheless, on,

later

as

this

narrative

will

show

we betrayed glimmering adumbra-

monogamy that was later to give and make mighty, such tribes as

tions of the

power

to,

embraced I

it.

Furthermore, even at the time

was born, there were several

faithful couples

that lived in the trees in the neighborhood of

my

mother.

Living in the thick of the horde

did not conduce this

reason,

couples

to

monogamy.

undoubtedly,

went away and

Through many years

that

lived

It

the

was

for

faithful

by themselves.

these couples stayed to-

BEFORE ADAM gether, though

when

the

man

or was eaten the survivor

new

77

woman

or

died

invariably found a

mate.

There was one thing that greatly puzzled me during the

first

days of

my

residence in the

There was a nameless and incommuni-

horde.

cable fear that

rested

upon

all.

At

first

it

appeared to be connected wholly with direc-

The horde

tion.

feared

the

northeast.

It

lived in perpetual apprehension of that quarter

of the compass.

And

every individual gazed

more frequently and with greater alarm

in

that direction than in any other.

When Lop-Ear and

I

went toward the north-

east to eat the stringy-rooted carrots that at

that season were at their best, he became unusually

timid.

He was

content

leavings, the big tough carrots

ropy ones,

rather

than

to

and the

venture

to

eat

a

the little

short

distance farther on to where the carrots were as

yet

When

I

so ventured, he

He

gave

to understand that in that direction

was

scolded

me

untouched.

some

me and

quarrelled with me.

horrible danger, but just

what the

horrible

BEFORE ADAM

78

danger was

language would not

his paucity of

permit him to say.

Many

meal

a good

got in this fashion,

I

while he scolded and chattered vainly at me. I

could not understand.

but

I

could

no

see

I

kept very

danger.

alert,

calculated

I

always the distance between myself and the

knew

nearest tree, and

that to

that haven of refuge I out-foot the

could

Tawny One,

or

old Saber-Tooth, did one or the other suddenly appear.

One village,

late

afternoon, in the

a great uproar arose.

The horde was animated

with

a single emotion, that of fear.

The

bluff-side

the Folk,

all

swarmed with

gazing and point-

ing into the northeast.

not the

know what

way up

did

was, but

to the safety of

cave before ever

And

it

I

I

I

my own

turned around to

then, across the river,

northeast, I

scrambled

saw for the

first

high

all

little

see.

away

into the

time the mystery of

BEFORE ADAM It was the biggest

smoke. I

thought

ing

its

to gather

to fear this

forth.

And

yet,

was

than the

and swaying

somehow,

I

seemed

They appeared

as the token of something else.

something

I

trees

not the danger.

else

was

I

Nor could they tell me. and

had ever seen.

from the conduct of the Folk that the

itself was it

I

was a monster snake, up-ended, rear-

head high above the

back and

smoke

it

animal

79

to

know

it

was unable

Yet

I

to guess.

was soon to know,

as a thing

Tawny One,

What

more

terrible

than old Saber-Tooth,

than the snakes themselves, than which there could be no things

more

terrible.

it

seemed

CHAPTER

BROKEN-TOOTH ster

who Hved by

Hved

had come

in the caves,

after

VII

was another younghimself.

His mother

but two more children

him and he had been

thrust

We had witnessed

out to shift for himself.

the

performance during the several preceding days,

and

had given us no

it

Tooth did not want mother

When

left

little

to go,

glee.

Broken-

and every time

the cave he sneaked back into

she returned and found

rages were delightful.

his it.

him there her

Half the horde made a

practice of watching for these

moments.

First,

from within the cave, would come her scolding

and shrieking.

Then we

could hear sounds of

the thrashing and the yelling of Broken-Tooth.

