And all the
while my people of Akatan hunted and fished, and were happy in
the thought that the world was small.
'But the look in the eyes of Unga coming home from the fishing
was with me always, and I knew I would find her when the time was
met. She walked down quiet lanes in the dusk of the evening, or
led me chases across the thick fields wet with the morning dew,
and there was a promise in her eyes such as only the woman Unga
could give.
'So I wandered through a thousand cities. Some were gentle and
gave me food, and others laughed, and still others cursed; but I
kept my tongue between my teeth, and went strange ways and saw
strange sights. Sometimes I, who was a chief and the son of a
chief, toiled for men--men rough of speech and hard as iron, who
wrung gold from the sweat and sorrow of their fellow men. Yet no
word did I get of my quest till I came back to the sea like a
homing seal to the rookeries.
'But this was at another port, in another country which lay to
the north. And there I heard dim tales of the yellow-haired sea
wanderer, and I learned that he was a hunter of seals, and that
even then he was abroad on the ocean.
'So I shipped on a seal schooner with the lazy Siwashes, and
followed his trackless trail to the north where the hunt was then
warm.
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