Big People and Little People of Other Lands Part 7

The guanaco is nearly as large as a cow, and has a head like a camel.

Its flesh is good to eat, and the people make cloaks of its skin.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Hunting Ostriches.]

The ostrich is the largest bird in the world. Its legs are very long, and it has a long neck. It cannot fly, for its wings are too small, but it can run very fast. It can run faster than a horse. It is hard for the hunter to catch it. He rides on horseback, and catches the ostrich with a bo'las. A bolas is a rope with a stone, a metal ball, or a lump of hard clay fastened to each end. The hunter swings one end of the bolas round and round his head, and then hurls it with great force at the ostrich. It strikes the ostrich or catches it by the legs and throws it down. Then the hunter runs up and kills the ostrich with a knife. The hunters also hunt the ostrich with dogs. Sometimes an ostrich will spring suddenly up from the long gra.s.s almost in front of the hunter and his dogs. Then the dogs can easily catch it.

The ostrich makes a hole in the ground under a bush for its eggs. This is its nest. The eggs are very large, and they are good to eat. Its flesh is also good to eat. Of course you know ostrich feathers are pretty for ladies' hats. The feathers for hats are taken from the tail and from the ends of the wings. But the feathers of the ostrich in Patagonia are not so fine and pretty as the feathers of the ostrich found in Africa.

There is an animal in Patagonia called the puma. It is like a cat, but it is much stronger. Often it kills and eats the guanaco.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Pumas.]

The boys and girls in Patagonia have very few toys, but they are merry and happy. As the boys grow up, they soon learn to hunt; and then they go out with their fathers to hunt the guanaco and the ostrich.

THE PYGMIES.

Perhaps you have read in fairy tales of very little people called dwarfs. There are old stories which tell us about very small men who lived a long time ago in Africa. They were called pygmies. They were only one foot high, and they built their houses with eggsh.e.l.ls. They lived in holes in the ground. They had goats and sheep which were much smaller than themselves, and they had corn which they cut down with axes, as we cut down trees.

This is what we are told about them; but, of course, those stories are fables. There never were men so small as one foot high.

But there are real people in Africa called pygmies. They are very small. The men and women look as if they were boys and girls. The men are about four feet high.

There are a great many large forests in Africa. It is in the forests that the pygmies live. The forests are so dark in many places that one could not see to read at noonday. Only a few white men have been in the land of the pygmies and seen them. They are shy, like children, and hide their faces when spoken to.

Some of the pygmies are black and some are red. They do not wear much clothing. They do not need much, for the weather is always very warm in the country in which they live. The men and boys wear only a strip of cloth around their loins.

Many of the pygmies have no houses. They wander from place to place, and sleep on the ground under a bush. But some of them have little houses, or huts, built in the shape of beehives and about four feet high. They are covered over with long leaves. The door is only about a foot and a half high, just high enough for the pygmies to creep in.

Their beds are made of sticks stuck in the ground with other sticks across them.

The pygmies live by hunting. They do not shoot with guns, as we do.

They use bows and arrows, and they are very quick and clever at shooting. A pygmy will shoot off three or four arrows one after the other so quickly that the last is flying away before the first has. .h.i.t the mark.

The pygmies are also very smart in making pits to catch the animals they wish to kill. They dig large holes and cover them with sticks and leaves. The animal comes along and falls into the pit and is caught.

The pygmies can kill elephants with their bows and arrows. They first shoot at the elephant's eyes until he is blind. They then keep shooting at him till he falls dead.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Village of Pygmies.]

The pygmies eat the flesh of some of the animals they kill. They sell or trade the fur and skin and ivory for arrows and knives. They also get tobacco and potatoes for their furs and skins.

They are also very good at fishing. They can catch large fish with a piece of meat fastened to a string.

The pygmies do not dig the ground or plant or sow anything. Bananas grow in Africa, and the pygmies are very fond of them. Often they come out of the forests to get bananas from the trees on which they grow.

