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IN THE MORNING OF TIME
IN THE MORNING OF TIME
BY
CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS
Author of "The Kindred of the Wild," etc.
NEW YORK
FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1922, by
Frederick A. Stokes Company
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE I The World Without Man 1 II The King of the Triple Horn 20 III The Finding of Fire 41 IV The Children of the Shining One 70 V The Puller-Down of Trees 97 VI The Battle of the Brands 123 VII The Rescue of A-ya 149 VIII The Bending of the Bow 174 IX The Destroying Splendor 198 X The Terrors of the Dark 219 XI The Feasting of the Cave Folk 243 XII On the Face of the Waters 259 XIII The Fear 278 XIV The Lake of Long Sleep 295
IN THE MORNING OF TIME
IN THE MORNING OF TIME
CHAPTER I
THE WORLD WITHOUT MAN
It lay apparently afloat on the sluggish, faintly discolored tide--aplacid, horse-faced, shovel-nosed head, with bumpy holes for ears andimmense round eyes of a somewhat anxious mildness.
The anxiety in the great eyes was not without reason, for their ownerhad just arrived in the tepid and teeming waters of this estuary, andthe creatures which he had already seen about him were both unknownand menacing. But the inshore shallows were full of water-weeds of arankness and succulence far beyond anything he had enjoyed in his oldhabitat, and he was determined to secure himself a place here.
From time to time, as some new monster came in sight, the ungainlyhead would shoot up amazingly to a distance of five or ten, or evenfifteen feet, on a swaying pillar of a neck, in order to get a betterview of the stranger. Then it would slowly sink back again to itsrepose on the water.
The water at this point was almost fresh, because the estuary, thoughfully two miles wide, was filled with the tide of the great riverrolling slowly down from the heart of the continent. The further shorewas so flat that nothing could be seen of it but an endless, palegreen forest of giant reeds. But the nearer shore was skirted, at adistance of perhaps half a mile from the water, by a rampart ofabrupt, bright, rust-red cliffs. The flat land between the watersideand the cliffs, except for the wide strip of beach, was clothed withan enormous and riotous growth of calamaries, tree-ferns, cane andpalm, which rocked and crashed in places as if some colossal wayfarerswere pushing through them. Here and there along the edge of the cliffssat tall beings with prodigious, saw-toothed beaks, like some speciesof bird conceived in a nightmare.
Far out across the water one of these creatures was flapping slowly infrom the sea. Its wings--eighteen feet across from tip to tip--werenot the wings of a bird, but of a bat or a hobgoblin. It had dreadful,hand-like claws on its wing-elbows; and its feet were those of alizard.
As this startling shape came flapping shoreward, the head afloat uponthe water eyed it with interest, but not, as it seemed, with any greatapprehension. Yet it certainly looked formidable enough to excitemisgivings in most creatures. Its flight was not the steady, evenwinging of a bird, but spasmodic and violent. It came on at a heightof perhaps twenty feet above the sluggish tide, and its immense,circular eyes appeared to take no notice of the strange head thatwatched it from the water's surface. It seemed about to pass a littleto one side, when suddenly, with a hoarse, hooting cry, it swerved andswooped, and struck at the floating head with open jaws.
Swift as was that unexpected attack, the assailant struck nothing buta spot of foam where the head had disappeared. Simultaneously with thelightning disappearance, there was a sudden boiling of the water someeighty-odd feet away. But the great bird-lizard was either too furiousto notice this phenomenon or not sagacious enough to interpret it.Flopping into the air again, and gnashing his beak-like jaws withrage, he kept circling about the spot in heavy zigzags, expecting theharmless looking head to reappear.
All at once his expectations were more than realized. The head notonly reappeared, but on a towering leather-colored column of a neck itshot straight into the air to a height of twenty feet. The big, placideyes were now sparkling with anger. The flat, shovel jaws were gapingopen. They seized the swooping foe by the root of the tail, and, inspite of screeches and wild flappings, plucked him down backwards. Atthe surface of the water there was a convulsive struggle, and the widewings were drawn clean under.
