As the wild game migrated between their high summer range and their lowland wintering grounds the savage tribes followed in search of meat. With the beginning of the pastoral age the need was urgent of moving the flocks and herds between the summer and the winter pastures. But as yet there were no beasts of draught or burden to carry the tribal camp. That meant the keeping of two camp equipments, or maybe a camp upon the highlands to supplement the village in the lowlands; and it was doubtful policy to leave valuable tents as a prey for marauding rivals. A larger and a bitter need arose when the tribe must move, and old folk who lacked the strength to travel must be left behind. There is nothing so terrible in savage life as the necessity of leaving old men and women exposed upon a hilltop after the tribe has moved. The poor old thing is provided with warm robes, a fire, fuel, water and some food, but as the days pass the last cinders, carefully raked together, sink to dust, and the cautious wolves close in for the final rush. Savages love as we do, think as we do, and their life which has for us some glamour of romance is full for them of sordid realism. So {104} we may reckon well that some good matron grudged the loss, at moving time, of tent poles, the cutting of which had cost her heavy labour, done as it was without steel tools like ours. [Sidenote: The travois] She saw the tent poles left behind when the milch-pony herd moved off. She told the herders to lash a pair of her poles, one on either side of each pony's neck with the ends trailing astern. The next idea was to lash a couple of cross bars across the trailing poles behind the pony's hocks, and that was enough to keep them at a proper angle. It was easy then to lash a skin robe in position between the trailing poles and the two cross bars, making a sort of basket, something to carry the old mother, who must otherwise be left behind to perish. Here then was transport which enabled the tribe to march with its tent poles, old folk and baggage. One can imagine how the medicine men protested against so shocking a violation of the laws of nature, which decree that the aged shall be left as a meal for our hunting companions, the range wolves. But here the priests would find themselves opposed by the common sense of every man and woman; so they would doubtless yield with an ill grace, after enacting a law that this new means of transport was a special privilege for aged {105} clergymen. The travois came into general use for transport. [Sidenote: The cart]