The oldest boy they called Kee, because when he was very young he always said "Kee-Kee" when anything pleased him. And before long the cries or grunts they used for the things they saw about them, such as fruit, or fish, or the Sun, the Rain, or the cave, came to be used over and over, and in this way they began to have words for things. There were not many words at first, but Man had invented speech, which was something none of the animals had ever done. [Illustration: THE HOME OF EARLY MAN The first houses built by man consisted of boulders piled up to form a cave and covered with sod. The one shown below represents the earliest attempts with rough, unhewn stone. Above is a stone house of later date showing that the boulders had been hewn for the purpose.] Mother Nature watched the progress of her children with a smile. "Just see," she said to the Sun, "how quickly they are learning. Did I not tell you that Love would teach my Ape-Man many things? If he had not loved his wife and child, he would have run away when the bear came to attack him, but because of them he stayed, and fought. And he has made a door to his cave, to keep his enemies away, during the night." "What are those strange grunts and cries I hear them using?" the Sun asked. "They are beginning to make a language," Mother Nature replied. "Before long, they will be able to say many things to each other, and be understood. They are certainly doing very well. I hope nothing happens to them." "It seems to me they are awfully slow," said the Sun. "Not at all. Think how many thousands of years they have ahead of them. There is no hurry, you know. The Earth is only a hundred million years old. They have plenty of time. I think I shall go away now, and take a look at another sun I am making, many times bigger than you are. I shan't be back for several thousand years. Good-bye." "Good-bye," said the Sun, in a surly voice, for it made him very angry to think that there were any suns in the Universe bigger than he was. CHAPTER VII RA MAKES A NEW SPEAR ADH had been dead a long time, now, and Ra was his great-great-great-great-grandson. He was called Ra because that was the word the Ape-Men used to mean big, or strong, and Ra was the strongest boy in the valley. He lived with his mother and father and several brothers and sisters in a cave high up among the rocks, and because his father was lame, Ra had to do most of the work for the family. He knew how to say a number of words, queer little cries and grunts that meant things, and the hair on his body was not as thick and shaggy as Adh's had been. The Ape-People had been living in caves, protected from the weather, for a long time now, and as they did not need so much hair to keep them warm, the great law of Nature we have heard about before, had begun to take their hair away from them. But it was not until Man began to wear clothes that he really lost his coat of hair.