Part 3 (1/2)

Yet in spite of all the care he bestowed upon her, she grew more lean and feeble every day, and in the end death overtook her, when all her motions stopped and her actions ceased.

When the boy noticed this, sad grief overcame him, and he was stricken with the greatest sorrow. He called her with the same voice she used to answer; and though he shouted at the top of his voice, he could not perceive any movement or alteration in her. Thereupon he began to look closer into her eyes and ears, but could not find any visible defect. In equal manner, when he examined all the other parts of the body, he could find nothing amiss. He therefore earnestly desired to find out where the defect lay hidden, so that he might be able to remove it and make her return to her former state of vigorous life. But he was quite at a loss and utterly unable to find by what means to attain his ends. . . .

_Hayy takes an aversion to the dead Body._

In the meantime the dead body of the roe began to putrefy and to exhale noisome vapours, which tended to increase his aversion to it and made him unwilling to look upon it.

Not long after this he chanced to see two ravens fighting together, and one of them struck the other down dead. After that it began to sc.r.a.pe the earth with its claws, till it had dug up a pit wherein it buried the carcase of its adversary. When Hayy observed this, he said to himself: ”How well has this raven done in covering the body of his companion, though he did ill in killing him. How much greater reason was there for me to have performed this good office to my mother.”

_Hayy buries the body of the Roe._

Thereupon he digged a grave, in which he laid his mother's body, throwing earth upon it. Then he went on meditating on the thing which had governed the body, but could not apprehend what sort of thing it was. But when he looked on the rest of the roes, and saw that they all had the same figure and form as his mother had had, he gathered there was in every one of them something that governed and actuated them, like that which had actuated and governed his mother. And on account of that likeness he continued to follow them, and liked to be in their company.

_Hayy observes divers kinds of Living Creatures and Plants._

In this condition he remained some time, contemplating divers kinds of living creatures and plants, and walking about the sh.o.r.e of that Island to see whether he could find anything like himself, as he observed many of the other animals and plants had many resembling one another. But as much as he looked about, he could not find one like himself. And when, on walking round, he perceived that the Island was everywhere compa.s.sed with the sea, he fancied there was no other Island besides.

_Hayy discovers Fire kindled by the friction of Reeds._

But once it so happened that fire was kindled by friction among a parcel of reeds, which at first greatly frightened him, being a thing he had never seen before, so that he stood at a distance a good while, greatly wondering at it.

Yet at last he ventured to draw nearer and nearer to it by degrees; in amazement he observed the brightness of its light, and that wondrous force in consuming everything it seized, converting it into its own nature, till in the end, full of wonder and incited by that innate boldness and courage that G.o.d had implanted in his mind, he felt induced to stretch his hand out to get hold of it.

But when it burnt his fingers, and he saw he could not lay hold of it, he endeavoured to take a stick from the burning tree which the fire had not as yet completely seized upon, and taking hold of that part that was still untouched, he easily gained his ends and carried the tree brand home to his lodgings, which he had selected.

There he kept his fire and ceased not to tend it day and night.

Particularly at night it was of great service to him, inasmuch as its light and heat supplied the place of the sun, so that he was greatly pleased with it and began to look upon it as the most excellent thing he had yet had about him.

And when he noticed that it always tended upwards--he felt convinced that it was one of those celestial substances which he saw s.h.i.+ning in the firmament. He then tried the strength thereof upon all sorts of bodies by throwing them into it, and he perceived it consumed them all sooner or later according to their natures, which rendered them more or less combustible.

Amongst other experiments wherewith he tried to prove its strength, he flung therein certain fishes which the sea had cast upon the sh.o.r.e; as the steam thereof came to his nose, the smell whetted his appet.i.te so that he ventured to taste of them; and when he found it agreeable to his palate, he began to get used to the eating of fish and flesh. Then he applied himself to fis.h.i.+ng and hunting those creatures that are specially fit to feed on, until he became a great expert in those sports.

Thus his regard for the fire greatly increased day by day, because it helped to provide him with various sorts of food with which he was quite unacquainted before.

THE THIRD SEPTENARY.

_Hayy makes himself Clothes and Shoes of the Skins of Animals._

By the time he had attained to the end of his _third septenary_, viz. to the twenty-first year of his age, he had found out many things which were of great use to him for the conveniences of life. He made himself clothes and shoes of the skins of wild beasts after he had dissected them for use. He made himself thread of their hair, as also of the rind of the stalks of althea mallows, and other plants that could be easily parted asunder and drawn into threads. And he learned the making of these threads from the use he had made of the rushes before. He made a sort of bodkin of the strongest thorns he could get and splinters of cane sharp pointed with stones.

The art of building he was taught by the observations he made upon the swallows' nests. He built himself a room to repose and rest therein, and also a store-house and pantry to lay up the remainder of his victuals.

He guarded it with a door made of canes twisted together to prevent any of the beasts from getting in when he happened to be away. He also got hold of certain birds of prey which he made use of for hawking, and others of the tamer sort which he bred up, and fed upon their eggs and chickens. He also took to him the horns of wild bulls, which he fastened upon the strongest canes he could get and the staves of the tree Alzan and others of similar kind.