How the alphabet was made

THE week after Taffimai Metallumai (we will still call her Taffy, Best Beloved) made that little mistake about her Daddy`s spear and the Stranger-man and the picture-letter and all, she went carp-fishing again with her Daddy. Her Mummy wanted her to stay at home and help hang up hides to dry on the big drying-poles outside their Neolithic Cave, but Taffy slipped away down to her Daddy quite early, and they fished. Presently she began to giggle, and her Daddy said, `Don`t be silly, child.`
`But wasn`t it inciting!` said Taffy. `Don`t you remember how the Head Chief puffed out his cheeks, and how funny the nice Stranger-man looked with the mud in his hair?`
`Well do I,` said Tegumai. `I had to pay two deerskinssoft ones with fringesto the Stranger-man for the things we did to him.`
`We didn`t do anything,` said Taffy. `It was Mummy and the other Neolithic ladiesand the mud.`
`We won`t talk about that,` said her Daddy, `Let`s have lunch.`
Taffy took a marrow-bone and sat mousy-quiet for ten whole minutes, while her Daddy scratched on pieces of birch-bark with a shark`s tooth. Then she said, `Daddy, I`ve thinked of a secret surprise. You make a noiseany sort of noise.`
`Ah!` said Tegumai. `Will that do to begin with?`
`Yes,` said Taffy. `You look just like a carp-fish with its mouth open. Say it again, please.`
`Ah! ah! ah!` said her Daddy. `Don`t be rude, my daughter.`
`I`m not meaning rude, really and truly,` said Taffy. `It`s part of my secret-surprise-think. Do say ah, Daddy, and keep your mouth open at the end, and lend me that tooth. I`m going to draw a carp-fish`s mouth wide-open.`
`What for?` said her Daddy.
`Don`t you see?` said Taffy, scratching away on the bark. `That will be our little secret s`prise. When I draw a carp-fish with his mouth open in the smoke at the back of our Caveif Mummy doesn`t mindit will remind you of that ah-noise. Then we can play that it was me jumped out of the dark and s`prised you with that noisesame as I did in the beaver-swamp last winter.`
`Really?` said her Daddy, in the voice that grown-ups use when they are truly attending. `Go on, Taffy.`
`Oh bother!` she said. `I can`t draw all of a carp-fish, but I can draw something that means a carp-fish`s mouth. Don`t you know how they stand on their heads rooting in the mud? Well, here`s a pretence carp-fish (we can play that the rest of him is drawn). Here`s just his mouth, and that means ah.` And she drew this. (1.)
`That`s not bad,` said Tegumai, and scratched on his own piece of bark for himself; but you`ve forgotten the feeler that hangs across his mouth.`
`But I can`t draw, Daddy.`
`You needn`t draw anything of him except just the opening of his mouth and the feeler across. Then we`ll know he`s a carp-fish, `cause the perches and trouts haven`t got feelers. Look here, Taffy.` And he drew this. (2.)
`Now I`ll copy it.` said Taffy. `Will you understand this when you see it?`
`Perfectly,` said her Daddy.
And she drew this. (3.) `And I`ll be quite as s`prised when I see it anywhere, as if you had jumped out from behind a tree and said `”Ah!”`
`Now, make another noise,` said Taffy, very proud.
`Yah!` said her Daddy, very loud.
`H`m,` said Taffy. `That`s a mixy noise. The end part is ah-carp-fish-mouth; but what can we do about the front part? Yer- yer-yer and ah! Ya!`
`It`s very like the carp-fish-mouth noise. Let`s draw another bit of the carp-fish and join `em,` said her Daddy. He was quite incited too.
`No. If they`re joined, I`ll forget. Draw it separate. Draw his tail. If he`s standing on his head the tail will come first. `Sides, I think I can draw tails easiest,` said Taffy.
`A good notion,` said Tegumai. “Here`s a carp-fish tail for the yer-noise.` And he drew this. (4.)
`I`ll try now,` said Taffy. “Member I can`t draw like you, Daddy. Will it do if I just draw the split part of the tail, and the sticky-down line for where it joins?` And she drew this. (5.)
Her Daddy nodded, and his eyes were shiny bright with `citement.
`That`s beautiful,` she said. `Now make another noise, Daddy.`
`Oh!` said her Daddy, very loud.
`That`s quite easy,` said Taffy. `You make your mouth all around like an egg or a stone. So an egg or a stone will do for that.`
`You can`t always find eggs or stones. We`ll have to scratch a round something like one.` And he drew this. (6.)
`My gracious!` said Taffy, `what a lot of noise-pictures we`ve made,carp-mouth, carp-tail, and egg! Now, make another noise, Daddy.`
`Ssh!` said her Daddy, and frowned to himself, but Taffy was too incited to notice.
`That`s quite easy,` she said, scratching on the bark.
`Eh, what?` said her Daddy. `I meant I was thinking, and didn`t want to be disturbed.`
`It`s a noise just the same. It`s the noise a snake makes, Daddy, when it is thinking and doesn`t want to be disturbed. Let`s make the ssh-noise a snake. Will this do?` And she drew this. (7.)
