To one accustomed to the daily recurrence of the darkness of night,
following the setting of the sun, escape from such a dilemma as that in
which Tanar found himself would have seemed merely a matter of waiting
for the coming of night, but where the sun does not set and there is no
night, and time is immeasurable and unmeasured, and where one may not
know whether a lifetime or a second has been encompassed by the duration
of such an event, the enforced idleness and delay are maddening.
But in spite of these conditions, or perhaps because of them, the Sarian
possessed a certain philosophic outlook upon life that permitted him to
accept his fate with marked stoicism and to take advantage of the
enforced delay by fashioning a bow, arrows and a spear from the material
afforded by the tree in which he was confined.
The tree gave him everything that he needed except the cord for his bow,
and this he cut from the rawhide belt that supported his loin cloth—a
long, slender strip of rawhide which he inserted in his mouth and chewed
thoroughly until it was entirely impregnated with saliva. Then he bent
his bow and stretched the wet rawhide from tip to tip. While it dried,
he pointed his arrows with his teeth.
In drying the rawhide shrunk, bending the bow still further and
tightening the string until it hummed to the slightest touch.
The weapons were finished and yet the great bulls still stood on guard,
and while Tanar remained helpless in the tree Jude was taking Stellara
toward the interior of the island.
But all things must end. Impatient of delay, Tanar sought some plan
whereby he might rid himself of the short tempered beasts beneath him.
He hit upon the plan of yelling and throwing dead branches at them and
this did have the effect of bringing them all to their feet. A few
wandered away to graze with the balance of the herd, but enough remained
to keep Tanar securely imprisoned.
A great bull stood directly beneath him. Tanar jumped up and down upon a
small branch, making its leafy end whip through the air, and at the same
time he hurled bits of wood at the great thags. And then, suddenly, to
the surprise and consternation of both man and beast, the branch broke
and precipitated Tanar full upon the broad shoulders of the bull.
Instantly his fingers clutched its long hair as, with a bellow of
surprise and terror, the beast leaped forward.
Instinct took the frightened animal toward the balance of the herd and
when they saw him with a man sitting upon his back they, too, became
terrified, with the result that a general stampede ensued, the herd
attempting to escape their fellow, while the bull raced to be among
them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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