About in.

this

And

time the two younger children joined

finally, like

the eruption of a minia-

ture volcano, Broken-Tooth out. 80

would come

flying

BEFORE ADAM At the end of

8i

several days his leaving

He

was accomplished.

v^ailed

his

grief,

heeded, from the centre of the open half an hour, and then

for

at

live

with Lop-Ear and me.

was

small, but with squeez-

least

ing there three.

was room

un-

space,

came

to

cave

for

no

have

I

Our

home

recollection of

Broken -Tooth

more

spending

than one night with us,

accident

so the

must have happened right away. It

the

came day.

in the

middle of

In the morning

had eaten our

fill

we

of the carrots,

and then, made heedless by

play,

we had

ventured on to the big trees just beyond.

cannot understand

how Lop-Ear

habitual caution, but play.

We

tree tag.

it

I

got over his

must have

been the

were having a great time playing

And

such tag!

We

leaped ten or

BEFORE ADAM

82 fifteen-foot

And

gaps as a matter of course.

a

twenty or twenty-five foot deliberate drop clear

down

to the

ground was nothing

fact, I

am

tances

we dropped.

heavier

we found we had

almost afraid to say the great dis-

As we grew older and to be

more cautious

dropping, but at that age our bodies were

in all

and springs and we could do anything.

strings

Broken-Tooth displayed remarkable the game.

in

In

to us.

He was "It"

less

agility

frequently

than any of us, and in the course of the game he discovered one difficult " slip " that neither Lop-

Ear nor

I

was able

To

to accomplish.

be truth-

we were afraid to attempt it. When we were "It," Broken-Tooth always

ful,

ran out to the end of a lofty branch in a certain tree. it

From

the end of the branch to the ground

must have been seventy

intervened to break a feet

fall.

feet,

and ;iothing

But about twenty

lower down, and fully fifteen feet out from

the perpendicular,

another

was the thick branch of

tree.

As we ran out the limb, Broken-Tooth, ing us, would begin teetering.

fac-

This naturally

BEFORE ADAM

83

impeded our progress; but there was more

He

the teetering than that.

back

jump he was

to the

nearly reached

him fell

teetered with his

far out,

we

to

make.

Just as

him he would

let go.

The teeter-

was Hke a spring-board.

ing branch

in

backward, as he

fell.

It

threw

And

as he

he turned around sidewise in the air so as

to face the other branch into

which he was

fall-

This branch bent far down under the

ing.

impact, and sometimes there was an ominous crackling;

but

was always

leaves

never broke, and out of the

it

to be seen the face of

Tooth grinning triumphantly up I

was "It" the

last

this.

He had

begun

his teetering,

Broken-

at us.

time Broken-Tooth tried

gained the end of the branch and

and

I

was creeping out

after

him, when suddenly there came a low warning cry from Lop-Ear. in the

against

I

looked

main fork of the the

down upon

trunk.

the

down and saw him

tree crouching close

Instinctively

thick

limb.

I

crouched

Broken-Tooth

stopped teetering, but the branch would not stop,

and

down with

his

body continued bobbing up and

the rustling leaves.

BEFORE ADAM heard the crackle of a dry twig, and looking

I

down saw my

first

creeping

on the ground and peering up

stealthily along

At

into the tree.

He was

Fire-Man.

first I

thought he was a wild

animal, because he wore around his waist and

over his shoulders a ragged piece of bearskin.

And

then

I

saw

hands and

his

He was

clearly his features.

my

kind, except that he

his feet

were

like

were far turn,

were equally hairy than the

came

me

to

at him.

the

in-

looked

stantly, as I

This was

terror

of

northeast, of

the

which

the mystery of

smoke

was a token.

Yet

was puzzled.

less

much

I

was

like

hairy and that

later to

In

know,

hairy than we, though we, in

less

Tree People. It

very

and more

hands than ours.

he and his people, as

fact,

less

less

was

feet,

I

Certainly

he was nothing of which

*

The

Fire-

Man

peered up

at

him and

the tree."

circled

around

BEFORE ADAM to be afraid.

87

Red-Eye or any of our strong

men would have been more than a match for He was old, too, wizened with age, him. and the hair on

his face

limped badly with one

doubt

at all that

out-climb him.

was

we

He

was

gray.