For several minutes the water seethed and foamed, and little waves ranclattering up the beach, while the owner of the harmless-looking headtrod his assailant down and crushed him among the weeds of the bottom.Then the foam slowly crimsoned, and the mauled, battered body of thegreat bird-lizard came up again; for the owner of the mysterious headwas a feeder on delicate weeds and succulent green-stuff only, andwould eat no blood-bearing food. The body was still struggling, andthe vast, dark, broken wings spread themselves in feeble spasms on thesurface. But they were not left to struggle long.
The water, in the distance, had been full of eager spectators ofthe fight, and now it boiled as they rushed in upon the disabledprey. Ravenous, cavern-jawed, fishlike beasts, half-porpoise,half-alligator, swarmed upon the victim, tearing at it and at eachother. Some bore off trailing mouthfuls of dark wing-membrane,others more substantial booty, while the rest fought madly in thevortex of discolored foam.
At the beginning of the fray the grim figures perched along the redramparts of the cliff had shown signs of excitement, lifting theirhigh shoulders and half unfolding the stiff drapery of their wings. Asthey saw their fellow overwhelmed they launched themselves from theirperch and came hooting hoarsely over the rank, green tops of the palmsand feathery calamaries. Swooping and circling they gathered over thehideous final struggle, and from time to time one or another woulddrop perpendicularly downward to stab the crown or the face of one ofthe preoccupied fish-beasts with his trenchant beak. Such of thefish-beasts as were thus disabled were promptly torn to pieces anddevoured by their companions.
Some fifty feet away, nearer shore, the harmless-looking head whichhad been the source and inspirer of all this bloody turmoil laywatching the scene with discontent in its round, wondering eyes.Slowly it reared itself once more to a height of eight or ten feetabove the water, as if for better inspection of the combat. Then, asif not relishing the neighborhood of the fish-beasts, it slowly sankagain and disappeared.
Immediately a heavy swirling, a disturbance that stretched over adistance of nearly a hundred feet, began to travel shoreward. Itgrew heavier and heavier as the water grew shallower. Then aleather-colored mountain of a back heaved itself up through thesmother and a colossal form, that would make the hugest elephant apigmy, came ponderously forth upon the beach.
The body of this amazing being was thrice or four times the bulk ofthe mightiest elephant. It stood highest--a good thirteen feet--overthe haunches (which were supported on legs like columns), and slopedabruptly to the lower and lighter-built fore-shoulders. The neck waslike a giraffe's, but over twenty feet in length to its juncture withthe mild little head, which looked as if Nature had set it t
here as apleasantry at the expense of the titanic body. The tail, enormous atthe base and tapering gradually to a whip-lash, trailed out to adistance of nearly fifty feet. As its owner came ashore, thistremendous tail was gathered and curled in a semi-circle at hisside--perhaps lest the delicate tip, if left too distant, might fall aprey to some significant but agile marauder.
For some minutes the colossus (he was one of the Dinosaurs, orTerrible Lizards, and known as a Diplodocus) remained on all-fours,darting his sinuous neck inquiringly in all directions, andsnatching here and there a mouthful of the rank tender herbage whichgrew among the trunks of fern and palm. Apparently the spot was tohis liking. Here was a wide beach, sunlit and ample, whereon to baskat leisure. There were the warm and weed-choked shallows wherein topasture, to wallow at will, to hide his giant bulk from his enemies ifthere should be found any formidable enough to make hiding advisable.Swarms of savage insects, to be sure, were giving him a hotreception--mosquitoes of unimaginable size, and enormous stingingflies which sought to deposit their eggs in his smooth hide, but withhis giraffe-like neck he could bite himself where he would, and thelithe lash of his tail could flick off tormentors from any cornerof his anatomy.
