Adventure Magazine Cover — page 153: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Fight for the Cave days since the hunters had fled unarmed and left them in the fish-catchers’ pos- session, they had not entirely forgotten their former lords. The fisher people crowded around Ufu the Great and with grunts of anticipation watched him whet his sacrificial knife. They approved, too, of the flat stone. Oc- casionally several would go near the pros- trate hunters and stare at them, but not one braved the wrath of Ufu the Great by administering sacrilegious blows to the destined victims. Ufu the Great, having sharpened the knife to his liking, harangued his followers, shouting so loudly that Lean Ak expected at least one of his men to start up at the sound. The chieftain-magician led his men to the corner where their enemies lay, and pointed out that the bewitched ones still remained deep in the magical spell. This was as a boast, for Ufu the Great by now had turned the credit for the mar- velous sorcery upon himself; at the bottom of facts it was he, and not the merchants, who had worked the marvel. In thanks- giving to the Fish he uttered a psalm, a prelude to the sacrifice: “Men were born of the river. In the river swims the Fish. The Fish is our meat. The Fish gives us strength. The Fish fattens us,” He continued with a long speech ad- dressed to the prostrate hunters, telling them that they had become fishes and would be eaten sacrificially. Lean Ak’s anxiety now had become a high fever. He saw no further hope than to leap to his feet, snatch a bludgeon from the hand of a fisherman and make a lone fight of it. If there had been three or four of his men fully aroused and ready for an instant slashing fight! There was little prospect of that, he saw, and the only thing he could do was to lie still until the last moment, when his sudden uprising would cause the greatest amount of surprize’and confusion. But here again the hunting-chief’s calculations went awry. Several of the fishermen who had re- ceived exceptionally hard beatings in the fight with the hunters several days before nourished a quantity of malice that it pained them to hold in bounds. These fellows, as they listened to Ufu the Great’s preach- 147 ments, stamped and snorted and spat with impatience for the sacrificial work. The chieftain-magician’s harangue proved overlong, and finally they could not deny themselves a small advance upon the ap- proaching fund of revenge. They were standing at the edge of the crowd of fishermen, and in close proximity to their . feet lay the forms of several of their de- tested enemies. Tempted past endurance, these vindictive fishermen nudged each other, and when Ufu the Great shouted his loudest, one of them directed a sly but very heavy kick upon the ribs of the hunter nearest him. Two other vindic- tive fishermen instantly followed with even heavier kicks administered to two more hunters. The kicks were given with abandon, with light heart and heavy foot. They were kicks a reindeer might have adminis- tered; kicks such as are found among sim- ple, hearty men; kicks the like of which might have made an impression upon a mammoth. Under the heart-shaking impact of those supreme kicks, the three unfortunates kicked were jarred out of their stupor, profound as it was. With loud grunts of pain they sat up. The fishermen recoiled in bewil- derment. The chieftain-magician’s apos- trophe came to a sudden halt. The three awakened hunters sat and stared with an astonishment born of clear wits—no shadow of slumber remained in their heads after those stupendous kicks. Lean Ak was on his feet. He had heard the outcry, and a glance had told him to strike. He leaped forward and wrenched a war-club from the nearest astounded enemy and laid it about him furiously. The mob of fishermen backed away in panic.. Lean Ak, filled with rage, plunged after them. Then, seeing but a single man against them, a number of fishermen recoiled and went at the hunting-chief, swinging savagely with their clubs. But now Lean Ak’s three awakened tribes- men rushed into the fight, after having taken weapons from the several fishermen that Lean Ak had knocked down. The four hunters strove mightily against the outnumbering enemy. Their blows fell with the strength born of roast rhinoceros fiesh, of the heartening knowledge that they had fed plentifully. They were hard pressed, though, for the bulk of the fishermen CORMICLOO© S (C@