If a pygmy sees a good bunch of bananas that he would like to have, he shoots his arrow into the stalk. When the owner of the tree sees the arrow he knows how it came there. So he leaves the stalk until the pygmy takes it away. Sometimes a pygmy pays for the bunch of bananas with pieces of meat. He wraps up a piece of meat in gra.s.s or leaves, and fastens it to the stalk where he has cut off the bananas.

A pygmy can eat twice as many bananas as the largest white man. He can eat as many as sixty at one meal.

Though the pygmies are small, they are very brave, and all the other people who live near them are very much afraid of them.

THE INDIANS.

Long, long ago, before Columbus found America, the Indians lived where we live now, There were no cities or houses then, such as we have.

There were no farms or gardens or fences or roads. A large part of the country was covered with trees. The rest was great gra.s.s plains and swamps.

The Indians built their houses where they pleased, beside the rivers or near the mountains or on the wide plains. What sort of houses did they live in? They lived in tents made of skins. The Indian tents were called wigwams.

[Ill.u.s.tration: An Indian Wigwam.]

There were many tribes of Indians. Each tribe had a great many men and women and children. Some of the tribes lived in the north, some in the south, some near the sea. In nearly every part of the country there were Indian tribes. Often some of the tribes went to war with other tribes. They fought with bows and arrows and tomahawks. The tomahawk was a sort of hatchet. The head of it was made of a stone with a sharp edge.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Indian Bow and Arrows.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Tomahawks.]

The Indians were very cruel in war. When they killed a man, they cut the skin and hair off the top of his head. This was called scalping.

When about to go to war, they painted their faces to make themselves look very fierce. They also wore a band around their heads, and in these they stuck some long feathers.

There are Indians still in some parts of our country, and many of them live in wigwams. They sleep in these wigwams, but they cook their food outside. They have no coal or stoves or fire-places. Instead of coal they use wood and dried gra.s.s. They make their fire on the ground.

Their food is very simple. They have meat and fish and berries, and cakes made of corn. The meat they eat is the flesh of the deer and other wild animals.

[Ill.u.s.tration: An Indian Chief.]

The Indians are of a copper color. They are sometimes called "Red Men." They have high cheek bones, black eyes, and straight black hair.

The Indian men spend their time hunting and fishing. They do not have bows and arrows now. They shoot with guns as white men do.

The Indian women do all the work. They cook the food, make the clothes, and plant the corn. They also put up the wigwams and take them down.

For the Indians do not live always in the same place, but often move about.

An Indian woman is called a squaw, and an Indian baby is called a pa-poose'. You would wonder if you saw the Indian baby's cradle. It is a bag made of skin fixed to a flat board. It is just large enough for baby to fit in. The little papoose is wrapped up warm and put into the bag. The mother carries the baby on her back in this cradle.

Often she hangs the cradle up on a branch of a tree. Then the little red baby swings while its mother is cooking or working in the field.

[Ill.u.s.tration: An Indian Baby.]

The men, women, and children wear clothes made of skin. They often wear blankets as shawls are worn by white people. Their shoes are made of deerskin and have no soles. They are called moccasins.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Moccasins.]

In many places the Indians now have schools, and the little Indian boys and girls go to school every day. Our government has sent teachers to teach them. They learn to read and write and count.

But the Indian boys and girls learn a great many things at home. Their fathers tell them about birds and beasts and trees and rivers. And they teach the boys to hunt and fish, and train them up to be brave in war.

The Indian boys and girls have a great many games. The boys play with bows and arrows. They play "blindman's buff," and "hunt the slipper,"

and handball and football. The girls take part in the football. One of their games is the "stick and ring" game. The ring is made of skin and is sometimes covered with beads. Each boy has a stick, and he throws it at the ring while it is rolling along the ground. The game is to send the stick through the ring. Every boy tries to strike every other boy's stick to stop it from going through the ring.

The Indian boys sometimes play at fighting battles. They form themselves into two armies, and one army fights against the other.