Also, he

There was no

leg.

could out-run

him and

could never catch us, that

certain.

But he carried something

had never seen

before.

It

in his

was

a

hand that

bow and

I

arrow.

bow and arrow had no meanHow was I to know that death ing for me. lurked in that bent piece of wood ? But LopEar knew. He had evidently seen the Fire People before and knew something of their ways. The Fire-Man peered up at him and circled around the tree. And around the main trunk But

at that time a

above the fork Lop-Ear circled too, keeping always

the trunk

between himself and

the

Fire-Man.

The

latter

Lop-Ear,

abruptly

reversed

his

circling.

caught unawares, also hastily reversed,

but did not win the protection of the trunk until after the

Fire-Man had twanged the bow.

BEFORE ADAM

ÂŤ8

I saw the arrow leap up, miss Lop-Ear, glance against a limb, and

fall

back to the ground.

my

danced up and down on delight.

throwing things at

threw things

The game

at

perch with

lofty

The Fire-Man was Lop-Ear as we sometimes

was a game

It

!

one another.

continued a

little

the Fire-Man gave

I

up.

it

I

Then

leaned far out over

horizontal limb and chattered

wanted

to hit

to play.

me

I

Lop-

longer, but

Ear did not expose himself a second time.

my

I

down

at

him.

wanted to have him

with the thing.

He saw

try

me, but

ignored me, turning his attention to Broken-

Tooth,

who was

still

teetering slightly

and

invol-

untarily on the end of the branch.

The Tooth reached

on

first

arrow leaped

yelled with its

mark.

the matter.

I

fright

upward.

and pain.

BrokenIt

had

This put a new complexion

no longer cared

crouched trembling close to

to play,

my Hmb.

but

A second

arrow and a third soared up, missing BrokenTooth, rustling the leaves as they passed through, arching in their

flight

The Fire-Man

and returning

stretched his

bow

to earth.

again.

He

BEFORE ADAM walking away several

shifted his position,

then shifted

it

89

a second time.

The

steps,

bow-string

twanged, the arrow leaped upward, and Broken-

Tooth, uttering a branch.

I

terrible scream, fell off the

saw him

over and over,

as he

went down, turning

arms and

all

legs

it

seemed, the

shaft of the arrow projecting from his chest

and appearing and disappearing with each revolution of his body.

Sheer down, screaming, seventy feet he

fell,

smashing to the earth with an audible thud and crunch, his body rebounding slightly and settling

down

again.

Still

he lived, for he moved and

squirmed, clawing with his hands and

I

feet.

remember the Fire-Man running forward with a stone and hammering him on the head

and then

I

.

.

remember no more.

Always, during the dream, did

—

.

I

my

childhood, at this stage of

wake up screaming

VTith fright

my mother or nurse, anxious and startled, by my bedside, passing soothing hands through my hair and telling me that they to find, often,

were there and that there was nothing to

My

fear.

next dream, in the order of succession,

BEFORE ADAM

90

begins always with the flight of Lop-Ear and

myself through the

Broken-Tooth and the gone.

Lop-Ear and

fleeing

through the

burning pain;

The Fire-Man and

forest.

I,

tree of the tragedy are in a cautious panic, are

and from the

head and shaft from either the Fire-Man.

of

it

pain

me

my

In

trees.

Not only

it

a

protruding

flesh,

side, is

is

an arrow of

did the pull and strain

severely, but

ments and made

right leg

it

bothered

impossible for

my move-

me

to

keep

up with Lop-Ear.

At

last I

gave up, crouching in

Lop-

the secure fork of a tree.

Ear went

right on.

him — most

called to

I

plaintively, I

remem-

ber; and he stopped and looked

back.

Then he

cHmbing

returned to me,

into the fork

amining the arrow. to pull

it

out, but

and ex-

He tried one way

the flesh resisted the barbed

head, and the other

way

sisted the feathered shaft.

hurt grievously, and

I

it

re-

Also,

it

stopped him.

