The Spearing of Alfred.

“The spears they carried, though entirely of wood, were dangerous weapons,” says the old writer in describing the armament of a tribe of the South Sea islanders.  “Their points are hardened by being subjected to fire, and, in the hands of those fierce men, they are as deadly as the assegai of the African.”

This passage, which he had stumbled upon somewhere, was of deepest interest to young Harlson.  His armament, he felt, was not yet what it should be.  He had arrived at the dignity of a gun, it was true, but that was quite another thing.  What he needed was something especially adapted for personal encounter and for any knight-errantry which chanced to offer itself.  He had imagined what might occur if he were with Katie Welwood and they should be assailed by anything or anybody.  He had large ideas of what was a lover’s duty, and was under the impression, from what he had read, that a proper knight should go always prepared for combat.  So he had fashioned him a spear, a formidable weapon contrived with great exactitude after the South Sea island recipe.  He had gone into the woods and selected a blue beech, straight as could be found, and nearly an inch in thickness.  From this he had cut a length of perhaps ten feet, which, with infinite labor and risk of jack-knife, he had whittled down to smoothness and to whiteness.  Upon one end he left as large a head as the sapling would allow, and this, after shaving it into the fashion of a spear-blade, he had plunged into the fire until it had begun to char.  He had scraped away the charring with a piece of broken glass, and, as a result of his endeavors, had really a spear with a point of undoubted sharpness and great hardness.  He took huge pride in his new weapon, and carried it to school with him for days and on his various woodland expeditions, but there had come no chance to rescue any distressful maiden anywhere, and the envy and admiration of the other boys had but resulted in emulation and in the appearance of similar warlike gear among them.

He had tired of carrying the thing about, and had for some time left it peacefully at home, leaning beside the hog-pen.  Now all was different.  The time had come!  He would have revenge, and have it in a gory way.  As the South Sea islanders treated their foes, his should be treated.  He would go upon the war-path, and as for Alf—­well, he was sorry for him in a general way, but all mercy was dead within his breast specifically.  He remembered something in the reader: 

  “‘Die! spawn of our kindred!  Die! traitor to Lara!’
  As he spake, there was blood on the spear of Mudara!”

There must be blood, and he laid his plans with what he considered the very height of savage craft and ingenuity.