The Cave Twins   By: Lucy Fitch Perkins (1865-1937)

In this 1916 Twins book, the sixth of the series by Lucy Fitch Perkins we meet with Firetop and Firefly, and their family. The setting is in an age where none of the nice things of the civilised world exist at all. There are no books, no wheels, no firearms to hunt with, and everything has to be done by sheer cunning, or found out by sheer accident. The twins' parents set off on a short voyage of exploration, to see what lies over the horizon, and the twins sneak off to follow them secretly. Of course they soon have to make a "rescue me" signal when they find they can't cope, but they are allowed to remain with their parents, especially as they are quite good at shooting arrows with their bows, and finding small items of food in other ways.

One day there is a huge earthquake and tsunami, and they find they are all marooned on an island, which is what we now know as the Isle of Wight. The twins' father gets an idea from something the twins do, and creates the first canoe, with which he goes and fetches old Granny and other members of the family. A short book, but quite a nice one. THE CAVE TWINS, BY LUCY FITCH PERKINS.

INTRODUCTION.

PREHISTORIC MAN.

This is a story about things that happened ages and ages ago, before any of us were born, or our great great grandfathers either, for that matter. It was so very long ago that there were no houses, or farms, or roads from one place to another, and there was not a single city, or a town, or even a village in the whole earth .

There was just the great, round world, all fresh and new, and covered with growing things; and there were wild beasts of all kinds in the forests, and fishes of all kinds in the seas, and all sorts of birds and flying creatures in the air .

Besides all these wonderful things in the new, new world, there was Man .

He was quite new too. He didn't know much of anything about the world. All that he really knew was that there was a world, and that he was in it, and that there were fierce wild animals in it too, which would kill him and eat him if he didn't kill them first. And he knew very well that he was not as swift as the deer, or as big as the elephant, or as strong as the lion, or as fierce as the tiger, and it seemed to him as if he hadn't much chance to stay alive at all in a world so full of terrible creatures who wanted to eat him up .

But this Prehistoric Man was very brave, and he could do two things which none of the other creatures could do he could laugh and he could think .

One day, he sat down on a rock, and took his head between his hands and thought and thought, and by and by he lifted up his head and said to his wife, for of course he had a wife, "I have it, my dear. If we are not as strong as the wild beasts, we must be a great deal more clever ."

So he got right up off the rock and set about being clever. And so did his wife. They were so clever that they hid themselves in trees and rocks where the wild beasts could not find them. And they found out the secret of fire .

The other creatures could not find out the secret of fire to save their lives, and they were dreadfully afraid of it. Then the Man and his wife made weapons out of stones, and bones, and they made dishes out of mud, and though these things weren't a bit like our weapons or our dishes, they got along very well with them for many years .