BEFORE ADAM For some time we crouched

91

nervous and anxious to be gone,

and apprehensively peering and myself whimpering

Lop-Ear was

perpetually

way and

this

and yet

plainly in a funk,

that,

and sobbing.

softly

duct in remaining by me, in spite of I

Lop-Ear

there,

his conhis fear,

take as a foreshadowing of the altruism and

comradeship that have helped make

man

the

mightiest of the animals.

Once again Lop-Ear

tried to

drag the arrow

through the flesh, and I angrily stopped him.

Then he

bent

down and began gnawing the As he did

of the arrow with his teeth.

shaft so he

held the arrow firmly in both hands so that

would not play about

same time

I

upon

scene

this

in the

wound, and

held on to him.

— the

often meditate

I

two of

it

at the

us,

half-grown

cubs, in the childhood of the race, and the one

mastering his fear, beating pulse of

flight, in

the other. that

of

And

down

Red Cross

im-

order to stand by and succor there rises up before

was there foreshadowed, and

Damon

his selfish

and Pythias, of

I

me

see visions

life-saving crews

nurses, of martyrs

all

and

and leaders of

BEFORE ADAM

92

Damien, and of the

forlorn hopes, of Father

men of earth, mighty may trace back to the

Christ himself, and of all the

of stature, whose strength

elemental loins of Lop-Ear and Big-Tooth and other dim denizens of the Younger World.

When Lop-Ear had chewed

off the

head of the

arrow, the shaft was withdrawn easily enough. I

started to go on, but this time

stopped me.

Some

My

it

was he that

was bleeding

leg

profusely.

of the smaller veins had doubtless been

ruptured.

Running out

Lop-Ear gathered These he plished

stopped.

a

end of a branch,

handful of green leaves.

stuffed into the

the

to the

purpose,

wound.

for

the

Then we went on

the safety of the caves.

They accombleeding

together,

soon

back to

CHAPTER

WELL

do

VIII

remember

I

home.

after I left

I

that

first

winter

have long dreams

Lop-

of sitting shivering in the cold.

Ear and legs

I sit close together,

each other, blue-faced and with

about

got particularly crisp along

chattering teeth.

It

toward morning.

In those

slept

little,

and waiting

with our arms and

chill early

numb

huddling together in

for the sunrise in order to get

When we went outside there was a frost under foot. One morning we ice

hours

on the surface of the quiet water

we

misery

warm.

crackle of

discovered in the

eddy

where was the drinking-place, and there was a great

How-do-you-do about

Bone was the

oldest

member of the

had never seen anything

member

Old Marrow-

it.

like

it

horde, and he before.

the worried, plaintive look that

into his eyes as he plaintive look always

examined the

came 93

ice.

into our eyes

I re-

came (This,

wherk

BEFORE ADAM

94

we

did not understand a thing, or

when we

felt

the prod of some vague and inexpressible de-

Red-Eye, too, when he investigated the

sire.)

ice,

looked bleak and plaintive, and stared across the river into the northeast, as

though

in

some way

he connected the Fire People with this latest happening.

But we found

ice

and that was the I

only on that one morning,

coldest winter

we

experienced.

have no memory of other winters when

so cold.

it

was

have often thought that that cold

I

winter was a fore-runner of the countless cold winters to come, as the ice-sheet from farther

down over the

north crept

we never saw

face of the land.

that ice-sheet.

Many

But

generations

must have passed away before the descendants of the horde migrated south, or remained and

adapted themselves to the changed conditions. Life us.

was

Little

cuted.

hit or

miss and happy-go-lucky with

was ever planned, and

We

ate

when we were

less

was

exe-

when we were hungry, drank

thirsty,

avoided our carnivorous

enemies, took shelter in the caves at night, and for the rest just sort of played along through

life.