Meanwhile, the excitement off-shore had died down. The harsh hootingsof the bird-lizards had ceased to rend the air as the dark wingshurtled away to seek some remoter or less disturbed hunting-ground.Then across the silence came suddenly a terrific crashing of branches,mixed with gasping cries. Startled, the diplodocus hoisted himselfupon his hind-quarters, till he sat up like a kangaroo, supported andsteadied by the base of his huge tail. In this position his head,forty feet above the earth, overlooked the tops of all but the tallesttrees. And what he saw brought the look of anxiety once more into hisround, saucer-eyes.
Hurling itself with desperate, plunging leaps through the rankgrowths, and snapping the trunks of the brittle tree-ferns in its pathas if they had been cauliflowers, came a creature not unlike himself,but of less than half the size, and with neck and tail of onlymoderate length. This creature was fleeing in frantic terror fromanother and much smaller being, which came leaping after it like agiant kangaroo. Both were plainly dinosaurs, with the lizard tail andhind-legs; but the lesser of the two, with its square, powerful headand tiger-fanged jaws, and the tremendous, rending claws on its shortforearms, was plainly of a different species from the greatherb-eaters of the dinosaurian family. It was one of the smallermembers of that terrible family of carnivorous dinosaurians whichruled the ancient cycad forests as the black-maned lion rules theRhodesian jungles to-day. The massive iguanodon which fled before itso madly, though of fully thrice its bulk, had reason to fear it asthe fat cow fears a wolf.
A moment more, and the dreadful chase, with a noise of raucous groansand pantings, burst forth into the open, not fifty feet from where thecolossus stood watching. Almost at the watcher's feet the fugitive wasovertaken. With a horrid leap and a hoot of triumph, the pursuersprang upon its neck and bore it to the ground, where it lay bellowinghoarsely and striking out blunderingly with the massive, horn-tippedspur which armed its clumsy wrist. The victor tore madly at its throatwith tooth and claw, and presently its bellowing subsided to ahideous, sobbing gurgle.
The diplodocus, meanwhile, had been looking down upon the scene withhalf-bewildered apprehension. These creatures were insignificant insize, to be sure, as compared with his own colossal stature, but thesmaller one had a swift ferocity which struck terror to his dullheart.
Suddenly a red wrath mounted to his small and sluggish brain. Histail, as we have seen, was curled in a half-circle at his side. Now hebent his body with it. For an instant his whole bulk quivered with theextraordinary tension. Then, like a bow released, the bent body sprangback. The tail (and it weighed at least a ton) struck the victor andthe victim together with an annihilating shock, and swept them cleanaround beneath the visitor's feet.
Down he came upon them at once, with the crushing effect of a hundredsteam pile-drivers; and for the next few minutes his panicky rageexpended itself in treading the two bodies into a shapeless mass. Thenhe slowly backed off down into the water where the weedy growths werethickest, till once more his whole form was concealed except theinsignificant head. This he reared among the swaying tufts of the"mares' tails," and waited to see what strange thing would happennext.
He had not long to wait. That hideous, mangled heap there, sweatingblood in the noon sun, seemed to have some way of making its presenceknown. Crashing sounds arose in different parts of the forest, andpresently some half-dozen of the leaping, kangaroo-like flesh-eatersappeared.
They were of varying sizes, from ten or twelve feet in length toeighteen or twenty, and they eyed each other with jealous hostility.But one glance at the weltering heap showed them that here wasfeasting abundant for them all. With a chorus of hoarse cries theycame hopping forward and fell upon it.
Presently two vast shadows came overhead, hovering a moment, and apair of the great bird-lizards dropped upon the middle of the heap.Hooting savagely, with wings half uplifted, they struck about themwith their terrible beaks till they had secured room for themselves atthe banquet. Other unbidden guests came leaping from among thethickets; and in a short time there was nothing left of the carcassesexcept two naked skeletons, dragged apart and half dismembered bymighty teeth. In the final melee one of the smaller revellers washimself pounced upon and devoured.
