upon which we depended much for food when the hunting chanced to be bad and we had nothing else to eat with our bread of wheat or barley or millet seed, which we cultivated upon the land. For beds we had the skins of wild animals or of our own tamed cattle, or sheep or goats. What finer homes could be? Surely we were a fortunate people. We had ways of orderly living. All disputes were decided by three chosen old men of the tribe, though not always would those who quarrelled abide by their decision, and to each man of the tribe was allotted his part in what was to be done for the general good. It must needs be so, for our occupations were so different that it was necessary that each should know how best to do his work. The potter--we had many dishes and huge jars for the grain, and other things of burned clay--could only do his best if always at his own sort of work; those who looked after the cattle and flocks must best know how to handle them and where were the richest and safest feeding places; those who did the hunting and fishing, of whom I was the chief, must be strong of arm and fleet of foot and wise in the habits of all wild things; and those who cultivated the ground--the women and some of the men--must know how to best prepare it for the seeding, digging it up with sharpened sticks, and hauling over it the branches of trees and the drags of stag’s horn, and how to do the harvesting. What a community we were! There was none other like us! Long already had our people lived above the lake, our numbers had increased, the huge platform stretched its length far along and became wider as it became longer. Thus safe and thus mingling together in such numbers we devised many new things and so were becoming more capable and potent. What we were some time to be who could foretell? The work of the hunters was, of needs, the most adventurous and arduous, and only the strong men and those who were most capable were chosen for it. They must be in the forefront in time of conflict with other tribes, should such time come, and we of the band were all provided with coats and leggings of dried aurochs’ hide, which arrow or even spear could hardly pierce with force sufficient to enter deeply the body of the wearer. Far and wide we ranged, but not deeply, the dark and almost endless forest region to the north and east, where were dangerous beasts and still more dangerous and savage men of the tribes who had once made frequent war upon us, in the time before we became Lake-Dwellers, and so protected and too well-weaponed and trained and strong for them. In our own village were more than a thousand people, and in other lakes not far to the south and east were almost as many more. As for my own life in my hut, or outside on land or water, it was but good. There were my mate and the child and the ardour of the chase. It seemed to me at times that I, Scar, the hunter and fisherman, was the most contented man among a contented people.