BEFORE ADAM

We

were very curious,

us, except

amused, and

easily

full

There was no seriousness

of tricks and pranks.

about

95

when we were

in

angry, in which cases the one

danger or were

was quickly

for-

gotten and the other as quickly got over.

We were

We

quential.

and

it

of us.

we

inconsecutive, illogical, and inconse-

had no steadfastness of purpose,

was here that the Fire People were ahead

They

possessed

possessed so

little.

all

these things of which

Occasionally, however,

especially in the realm of the emotions,

The

capable of long-cherished purpose. fulness of the

may be

to

my

monogamic couples

explained, any

have referred

One

cannot be so

more than can be explained the

undying enmity between it

faith-

explained as a matter of habit; but

long desire for the Swift

But

I

we were

me and Red-Eye.

was our inconsequentiality and

pidity that especially distresses

back upon that

life

me when

in the long ago.

I

stu-

look

Once

found a broken gourd which happened to right side

filled

lie

with

The water was sweet, and I drank it. even took the gourd down to the stream and

the rain. I

up and which had been

I

BEFORE ADAM

96

with more water, some of which

filled it

and some of which

And

then

I

entered

my

carry

into

it

poured over Lop-Ear.

I

threw the gourd away.

head to

my

fill

drank

I

never

It

the gourd with water and

Yet often

cave.

I

was

thirsty

at night, especially after eating wild onions

no one ever dared leave the

watercress, and

a while.

But

And

yet,

this that the using of

became the general I

was not the

to old

that

it

it

was not long

after

gourds for storing water

practice of the horde.

But

The honor was due

inventor.

Marrow-Bone, and

was the

was a plaything,

l^WWflW-

it

nothing more.

and

it

is

fair

to

assume

necessity of his great age that

brought about the innovation.

At any

rate, the first

to use gourds

member of

was Marrow-Bone.

the horde

He

kept a

BEFORE ADAM

97

supply of drinking-water in his cave, which cave belonged to his son, the Hairless One, mitted him to occupy a corner of see

Marrow-Bone

filling his

ing-place and carrying

it

who

We

it.

per-

used to

gourd at the drink-

carefully

up

to his cave.

Imitation was strong in the Folk, and

one,

first

and then another and another, procured a gourd and used general

it

in similar fashion, until

with

practice

all

of us

so

it

to

was a store

water.

Sometimes old Marrow-Bone had

and was unable

to leave the cave.

that the Hairless

A

little later,

to Long-Lip,

One

filled

the Hairless his

son.

when Marrow-Bone was

sick spells

Then

it

the gourd for him.

One deputed the task And after that, even well again,

Long-Lip

continued carrying water for him.

By and

except on unusual occasions, the

men

carried any water at

women and

carriers

to

fill

We

by,

never

leaving the task to the

larger children.

were independent. ourselves,

all,

was

Lop-Ear and

I

carried water only for

and we often mocked the young water-

when they were

the gourds.

called

away from play

BEFORE ADAM

98

Progress

through

was

slow

with

even the

life,

same way that children

We

us.

much

adults,

play,

learned,

was usually

and was due

What

and keenness of

For that matter, the one big

invention of the horde, during the time it,

Httle

in the course of play,

to our curiosity

appreciation.

with

the

in

and we played as

none of the other animals played.

we

played

was the use of gourds.

only water in the gourds

—

At

first

I lived

we

stored

in imitation of old

Marrow-Bone. But one day some one of the women

know which one

not

berries all

the

roots

had

and carried

— it

filled

—

I

do

a gourd with black-

to her cave.

In no time

women were carrying berries and nuts and The idea, once started, in the gourds. Another evolution of the carry-

to go on.

ing-receptacle

was due

to the

women.

With-

out doubt, some woman's gourd was too small, or else she had forgotten her gourd ; but be that as

it

may, she bent two great leaves together,

pinning the seams with twigs, and carried

home

a bigger quantity of berries than could have

been contained

in the largest gourd.