Then, as if by consent of a mutual distrust, the throng drew quicklyapart, each eyeing his neighbor warily, and scattered into the woods.Only the two grim bird-lizards remained, seeming to have a sort ofunderstanding or partnership, or possibly being a mated pair. Theypried into the cartilages and between the joints of the skeletons withthe iron wedges of their beaks, till there was not another tit-bit tobe enjoyed. Then, hooting once more with satisfaction, they spreadtheir batlike vanes and flapped darkly off again to their redwatch-tower on the cliff.
When all was once more quiet the giant visitor fell to pasturing amongthe crisp and tender water-weeds. It took a long time to fill hiscavernous paunch by way of that slender neck of his, and when he wassatisfied he went composedly to sleep, his body perfectly concealedunder the water, his head resting on a little islet of matted reeds ina thicket of "mares' tails." When he woke up again the sun washalf-way down to the west, and the beach glowed hotly in the afternoonlight. Everything was drenched in heavy stillness. The visitor made uphis drowsy mind that he must leave his hiding-place and go and bask inthat delicious warmth.
He was just bestirring himself to carry out his purpose, when oncemore a swaying in the rank foliage of the cycads caught his vigilanteye. Discreetly he drew back into hiding, the place being, as he hadfound it, so full of violent surprises.
Suddenly there emerged upon the beach a monster even more extraordinaryin appearance than himself. It was about thirty-five feet in length,and its ponderous bulk was supported on legs so short and bowed thatit crawled with its belly almost dragging the ground. Its small head,which it carried close to the earth, was lizard-like, shallow-skulled,feeble-looking, and its jaws cleft back past the stupid eyes. Infact, it was an inoffensive-looking head for such an imposing body.At the base of the head began a system of defensive armor thatlooked as if it might be proof against artillery. Up over theshoulders, over the mighty arch of the back, and down over the haunchesas far as the middle of the ponderous tail, ran a series of immense flatplates of horn, with pointed tips and sharpened edges. The largest ofthese plates, those that covered the center of the back, were eachthree feet in height, and almost of an equal breadth. Where thediminished plates came to an end at the middle of the tail, theirplace was taken by eight immense, needle-pointed spines, set in pairs,of which the chief pair had a length of over two feet. The monster'shide was set thick with scales and knobs of horn, brilliantlycolored in black, yellow, and green, that his grotesque bulk mightbe less noticeable to his foes among the sharp shadows and patchy lightsof the fern jungles where he fed.
The sluggish giant moved nervously,
glancing backwards as he came, andseemed intent upon reaching the water. In a few moments his anxietywas explained. Leaping in splendid bounds along his broad trail cametwo of those same ferocious flesh-eaters whom the great watcher amongthe reeds so disliked. They ranged up one on each side of thestegosaur, who had halted at their approach, stiffened himself, anddrawn his head so far back into the loose skin of his neck that onlythe sharp, chopping beak projected from under the first armor-plate.One of the pair threatened him from the front, as if to engross hisattention, while the other pounced upon one of his massive, bowedhind-legs, as if seeking to drag it from beneath him and roll him overon his side.
But at this instant there was a clattering of the plated hide, andthat armed tail lashed out with lightning swiftness, like aporcupine's. There was a tearing screech from the rash flesh-eater,and he was plucked back sidewise, all four feet in air, deeply impaledon three of those gigantic spines. While he clawed and writhed,struggling to twist himself free, his companion sprang hardily to therescue. She hurled herself with all her weight and strength full uponthe stegosaur's now unprotected flank. So tremendous was the impactthat, with a frightened grunt, he was rolled clean over on his side.But at the same time his sturdy forearms clutched his assailant, andso crushed, mauled and tore her that she was glad to wrench herselfaway.
Coughing and gasping, she bounded backwards out of reach; and then shesaw that her mate, having wriggled off the spines, was dragginghimself up the beach toward the forest, leaving a trail of bloodbehind him. She followed sullenly, having had more than enough of theventure. The triumphant stegosaur rolled himself heavily back upon hisfeet, grunted angrily, clattered his armored plates, jerked histerrible tail from side to side as if to see that it was still inworking order, and went lumbering off to another portion of the wood,having apparently forgotten his purpose of taking to the water. As hewent, one of the grim bird-lizards from the cliff swooped down andhovered, hooting over his path, apparently disappointed at histriumph.