`There,` she said. `That`s another s`prise-secret. When you draw a hissy-snake by the door of your little back-cave where you mend the spears, I`ll know you`re thinking hard; and I`ll come in most mousy-quiet. And if you draw it on a tree by the river when you are fishing, I`ll know you want me to walk most most mousy-quiet, so as not to shake the banks.`
`Perfectly true,` said Tegumai. And there`s more in this game than you think. Taffy, dear, I`ve a notion that your Daddy`s daughter has hit upon the finest thing that there ever was since the Tribe of Tegumai took to using shark`s teeth instead of flints for their spear-heads. I believe we`ve found out the big secret of the world.`
`Why?` said Taffy, and her eyes shone too with incitement.
`I`ll show,` said her Daddy. `What`s water in the Tegumai language?`
`Ya, of course, and it means river toolike Wagai-yathe Wagai river.`
`What is bad water that gives you fever if you drink itblack waterswamp-water?`
`Yo, of course.`
`Now look,` said her Daddy. `S`pose you saw this scratched by the side of a pool in the beaver-swamp?` And he drew this. (8.)
`Carp-tail and round egg. Two noises mixed! Yo, bad water,` said Taffy. “Course I wouldn`t drink that water because I`d know you said it was bad.`
`But I needn`t be near the water at all. I might be miles away, hunting, and still`
`And still it would be just the same as if you stood there and said, “G`way, Taffy, or you`ll get fever.” All that in a carp-fish-tail and a round egg! O Daddy, we must tell Mummy, quick!` and Taffy danced all round him.
`Not yet,` said Tegumai; `not till we`ve gone a little further. Let`s see. Yo is bad water, but So is food cooked on the fire, isn`t it?` And he drew this. (9.)
`Yes. Snake and egg,` said Taffy `So that means dinner`s ready. If you saw that scratched on a tree you`d know it was time to come to the Cave. So`d I.`
`My Winkie!` said Tegumai. `That`s true too. But wait a minute. I see a difficulty. SO means “come and have dinner,” but sho means the drying-poles where we hang our hides.`
`Horrid old drying-poles!` said Taffy. `I hate helping to hang heavy, hot, hairy hides on them. If you drew the snake and egg, and I thought it meant dinner, and I came in from the wood and found that it meant I was to help Mummy hang the two hides on the drying-poles, what would I do?`
`You`d be cross. So`d Mummy. We must make a new picture for sho. We must draw a spotty snake that hisses sh-sh, and we`ll play that the plain snake only hisses ssss.`
`I couldn`t be sure how to put in the spots,` said Taffy. `And p`raps if you were in a hurry you might leave them out, and I`d think it was so when it was sho, and then Mummy would catch me just the same. No! I think we`d better draw a picture of the horrid high drying-poles their very selves, and make quite sure. I`ll put them in just after the hissy-snake. Look!` And she drew this. (10.)
`P`raps that`s safest. It`s very like our drying-poles, anyhow,` said her Daddy, laughing. `Now I`ll make a new noise with a snake and drying-pole sound in it. I`ll say shi. That`s Tegumai for spear, Taffy.` And he laughed.
`Don`t make fun of me,` said Taffy, as she thought of her picture-letter and the mud in the Stranger-man`s hair. `You draw it, Daddy.`
`We won`t have beavers or hills this time, eh?` said her Daddy, `I`ll just draw a straight line for my spear.` And he drew this. (11.)
`Even Mummy couldn`t mistake that for me being killed.`
`Please don`t, Daddy. It makes me uncomfy. Do some more noises. We`re getting on beautifully.`
`Er-hm!` said Tegumai, looking up. `We`ll say shu. That means sky.`
Taffy drew the snake and the drying-pole. Then she stopped. `We must make a new picture for that end sound, mustn`t we?`
`Shu-shu-u-u-u!` said her Daddy. `Why, it`s just like the round-egg-sound made thin.`
`Then s`pose we draw a thin round egg, and pretend it`s a frog that hasn`t eaten anything for years.`
`N-no,` said her Daddy. `If we drew that in a hurry we might mistake it for the round egg itself. Shu-shu-shu! `I tell you what we`ll do. We`ll open a little hole at the end of the round egg to show how the O-noise runs out all thin, ooo-oo-oo. Like this.` And he drew this. (12.)
`Oh, that`s lovely! Much better than a thin frog. Go on,` said Taffy, using her shark`s tooth. Her Daddy went on drawing, and his hand shook with incitement. He went on till he had drawn this. (13.)
`Don`t look up, Taffy,` he said. `Try if you can make out what that means in the Tegumai language. If you can, we`ve found the Secret.`
`Snakepolebrokeneggcarptail and carp-mouth,` said Taffy. `Shu-ya. Sky-water (rain).` Just then a drop fell on her hand, for the day had clouded over. `Why, Daddy, it`s raining. Was that what you meant to tell me?`
`Of course,` said her Daddy. `And I told it you without saying a word, didn`t I?`
`Well, I think I would have known it in a minute, but that raindrop made me quite sure. I`ll always remember now. Shu-ya means rain, or “it is going to rain.” Why, Daddy!` She got up and danced round him. `S`pose you went out before I was awake, and drawed shu-ya in the smoke on the wall, …