BEFORE ADAM So

far

we

and no

got,

99

farther, in the trans-

portation of suppHes during the years I lived

with the

Folk.

anybody's

never entered

It

head to weave a basket out of willow-withes.

Sometimes the men and

women

tough vines

tied

about the bundles of ferns and branches that they carried to the caves to sleep upon. bly

in

ten

Possi-

we might

or twenty generations

have worked up to the weaving of baskets.

And

of

this,

one thing

is

sure

if

:

once

we wove

withes into baskets, the next and inevitable step

would have been the weaving of

cloth.

Clothes would have followed, and with covering

our nakedness would have come modesty.

Thus was momentum gained But we were without

World.

We

were just getting

started,

go far in a single generation.

weapons, without

The

of speech.

the future that I

Even covery.

I

fire,

and

in the

this

momentum.

and we could not

We were without

in the

raw beginnings

device of writing lay so far in

am

appalled

when

was once on the verge of

To show

velopment

Younger

in those

I

think of it.

a great dis-

you how fortuitous was dedays

let

me

state that

had

it

BEFORE ADAM

100

not been for the gluttony of Lop-Ear I might

have brought about the domestication of the

And this was something that the Fire People who lived to the northeast had not yet

dog.

They were without dogs;

achieved.

knew from

observation.

how Lop-Ear's social

But

let

me

this tell

I

you

gluttony possibly set back our

development many generations.

Well to the west of our caves was a great

swamp, but rocky

to the south lay a stretch of low,

These were

hills.

two reasons.

First of

there of the kind hills

were

filled

we

ate

little

there

all, ;

with the

frequented for

and

was no food

next, those rocky

lairs

of carnivorous

beasts.

But Lop-Ear and

We

one day.

tiger.

We

forest, early in the

dislike

to branch,

himself.

We

chanced upon him

were in the

morning, and from the safety

of the branches overhead

him our

hills

Please do not laugh.

was old Saber-Tooth

perfectly safe.

over to the

would not have strayed had we

not been teasing a It

I strayed

we

and hatred.

and from tree to

chattered

down

at

And

from branch

tree,

we

followed

BEFORE ADAM

loi

overhead, making an infernal row and warning the forest-dwellers that old Saber-Tooth

all

was

coming.

We

spoiled his hunting for him, anyway.

we made him good and at us

and lashed

angry.

He

And

snarled

and sometimes he

his tail,

paused and stared up at us quietly for a long time, as

if

way by

debating in his mind some

which he could get hold of

us.

But we only

laughed and pelted him with twigs and the ends of branches.

This tiger-baiting was

sport

among

Sometimes half the horde would

the folk.

low from overhead a

tiger or lion that

tured out in the daytime. for

common

It

fol-

had ven-

was our revenge;

more than one member of the horde, caught

unexpectedly, had gone the belly or the lion's.

helplessness

way

of the tiger's

Also, by such ordeals of

and shame, we taught the hunt-

ing animals to some extent to keep out of our territory.

then funny.

And was

it

It

was

a great game.

BEFORE ADAM

102

And

Lop-Ear and

so

I

had chased Saber-

Tooth across three miles of the last he put his

from our gibing best to keep

tail

like a

between

forest.

Toward

his legs

and

We

beaten cur.

up with him

;

but when

the edge of the forest he was no

fled

did our

we reached

more than a

streak in the distance. I

was

know what prompted

don't

curiosity;

Lop-Ear and

I

unless

it

but after playing around awhile,

ventured across the open ground

to the edge of the rocky far.

us,

Possibly at no time were

hundred yards from the

We

hills.

trees.

did not go

we more than

a

Coming around

a sharp corner of rock (we went very carefully,

we

because

counter),

did not

know what we might

we came upon

en-

three puppies playing

in the sun.

They for

some

did not see us, and time.

They were

we watched them wild dogs.

rock-wall was a horizontal fissure the lair where

their

mother had

In the

— evidently left

them,

and where they should have remained had they been obedient.

