Two Little Savages Part 16

"The best wood is Spanish Yew."

"Don't know it."

"An' the next is Oregon Yew."

"Nope."

"Then Lancewood and Osage Orange."

'Try again."

"Well, Red Cedar, Apple tree, Hickory and Elm seem to be the only ones that grow around here."

"Hain't seen any _Red_ Cedar, but the rest is easy."

"It has to be thoroughly seasoned winter-cut wood, and cut so as to have heart on one side and sap wood on the other."

"How's that?" and Sam pointed to a lot of half-round Hickory sticks on the rafters of the log house. "Those have been there a couple of years."

A good one of five feet long was selected and split and hewn with the axe till the boys had the two bow staves, five and one-half feet long and two inches square, with the line of the heart and sap wood down the middle of each.

Guided by his memory of that precious book and some English long bows that he had seen in a shop in town, Yan superintended the manufacture.

Sam was apt with tools, and in time they finished two bows, five feet long and drawing possibly twenty-five pounds each. In the middle they were one and one-half inches wide and an inch thick (see page 183).

This size they kept for nine inches each way, making an eighteen-inch middle part that did not bend, but their two limbs were shaved down and sc.r.a.ped with gla.s.s till they bent evenly and were well within the boys' strength.

The string was the next difficulty. All the ordinary string they could get around the house proved too weak, never lasting more than two or three shots, till Si Lee, seeing their trouble, sent them to the cobbler's for a hank of unbleached linen thread and some shoemaker's wax. Of this thread he reeled enough for a strong cord tight around two pegs seven feet apart, then cutting it loose at one end he divided it equally in three parts, and, after slight waxing, he loosely plaited them together. At Yan's suggestion he then spliced a loop at one end, and with a fine waxed thread lashed six inches of the middle where the arrow fitted, as well as the splice of the loop. This last enabled them to unstring the bow when not in use (see page 183).

"There," said he, "you won't break that." The finis.h.i.+ng touch was thinly coating the bows with some varnish found among the paint supplies.

"Makes my old bow look purty sick," remarked Sam, as he held up the really fine new weapon in contrast with the wretched little hoop that had embodied his early ideas. "Now what do you know about arrers, mister?" as he tried his old arrow in the new bow.

"I know that that's no good," was the reply; "an' I can tell you that it's a deal harder to make an arrow than a bow--that is, a good one."

"That's encouraging, considering the trouble we've had already."

"'Tisn't meant to be, but we ought to have a dozen arrows each."

"How do the Injuns make them?"

"Mostly they get straight sticks of the Arrow-wood; but I haven't seen any Arrow-wood here, and they're not so awfully straight. You see, an arrow must be straight or it'll fly crooked. 'Straight as an arrow'

means the thing itself. We can do better than the Indians 'cause we have better tools. We can split them out of the solid wood."

"What wood? Some bloomin' foreign kind that no White-man never saw nor heard of before?"

"No sir-ree. There ain't anything better 'n White Pine for target and Ash or Hickory for hunting arrows. Which are we making?"

"I'm a hunter. Give me huntin' arrows every time. What's needed next?"

"Seasoned Ash twenty-five inches long, split to three-eighths of an inch thick, hot glue, and turkey-wing feathers."

"I'll get the feathers and let you do the rest," said Sam, producing a bundle of turkey-wings, laid away as stove-dusters, and then belied his own statement by getting a block of Ash and splitting it up, halving it each time till he had a pile of two dozen straight sticks about three-quarters of an inch thick.

Yan took one and began with his knife to whittle it down to proper size and shape, but Sam said, "I can do better than that," then took the lot to the workbench and set to work with a smoothing plane. Yan looked worried and finally said:

"Injuns didn't have planes."

"Nor jack-knives neither," was the retort.

That was true, and yet somehow Yan's ideal that he hankered after was the pre-Columbian Indian, the one who had no White-man's help or tools.

"It seems to me it'd be more Injun to make these with just what we get in the woods. The Injuns didn't have jack-knives, but they had sharp flints in the old days."

"Yan, you go ahead with a sharp stone. You'll find lots on the road if you take off your shoes and walk barefoot--awful sharp; an' I'll go ahead with the smoothing plane an' see who wins."

Yan was not satisfied, but he contented himself with promising that he would some day make some arrows of Arrow-wood shoots and now he would finish at least one with his knife. He did so, but Sam, in the meantime, made six much better ones with the smoothing plane.

"What about heads?" said he.

"I've been thinking," was the reply. "Of course the Indians used stone heads fastened on with sinew, but we haven't got the stuff to do that.

Bought heads of iron with a ferrule for the end of the arrow are best, but we can't get them. Bone heads and horn heads will do. I made some fine ones once filing bones into the shape, but they were awfully brittle; and I made some more of big nails cut off and set in with a las.h.i.+ng of fine wire around the end to stop the wood splitting. Some Indian arrows have no point but the stick sharpened after it's scorched to harden it."

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIX SAMPLE ARROWS, SHOWING DIFFERENT FEATHERS]

"That sounds easy enough for me," said Sam; "let's make some of them that way."

So the arrows were made, six each with nail points filed sharp and lashed with broom wire. These were called "War arrows," and six each with fire-hardened wood points for hunting arrows.

"Now for the feathering," and Yan showed Sam how to split the midrib of a turkey feather and separate the vane.

"Le's see, you want twice twenty-four--that's forty-eight feathers."

"No," said Yan, "that's a poor feathering, two on each. We want three on each arrow--seventy-two strips in all, and mind you, we want all three that are on one arrow from the same side of the bird."

"I know. I'll bet it's bad luck to mix sides; arrows doesn't know which way to turn."

At this moment Si Lee came in. "How are ye gettin' on with the bows?"

"Waitin' for arrows now."

"How do ye put on the feathers?"

DESCRIPTION OF SIX SAMPLE ARROWS SHOWING DIFFERENT FEATHERS

_A_ is a far-flying steel-pointed bobtail, very good in wind.

_B_ is another very good arrow, with a horn point. This went even better than _A_ if there were no wind. _C_ is an Omaha war and deer arrow. Both heads and feathers are lashed on with sinew. The long tufts of down left on the feathers are to help in finding it again, as they are snow-white and wave in the breeze. The grooves on the shaft are to make the victim bleed more freely and be more easily tracked. _D_ is another Omaha arrow with a peculiar owner's mark of lines carved in the middle, _E_ is a bone-headed bird shaft made by the Indians of the Mackenzie River. _F_ is a war arrow made by Geronimo, the famous Apache chief. Its shaft is three joints of a straight cane.

The tip is of hard wood, and on that is a fine quartz point; all being lashed together with sinew.

"White-men glue them on, and Injuns lash them on," replied Yan, quoting from memory from "that book."

"Which is best?"