The watcher in the reeds, on the other hand, was encouraged by theresult of the combat. He began to feel a certain dangerous contemptfor those leaping flesh-eaters, in spite of their swiftness andferocity. He himself, though but an eater of weeds, had trodden oneinto nothingness, and now he had seen two together overthrown and putto flight. With growing confidence he came forth from his hiding,stalked up the beach, coiled his interminable tail beside him, and laydown to bask his dripping sides in the full blaze of the sun.
The colossus was at last beginning to feel at home in his newsurroundings. In spite of the fact that this bit of open beach,overlooked by the deep green belt of jungle and the rampart of redcliffs, appeared to be a sort of arena for titanic combats, he beganto have confidence in his own astounding bulk as a defense against allfoes. What matter his slim neck, small head and feeble teeth, whenthat awful engine of his tail could sweep his enemies off their feet,and he could crush them by falling upon them like a mountain! A pairof the great bird-lizards flapped over him, hooting malignantly andstaring down upon him with their immense, cold eyes, but he hardlytook the trouble to look up at them.
Warmed and well fed, his eyes half-sheathed in their membraneous lids,he gazed out vacantly across the waving herbage of the shallows,across the slow, pale tides whose surface boiled from time to timeabove the rush of some unseen giant of a shark or ichthyosaur.
In the heavy heat of the afternoon the young world had become verystill. The bird-lizards, all folded in their wings, sat stiff andmotionless along the ramparts of red cliff. The only sounds were thehiss of those seething rushes far out on the tide, the sudden droninghum of some great insect darting overhead, or the occasional softclatter of the long, crisp cycad leaves as a faint puff of hot airlifted them.
At the back of the beach, where the tree-ferns and the calamaries grewrankest, the foliage parted noiselessly at a height of perhaps twentyfeet from the ground, and a dreadful head looked forth. Its jaws wereboth long and massive, and armed with immense, curved teeth likescimitars. Its glaring eyes were overhung by eaves of bony plate, andfrom the front of its broad snout rose a single horn, long and sharp.For some minutes this hideous apparition eyed the unconscious colossusby the waterside. Then it came forth from the foliage and creptnoiselessly down the beach.
Except for its horned snout and armored eyes, this monster was notunlike in general type to those other predatory dinosaurs which hadalready appeared upon the scene. But it was far larger, approachingthirty-five feet in length, and more powerfully built in proportion toits size; and the armory of its jaws was more appalling. With astealthy but clumsy-looking waddle, which was nevertheless soundlessas a shadow, and his huge tail curled upwards that it might not dragand rattle the stones, he crept down until he was within some fiftyfeet or more of the drowsing colossus.
Some premonition of peril, at this moment, began to stir in the heavybrain of the colossus, and he lifted his head apprehensively. In thesame instant the horned giant gathered himself, and hurled himselfforward. In two prodigious leaps he covered the distance thatseparated him from his intended prey. The coiled tail of the colossuslashed out irresistibly, but the assailant cleared it in his spring,fell upon the victim's shoulders, and buried his fangs in the base ofthat columnar neck.
The colossus, for the first time, was overwhelmed with terror. He gavevent to a shrill, bleating bellow--an absurdly inadequate utterance toissue from this mountainous frame--writhed his neck in snaky folds,and lashed out convulsively with the stupendous coils of his tail. Buthe could not loosen that deep grip, or the clutch of those ironclaws.
In spite of the many tons weight throttling his neck, he rearedhimself aloft, and strove to throw himself over upon his assailant.But the marauder was agile, and eluded the crushing fall withoutloosing his grip. Then, bleating frightfully, till the soundsre-echoed from the red cliffs and set all the drowsing bird-lizardslifting their wings, he plunged down into the tide and bore hisdreadful adversary out of sight beneath a smother of ensanguinedfoam.