But the growing

Lop-Ear and me had impelled

life,

that in

us to venture

BEFORE ADAM away from

103

the forest, had driven the puppies

out of the cave to

frolic.

I

know how

their

mother would have punished them had she caught them.

But

He

who caught them. me, and then we made a dash

was Lop-Ear and

it

looked at

for

The

it.

knew no

puppies

place to

except into the

lair,

run

and

we headed them off. One rushed between my legs.

squatted

I

his

sharp

my

little

arm, and

him

in

and

He sank

grabbed him.

teeth into I

dropped

suddenness

the

of the hurt and surprise.

The

next

moment he

had scurried

Lop -Ear,

inside.

struggling

with the second puppy,

scowled at

me and

timated by a variety of sounds the

in-

I

BEFORE ADAM

104

different kinds of a fool

This made

was.

to valor.

the

then

I

me ashamed and

spurred

I

me

grabbed the remaining puppy by

I

He

tail.

and a bungler that

got his teeth into

me

and

once,

him by the nape of the neck.

got

Lop-Ear and

I sat

down, and held the puppies

up, and looked at them, and laughed.

They were Lop-Ear

snarling and yelping and crying.

started

suddenly.

had heard something.

We

He

thought

looked

at

he

each

other in fear, realizing the danger of our position.

The one thing that made was tampering with puppies that

their young.

made such

the wild dogs.

animals raging demons

And

these

a racket belonged to

Well we knew them, running

in packs, the terror of the grass-eating animals.

We

had watched them following the herds of

cattle

and bison and dragging down the

the aged, and the sick.

We

calves,

had been chased

by them ourselves, more than once.

I

had seen

one of the Folk, a woman, run down by them

and caught the woods.

just as she reached the shelter of

Had

she not been tired out by the

run, she might have

made

it

into a tree.

She

•*

Well we knew them, running

in packs, the terror

the grass-eating animals."

of

BEFORE ADAM tried,

and slipped, and

short

work of

We

a

back.

They made

her.

did not stare at each other longer than

a moment.

we

fell

107

Keeping

tight hold of

Once

ran for the woods.

our

prizes,

in the security of

we held up the puppies and laughed You see, we had to have our laugh out,

tall tree,

again.

no matter what happened.

And

then began one of the hardest tasks I

We started to carry the puppies

ever attempted. to our cave.

Instead of using our hands for

climbing, most of the time they were occupied

with holding our squirming captives.

we

tried

treed

to

walk on the ground, but were

by a miserable

Lop-Ear got an

to

tied

up bundles of leaves

carry

Breaking vines,

hyena,

home

he tied

legs together,

for

some

off

his

beds.

tough

puppy's

and then, with

another piece of vine passed

around

who

followed

He was a wise hyena. idea. He remembered how

along underneath.

we

Once

his neck, slung the

BEFORE ADAM

io8

puppy on and

feet free to

and then on

It

it

into Lop-Ear's soft

the puppy, the ground.

its

were not

four legs

fell,

and clutched

hands to save

still

dropped to

tied,

The hyena proceeded disgusted

trees.

I

knew for wanting to

and

to dine.

angry.

made

the

He

off alone

had no reason that

carry the

except that I wanted to; I

teeth

and unprotected stomach.

abused the hyena, and then went

task.

its

tied,

vine around his neck broke, and

Lop-Ear was

through the

puppy's

difficulty,

to the side

did was to sink

a branch violently with both

The

and

stay slung on

Its teeth

out a scream, nearly

himself.

my

swung around

in front.

and the next thing

jubilant,

There was one

The puppy wouldn't

Lop-Ear's back.

let

him with hands

to finish tying

but started on.

however.

He

left

He was

cHmb.

me

did not wait for legs,

This

his back.

work

puppy

and

I

I

to the cave,

stayed by

my

a great deal easier by

elaborating on Lop-Ear's idea.

Not only did

the puppy's legs, but I

thrust a stick

I

tie

through his jaws and tied them together curely.

se-

BEFORE ADAM At I

puppy home.

got the

I

last

109

imagine

I

had more pertinacity than the average Folk,

or else

should not have succeeded.

