but bent and could be pounded straight again, was exceedingly odd.
They even showed Umpl a piece of copper which had been brought to the
village in a large lump by some young men from a far country, and
explained how the knife had been hammered out with stones.

This gave Umpl an idea. Taking a flint knife he sawed off a slice of
copper from the lump and with his iron war-club he hammered it out on
the Iron Star and fashioned a beautiful spearhead in no time, the iron
clinking merrily beneath his blows. There was a great rush around him
after that. Every one who had copper wanted it worked up, and Umpl was
clear-headed enough to bargain for a hut for his people and one for
himself and Sptz.

Here he lived happily for many years. He owned a share in the long-
horned cattle. His men were the best hunters in the village, and the
copper things he made were sought for by men who came long distances.
Sometimes they brought him bars of copper. After a time some one
brought tin, and two pieces fell into the fire one day, along with a
copper knife, and all three were melted into one and cooled in a
little hollow in the ashes after the fire was out. Umpl was astonished
to find that the sharp edge of this would cut like flint, yet would
not bend like copper; and he began to make regular knives and
spearheads of such material, finding out a way of making clay moulds
and pouring the melted metal into them to harden into the right
shapes. Of course these were far more valuable than the copper tools
and they were sold here and there among the tribes of other peoples,
and often travelled far from where they were made. Other people began
to find out how to make them, and made so many that, although they
still used flint knives too, yet people nowadays when speaking of that
long ago time often call it the Bronze Age, because tin and copper,