Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) (471 page)

‘Taffy dear, I’m afraid we’re in for a little trouble,’ said her Daddy, and put his arm round her, so she didn’t care.

‘Explain! Explain! Explain!’ said the Head Chief of the Tribe of Tegumai, and he hopped on one foot.

‘I wanted the Stranger-man to fetch Daddy’s spear, so I drawded it,’ said Taffy. ‘There wasn’t lots of spears. There was only one spear. I drawded it three times to make sure. I couldn’t help it looking as if it stuck into Daddy’s head — there wasn’t room on the birch-bark; and those things that Mummy called bad people are my beavers. I drawded them to show him the way through the swamp; and I drawded Mummy at the mouth of the Cave looking pleased because he is a nice Stranger-man, and
I
think you are just the stupidest people in the world,’ said Taffy. ‘He is a very nice man. Why have you filled his hair with mud? Wash him!’

Nobody said anything at all for a long time, till the Head Chief laughed; then the Stranger-man (who was at least a Tewara) laughed; then Tegumai laughed till he fell down flat on the bank; then all the Tribe laughed more and worse and louder. The only people who did not laugh were Teshumai Tewindrow and all the Neolithic ladies. They were very polite to all their husbands, and said ‘idiot!’ ever so often.

Then the Head Chief of the Tribe of Tegumai cried and said and sang, ‘O Small-person-without-any-manners-who-ought-to-be-spanked, you’ve hit upon a great invention!’

‘I didn’t intend to; I only wanted Daddy’s black-handled spear,’ said Taffy.

‘Never mind. It
is
a great invention, and some day men will call it writing. At present it is only pictures, and, as we have seen to-day, pictures are not always properly understood. But a time will come, O Babe of Tegumai, when we shall make letters — all twenty-six of ‘em, — and when we shall be able to read as well as to write, and then we shall always say exactly what we mean without any mistakes. Let the Neolithic ladies wash the mud out of the stranger’s hair.

‘I shall be glad of that,’ said Taffy, ‘because, after all, though you’ve brought every single other spear in the Tribe of Tegumai, you’ve forgotten my Daddy’s black-handled spear.’

Then the Head Chief cried and said and sang, ‘Taffy dear, the next time you write a picture-letter, you’d better send a man who can talk our language with it, to explain what it means. I don’t mind it myself, because I am a Head Chief, but it’s very bad for the rest of the Tribe of Tegumai, and, as you can see, it surprises the stranger.’

Then they adopted the Stranger-man (a genuine Tewara of Tewar) into the Tribe of Tegumai, because he was a gentleman and did not make a fuss about the mud that the Neolithic ladies had put into his hair. But from that day to this (and I suppose it is all Taffy’s fault), very few little girls have ever liked learning to read or write. Most of them prefer to draw pictures and play about with their Daddies — just like Taffy.

This is the story of Taffimai Metallumai carved on an old tusk a very long time ago by the Ancient Peoples. If you read my story, or have it read to you, you can see how it is all told out on the tusk. The tusk was part of an old tribal trumpet that belonged to the Tribe of Tegumai. The pictures were scratched on it with a nail or something, and then the scratches were filled up with black wax, but all the dividing lines and the five little rounds at the bottom were filled with red wax. When it was new there was a sort of network of beads and shells and precious stones at one end of it; but now that has been broken and lost — all except the little bit that you see. The letters round the tusk are magic — Runic magic, — and if you can read them you will find out something rather new. The tusk is of ivory — very yellow and scratched. It is two feet long and two feet round, and weighs eleven pounds nine ounces.

There runs a road by Merrow Down —
A grassy track to-day it is —
An hour out of Guildford town,
Above the river Wey it is.

Here, when they heard the horse-bells ring,
The ancient Britons dressed and rode
To watch the dark Phœnicians bring
Their goods along the Western Road.

And here, or hereabouts, they met
To hold their racial talks and such —
To barter beads for Whitby jet,
And tin for gay shell torques and such.

But long and long before that time
(When bison used to roam on it)
Did Taffy and her Daddy climb
That down, and had their home on it.

Then beavers built in Broadstonebrook
And made a swamp where Bramley stands:
And bears from Shere would come and look
For Taffimai where Shamley stands.

The Wey, that Taffy called Wagai,
Was more than six times bigger then;
And all the Tribe of Tegumai
They cut a noble figure then!

How the Alphabet Was Made

HOW THE ALPHABET WAS MADE

HE
week after Taffimai Metallumai (we will still call her Taffy, Best Beloved) made that little mistake about her Daddy’s spear and the Stranger-man and the picture-letter and all, she went carp-fishing again with her Daddy. Her Mummy wanted her to stay at home and help hang up hides to dry on the big drying-poles outside their Neolithic Cave, but Taffy slipped away down to her Daddy quite early, and they fished. Presently she began to giggle, and her Daddy said, ‘Don’t be silly, child.’

‘But wasn’t it inciting!’ said Taffy. ‘Don’t you remember how the Head Chief puffed out his cheeks, and how funny the nice Stranger-man looked with the mud in his hair?’

‘Well do I,’ said Tegumai. ‘I had to pay two deerskins — soft ones with fringes — to the Stranger-man for the things we did to him.’

‘
We
didn’t do anything,’ said Taffy. ‘It was Mummy and the other Neolithic ladies — and the mud.’

‘We won’t talk about that,’ said her Daddy. ‘Let’s have lunch.’

Taffy took a marrow-bone and sat mousy-quiet for ten whole minutes, while her Daddy scratched on pieces of birch-bark with a shark’s tooth. Then she said, ‘Daddy, I’ve thinked of a secret surprise. You make a noise — any sort of noise.’

‘Ah!’ said Tegumai. ‘Will that do to begin with?’

‘Yes,’ said Taffy. ‘You look just like a carp-fish with its mouth open. Say it again, please.’

‘Ah! ah! ah!’ said her Daddy. ‘Don’t be rude, my daughter.’

‘I’m not meaning rude, really and truly,’ said Taffy. ‘It’s part of my secret-surprise-think.
Do
say
ah
, Daddy, and keep your mouth open at the end, and lend me that tooth. I’m going to draw a carp-fish’s mouth wide-open.’

‘What for?’ said her Daddy.

‘Don’t you see?’ said Taffy, scratching away on the bark. ‘That will be our little secret s’prise. When I draw a carp-fish with his mouth open in the smoke at the back of our Cave — if Mummy doesn’t mind — it will remind you of that ah-noise. Then we can play that it was me jumped out of the dark and s’prised you with that noise — same as I did in the beaver-swamp last winter.’

‘Really?’ said her Daddy, in the voice that grown-ups use when they are truly attending. ‘Go on, Taffy.’

1

‘Oh bother!’ she said. ‘I can’t draw all of a carp-fish, but I can draw something that means a carp-fish’s mouth. Don’t you know how they stand on their heads rooting in the mud? Well, here’s a pretence carp-fish (we can play that the rest of him is drawn). Here’s just his mouth, and that means
ah
.’ And she drew this. (1.)

‘That’s not bad,’ said Tegumai, and scratched on his own piece of bark for himself; but you’ve forgotten the feeler that hangs across his mouth.’

‘But I can’t draw, Daddy.’

2

‘You needn’t draw anything of him except just the opening of his mouth and the feeler across. Then we’ll know he’s a carp-fish, ‘cause the perches and trouts haven’t got feelers. Look here, Taffy.’ And he drew this. (2.)

‘Now I’ll copy it.’ said Taffy. ‘Will you understand
this
when you see it?’ And she drew this. (3.)

3