I

me when

laughed at

puppy up mind.

to

my

high

little

Success crowned

I

boxed

his ears,

and there

efforts,

a plaything such as

none of the Folk possessed.

When

lugging the

cave, but I did not

my

He was

was the puppy.

me

they saw

They

He learned

rapidly.

played with him and he bit me,

and then he did not

I

try again

to bite for a long time. I

something new, and the Folk to like

he

He was

was quite taken up with him.

refused

birds for

it

new

was a

characteristic of

When

things.

and vegetables,

fruits

him and

squirrels

saw that

I I

caught

and young

rabbits.

(We Folk were meat-eaters, as well as vegetarians, and we were adept at catchingsmall game.)

The puppy

ate the

as I can estimate, I

week.

And

then,

meat and

thrived.

As well

must have had him over a

coming back

to the cave

one

day with a nestful of young-hatched pheasants, I

found Lop-Ear had

killed the

just beginning to eat him.

I

puppy and was

sprang for Lop-

BEFORE ADAM

no Ear, it

— the cave was small, — and we went

at

tooth and nail.

And

thus, in a fight,

ended one of the

earliest

We

pulled

attempts to domesticate the dog. hair out in handfuls,

gouged. that

we

Then we ate

the

and scratched and

sulked and

into cooking animals scroll of the future.

up.

Raw ?

puppy.

had not yet discovered

made

fire.

lay in

Yes.

Our the

bit

and

After

We

evolution

tight-rolled

CHAPTER IX

RED-EYE was

He was

an atavism.

the

great discordant element in our horde.

He was more He

primitive than any of us.

did not belong with us, yet

primitive ourselves that

we were

we were

him

out.

Rude

was our

as

kill

to live

tended always to destroy the horde

in

it.

by

his unsocial acts.

to an

him or

social organi-

zation, he was, nevertheless, too rude

He

so

incapable of a

cooperative effort strong enough to cast

still

earlier type,

He was

and

really a reversion

his place

was with the

Tree People rather than with us

who were

in

the process of becoming men.

He was

a monster of cruelty,

He

a great deal in that day.

which

is

saying

beat his wives

—

not that he ever had more than one wife at a time, It

but that he was married

was impossible

for

any

him, and yet they did compulsion.

woman

live

many

times.

to live with

with him, out of

There was no gainsaying him. Ill

BEFORE ADAM

112

man was strong ^.j^^^^^

--

^/^-^ '

^/

enough stand

to

against

him.

Often do

I

have visions of the quiet hour

From drinking-place and patch and berry swamp the Folk are

before the twilight. carrot

BEFORE ADAM

113

trooping into the open space before the caves.

They dare

dreadful darkness

world

is

no

linger

is

than

later

this,

for the

approaching, in which the

given over to the carnage of the hunting

animals, while the

fore-runners of

man

hide

tremblingly in their holes.

There yet remain

we climb

our caves.

to

few minutes before

to us a

We

are tired from the

play of the day, and the sounds

subdued.

and

Even the cubs,

antics, play

still

with restraint.

we make

are

greedy for fun

The wind from

the sea has died down, and the shadows are

lengthening with the last of the sun's descent.

And

suddenly,

then,

breaks a wild

He

blows.

At

But

first

as

is

from Red-Eye's

screaming

cave,

and the sound of

beating his wife.

an awed silence comes

the blows

upon

us.

and screams continue we

break out into an insane gibbering of helpless rage.

It

is

plain that the

men

resent

Red-

Eye's actions, but they are too afraid of him.

The

blows cease,

and a low groaning

dies

away, while we chatter among ourselves and the sad twilight creeps upon us.

BEFORE ADAM

114

We,

whom

to

most happenings were jokes,

never laughed during Red-Eye's wife-beatings.

We

knew

more than one morning, cliff,

we

did

He had from

he

body of

He

cave-mouth.