hidden by the folds and crossings of that horrible bandage. Of the eight arms of the octopus, three adhered to the rock while five adhered to Gilliatt. In this manner, clamped on one side to the granite, on the other to the man, the monster chained Gilliatt to the rock. Gilliatt had two hundred and fifty suckers upon him, a combination of anguish and disgust. To be crushed in a gigantic fist, whose elastic fingers, nearly a meter in length, are inwardly full of living needles which ransack the flesh!

As we have said, one cannot tear one's self away from the octopus. If he attempts it, he is but the more surely bound the monster only clings the closer. Its efforts increase in proportion to yours. A great struggle produces a great contraction. Gilliatt had but one resource - his knife.

He had only his left hand free; but he could make powerful use of that. It might have been said of him that he had two right hands.

His open knife was in his hand.

The tentacles of an octopus cannot be cut off; they are leathery and difficult to sever, and slip away from under the blade. Moreover, their position is such that a cut into them would attack your own flesh.

The octopus is formidable; nevertheless, there is a way of getting free from it. The fishermen of Sark are acquainted with this way; anyone who has seen them executing abrupt movements at sea knows this fact. Porpoises also know it; they have a way of biting the devil-fish which cuts off its head. The octopus is, in fact, vulnerable only in the head.

Gilliatt was not ignorant of this fact.

He had never seen an octopus of this size. He found himself seized at the outset by one of the larger species. Any other man I would have been terrified.

In the case of the octopus, as in that of the bull, a certain moment arrives at which to seize it; this is the instant when it thrusts forward its head a sudden movement. He who misses that moment is lost.

All that we have related lasted only a few minutes. But Gilciatt felt the suction of the two hundred and fifty pustules increasing.

The octopus is cunning. It tries to stupefy its prey in the first place. It seizes, then waits as long as it can. Gilliatt held his knife. The suction increased. He gazed at the octopus, which stared at him.

All at once the creature detached its sixth tentacle from the rock and, launching it at him, attempted to seize his left arm.

At the same time it thrust its head forward swiftly. A second more, and its mouth would have been applied to Gilliatt's breast. Gilliatt, wounded in the flank and with both arms pinioned, would have been a dead man.

But Gilliatt was on his guard. Being watched, he watched. He avoided the tentacle. At the moment when the creature was about to bite his breast, his armed fist descended on the monster. Two convulsions in opposite directions: that of Gilliatt and that of the octopus. It was like the conflict of two flashes of lightning.

Gilliatt plunged the point of his knife into the flat, viscous mass, and, with a twisting movement similar to the flourish of a whip, he described a circle around the two eyes, tearing out the head as one wrenches out a tooth.

The combat was finished.

The whole creature dropped. It resembled a sheet detaching itself. The air pump was destroyed, the vacuum no longer existed. The four hundred suckers released their hold, simultaneously, of the rock and the man. The body sank to the bottom. Gilliatt, panting with the combat, could see on the rocks at his feet two shapeless, gelatinous masses, the head on one side, the rest on the other.

Fearing some convulsive return of agony, Gilliatt retreated beyond the reach of the tentacles. But the monster was really dead. Gilliatt closed his knife.

It was time that Gilliatt killed the octopus. He was almost strangled; his right arm and body were violet in hue; more than two hundred swellings were outlined upon them; the blood spurted from some of them here and there. The remedy for these wounds is salt water. Gilliatt plunged into it. At the same time, he rubbed himself with the palm of his hand. The swelling subsided under the friction. Gilliatt left the cavern.

CLASS ACTIVITIES

Questions and Problems

1. Suggest or sketch four drawings to illustrate this story.

2. Mention three details which Hugo uses to make the octopus a creature of horror. What is the climax, or point of highest interest?

3. Does the fact that the combat takes place in a dark cavern add to the interest of the story? Explain.

4. Reports for volunteers: From Hugo's The Toilers of the Sea.

a. Why Gilliatt wanted to save the engine.

b. Gilliatt's fight with the tempest.

c. What Gilliatt found in the cavern.

d. Gilliatt and the leaking boat.

e. How Gilliatt saved the engine.

Style

By style is meant the manner in which an author writes-his choice of words, the kinds of sentences and paragraphs he uses, the way he arranges his details, his choice of figures of speech, and the like. Find three differences in style between "A Fight with an Octopus" and "Turkey Red," (p. 27). From the standpoint of style which of the two does Conrad's "Typhoon" (p. 8) most resemble?

