apUjSing ti^e Cl^trtietl^ 



Adam the Hunter 



ADAM had no sooner learned to convert his 

 floating log into a canoe by the use of 

 fire, than it silently bore him into a before 

 unknown pleasure of Paradise. He had no other 

 projectile than his flint-bladed spear, hurled by his 

 sinewy arm. To bring him within reach of his 

 quarry the greatest stealth and patience were re- 

 quired, and he was often disappointed. Now, with 

 his lovely Eve propelling his canoe, and his torch 

 held aloft, he could approach, unsuspected, what- 

 ever living thing might be frequenting the shores 

 of river or lake. Adam always chose a night on 

 the dark of the moon, when the wind was still and 

 the atmosphere clear of fog. It remained for one 

 of his sons, who was also his devoted disciple and 

 admirer, some twenty thousand or two millions of 

 years later, to make the discovery that in a lighter 

 and swifter canoe livelier sport was to be had in 

 the full light of the moon. 



We watched the sun descending with the impa- 

 tience of school-boys, as we were to go that night 

 to make the experiment of a moonlight fire-hunt, a 

 thing that Adam would have said to be fatuous and 

 impossible. I polished the reflector of my lamp till 



3" 



