MAN'S PROGRESS 261 



the cave happened to be, for they could choose any 

 place that seemed best fitted for their homes. By 

 this time they had learned to plant the seeds of the 

 grasses that gave them grain and flax, and some 

 fruits. Then it became necessary that they should 

 live in communities near the cultivated ground. 



Some of the peoples made their houses on piles 

 that they had driven into the bottom of the lake. 

 May we not beUeve that they had seen their little 

 brother, the beaver, at work upon his house in the 

 pond? How could they help wishing to be as safe 

 as he? Don't you suppose it was from the beaver 

 and from the birds that those early men learned to 

 plaster their houses with clay? 



Then, later, when they found how hard the clay 

 would become when dried in the sun or baked in a 

 fire, they learned to make dishes of it. Indeed, our 

 own dishes that we call chma, and prize so highly, 

 are all made of clay. So from these early people 

 has come down to us the knowledge of making dishes 

 of clay, as well as of making houses, and of spinning 

 and weaving the fiber of flax into cloth. 



They watched the beaver fell the trees and roll 

 them down to the water, float them over to the dam 

 or to their house, and anchor them securely in the 

 mud. Their own way of felling trees was almost as 

 toilsome as that of the beaver, for all they had to 

 use were hatchets made of stone. Much patience it 

 must have required to chop down the trees with those 

 rough tools. But those men knew nothing of metal 

 and its uses, and all their implements were made of 

 stone or carved out of the bones and horns of animals. 