I.

CLASS-LIBRARY READINGS

CONTESTS WITH NATURE

'Captain Thomas A. Scott, Master Diver," F. H. Smith, in Stories of the Day's Work, 69–77.

2. "Billy Topsail," Norman Duncan, ibid., 120-130.

3. "The Backwoodsman," Theodore Roosevelt, ibid., 204–209.

4. "The North Pole," R. E. Peary, ibid., 283-290.

5. "The Man Who Named Mount Whitney," E. T. Brewster, Vocational Reader, 66-73.

6. "Trapped by the Wire," A. W. Tolman, ibid., 74–84.

7. "Daniel Boone, Backwoodsman," in Makers of Our History, 51–67.

8. George Rogers Clark, Winner of the West," ibid., 80–97.

9. "Sam Houston, Pioneer," ibid., 201-215.

10. "Dr. Grenfell's Parish," Norman Duncan, in The Joy in Work, 147– 158.

II. "The Habitants," S. E. White, in The Promise of Country Life, 7–14. 12. "Alone," R. Stock, ibid., 44-47.

66

13. 'Solitude," H. D. Thoreau, ibid., 48–57.

14. "A Night Among the Pines," R. L. Stevenson, ibid., 68-72.

15. "The Deep-Sea Diver," Careers of Danger and Daring, 40-86.

Who first tamed the wild grasses? Who first planted and cared for wheat, barley, and corn? The answers to these questions are in this selection. Read it through first in order to get a general view of the entire article and to locate the chief parts; then read it a second time in order to fix the details in your mind.

Primitive woman, left at home to tend the fire, was the first farmer. While the man was hunting or fighting, the woman by the fire, trying to piece out the scanty fare with roots and stems, barks and leaves, began the peaceful industries of life. She was the first basket-maker; she devised pottery; she first spun fiber into thread, wove threads into fabrics, cut cloths and skins and made them into clothing. It was she, also, who began the cultivation of plants and who first tamed animals.

In her search for roots and fruits primitive woman came upon some plant noticed on account of its food value; for fear that some careless hunter might trample this plant underfoot, or that some animal might steal or harm the fruit before it ripened, she protected the plant by putting a few sticks about it. In order that it might have a better chance to grow and bear fruit she cut away or plucked out the plants or weeds which prevented its getting a full share of air and light. This was the beginning of care for plants. Later, she transplanted some young and

sprouting plant near to the fireside in order that it might be more accessible in time of need. Still later, she began to save seed for planting; and with this custom came the clearing of the soil and true agriculture.

While agriculture began with woman, its full development came much later, after man, by irrigation and the help of beasts, perfected it. In roving tribes with flocks and herds, the old and feeble men and the women and children remained in village settlements while the men swarmed out to hunt and steal. Meantime the women gathered stores and, if time allowed. raised a new crop. After harvest, all moved to some new village site. When once brought under cultivation, a really useful plant would be carried along with a tribe in its migrations. The grains, no doubt, arose in Eurasia, and have been carried around the world. Corn, a native of our continent, has spread over the globe.

The first agricultural tool was a sharpened stick for digging up roots. This simple tool was used not only as a digging stick, but also for drilling holes in which to plant seeds. Corn-planting in Central America was, and is, a very simple process: a man going first makes a hole in the ground with his drilling stick; his wife, following after him, drops in a few seeds of corn; the children, following after their parents, with their feet cover the grain with the earth which was loosened by the stick.

Of course, a broader implement, like an oar or paddle, is much better for working soft soil, and many a simple wooden spade has been found in use among primitive peoples. A bent stick or a branch with an offshoot trimmed down makes a simple hoe. The Delaware women used the broad shoulder-blades of animals for spades and hoes.

The first harvesting was very simple. Indian women simply bent the stalks of wild rice over the edge of their canoes, and. with flat paddles beat the heads until the seeds fell from them into the boats. After animals were tamed, they were brought into service. Among the Indians in the Southwest, for example, threshing is done as follows:

A circular space some yards across is cleared and smoothed and covered with a firm floor of clay. This floor is enclosed by a circle of poles set in the ground and connected by ropes or cords.