Now, the horned giant was himself a powerful swimmer and quite at homein the water, but in this respect he was no match for his quarry.Refusing to relinquish his hold, he was borne out into deep water; andthere the colossus, becoming all at once agile and swift, succeeded inrolling over upon him. Forced thus to loose his grip, he gave onelong, ripping lunge with his horn, deep into the victim's flank, andthen writhed himself from under. The breath quite crushed out of him,he was forced to rise to the surface for air. There he rested,recovering his self-possession, reluctant to give up the combat, buteven more reluctant to expose himself to another such mauling in thedepths. As he hesitated, about a hundred feet away he saw the mildlittle head of the colossus, apparently floating on the tide, andregarding him anxiously. That decided him. With a crashing bellow ofrage and a sweep of his powerful tail he darted at the inoffensivehead. But it vanished instantly, and a sudden tremendous turmoil,developing into a wake that lengthened out with the speed of atorpedo-boat, showed him the hopelessness of pursuit. Turningabruptly, he swam back to the shore and sulkily withdrew into thethickets to seek some less unmanageable quarry.
The colossus, so deeply wounded that his trail threw up great clotsand bubbles of red foam, swam onward several miles up the estuary. Herealized now that that patch of sunny beach was just a death-trap. Butin the middle of the estuary, far out from either shore, far removedfrom the unseen, lurking horrors of the fern forests, spread acre uponacre of drowned marsh, overgrown with tall green reeds and feathery"mares' tails." Through these stretches of marsh he ploughed his way,half-swimming, half-wading, and felt that here he might find a saferefuge as well as an unfailing pasturage. But the anguish of hiswounds urged him still onwards.
Beyond the reed-beds he came to a long, narrow islet of wet sand,naked to the sun. This appeared to him the very refuge he was craving,a spot where he could lie secure and lick his hurts. He draggedhimself out upon it eagerly. Not until he had gained the very centerof it did he notice how his ponderous feet sa
nk in it at every stride.As soon as he halted he felt the treacherous sands sucking him down.In terror he struggled to free himself, to regain the water. But nowthe sands had a grip upon him, and his efforts only engulfed him themore swiftly. He reared upon his hind legs, and immediately foundhimself swallowed to the haunches. He fell forward again, and sank tohis shoulder-blades. And then, the convulsive thrashings of his tailhurling the sands in every direction, he lifted his head and bleatedpiteously.
The struggle had already drawn the dreadful eyes of those grim, foldedfigures perched along the cliff-tops miles away; and now, as if inanswer to his cry they came fluttering darkly over him. Seeing hishelplessness, they flapped down upon him with hoots of exultation.Their vast beaks tore at his helpless back, and stabbed at the swiftlywrithing convolutions of his neck. One, more heedless than hisfellows, came within reach of the thrashing tail, and was dashed, halfstunned, to earth, where the sands got him in their hold before hecould recover himself. With dreadful screeches, he was sucked down,but his fellows paid no attention to his fate. And meanwhile, in aring about the islet, not daring to come near for terror of thequicksand, crocodiles and alligators and ichthyosaurs, with upturned,gaping snouts, watched the struggle greedily.
As the lower part of his neck was drawn down into the quicksand, thecolossus lost the power to move his head quickly enough to evade theattacks of his horrid assailants. A moment more, and he was blinded.Then he felt his head enfolded in the strangling membranes of wingsand borne downwards. Once or twice the convulsions of his neck threwhis enemies off, and the bleeding, sightless head reemerged to view.
But not only his force, but his will to struggle, was fast ebbingaway. Presently, with a thunderous, gasping sob, the last breath lefthis mighty lungs, and his head dropped on the sand. It was troddenunder in an instant; and then, afraid of being engulfed themselves,the hooting revellers abandoned it, to crowd struggling upon thearched hump of the back. Here they tore and gorged and quarreled till,some fifteen minutes later, their last foothold sank beneath them.Then, with dripping beaks and talons, they all flapped back to theircliffs; and slowly the fluent sand smoothed itself to shiningcomplacency over the tomb of the diplodocus, hiding and sealing awaythe stupendous skeleton for half a million years.