"
Hildreth's applause was sweet. My heart almost burst with happiness
within me, as those tiny hands, that had run through my hair and been so
wonderful with me ... hands that I had kissed and fondled in
secret--joined in unison with Penton's and Darrie's and Ruth's
hand-claps.
"And now I will finish with the _Song of Kaa, the Cave-Man_," I
announced ... it seemed that the poem was not, after all, in the bunch
of MSS. I had brought along with me....
At last I found it--and read:
"THE SONG OF KAA
"Beat with thy club on a hollow tree
While I chant the song of Kaa for thee:
I lived in a cave, alone, at first,
Till into a neighbouring valley I burst
Wild and bearded and seeking prey,
And I came on Naa, and bore her away ...
Away to my hole in the crest of the hill,
Where I broke her body to my fierce will....
* * * * *
"My fellow cave-men, fell in a rage:
'What hast thou done?' cried Singh, the Sage,
'For I hear far off a battle-song,
And the tree-men come, a hundred strong ...'
Long the battle and dread the fight;
We hurled rocks down from our mountain height"--
I copy this from memory alone ... Hildreth has all my cave-poems. I gave
them to her, holding no transcripts of them--
The upshot--
"All of our tribe were slain ... Naa and I alone escaped--
going far off--
To start another people and clan:
She, the woman, and I, the man!"
In my love-drunkenness, I looked directly at Hildreth as I read the
last lines .
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