adapted to the times and were very beautiful. Down each of them from
shoulder to elbow ran a strip of short dark hair. From either hand ran
upward to the elbow another strip of hair, and the two, meeting at the
elbow, formed a delightful little tuft reminding one of what is known as
a "widow's peak," or that little point which grows down so charmingly on
an occasional woman's forehead. Her biceps were tremendous, as must
necessarily be the case with a lady accustomed to swing from limb to limb
along the treetops. Her thumb was nearly as long as her fingers, and the
palms of her hands were hard. Her legs were like her arms in their degree
of muscular development and hairy adornment. She had beautiful feet. It
is to be admitted that her heels projected a trifle more than is counted
the ideal thing at the present day, and that her big toe and all the
other toes were very much in evidence, but there is not one woman in
ten thousand now who could as handily pick up objects with her toes as
could the mother of the baby Ab. She was as brown as a nut, with the tan
of a half tropical summer, and as healthy a creature, from tawny head to
backward sloping heel, as ever trod a path in the world's history. This
was the quality of the lady who came so swiftly to learn the nature of
her offspring's trouble. Ladies of that day attended, as a rule, to the
wants of their own children. A wet nurse was a thing unknown and a dry
one as unthought of. This was good for the children.

The woman made a dive into the little hollow and picked the babe from its
nest of leaves and tossed him up lightly, and at once his crying ceased,
and his little brown arms went around her neck, and he cooed and prattled
in very much the same fashion as does a babe of the present time. He was
content, all in a moment, yet some noise must have aroused him, for, as
it chanced, there was great need that this particular babe at this
particular moment should have awakened and cried aloud for his mother.
This was made evident immediately. As the woman tossed him aloft in her