Savages of Gor by John Norman Page B

tend to protect and preserve, in an almost natural harmony and balance, delicate relationships between food supplies, territories and populations. Viewed in this manner tribal warfare may be seen as an example of intraspecific aggression, with its attendant consequences in decentralizing and refining diverse populations. Too, if one regards these things as of any interest, the counting of coup and intertribal warfare lends color, excitement and zest to the lives of the red savages. They live in a world in which danger is not unknown. Surely they could live otherwise, but they have not chosen to do so. They live with the stars and the, winds, and the kaiila and kailiauk. They have not chosen to revere the fat-bellied, beer-drinking gods of more sedentary peoples. Too, of course, it should he noted that the counting of coup tends, statistically, to ensure that it is the stronger and healthier, the more alert, the more intelligent and sharper-sensed who will repro- duce themselves. This is in marked contrast to certain societies where it is the healthiest and finest who are sent off to war while the inferior and defective remain behind in safety, making money and multiplying themselves.
    In most tribes, incidentally, a man who refuses to go on the warpath is put in women's clothes and given a woman's name. He must then live as a woman. Henceforth he is referred to in the female gender. Needless to say, she is never permitted to mate. Sometimes she must even serve the members of a warrior society, as a captive female.
    Interestingly enough, whites stand outside the coup structure. This is something that few of them will object to. It seems they are simply not regarded, on the whole, as being suitable foes, or foes worthy enough to stand within the coup structure. It is not that the red savages object to killing them. It is only that they do not take pride, commonly, in doing so.
    Similarly a man of the high cities would not expect to be publicly rewarded for having speared a tarsk or slain an urt, Accordingly the red savage will seldom go out of his way to slay a white person; he commonly sees little profit in doing so; in killing such a person, he is not entitled to count coup.
    "The man, now," said Kog, "is not fifty feet from the mounted hunters. In the soft snow he has descended the slope silently."
    "Surely the dark guest, as we may call him, that crouching behind the kailiauk, has seen him."
    "Of course," said Kog, "but he has given no sign."
    "No sign," I said, "which was read by the mounted hunters.
    "Yes," said Kog. His lips drew back, over his fangs. There are always signs. It is only a question of their delectability. They are as small, sometimes, as the dilation of a pupil.
    "The bow is drawn," said Kog.
    The small bow has many advantages. High among these is the rapidity with which it may be drawn and fired. A skilled warrior, in the Gorean gravity, can fire ten arrows into the air, the last leaving the bow before the first has returned to the earth. No Gorean weapon can match it in its rate of fire. At close range it can be devastating. Two further advantages of the small bow that might be mentioned are its maneuverability and its capacity to be concealed, say beneath a robe. It can be easily swept from one side of the kaiila to the other. In this type of combat, incidentally, it is not unusual for the warrior to shield himself behind the body of his racing kaiila, and, circling the enemy, rise up, suddenly, to fire over the animal's back or, sometimes, from beneath its neck: A heel over the animal's back and a fist in its silken neck hair, or an arm thrust through a leather throat loop, provide the leverage needed for these feats.
    To be sure, these folk are superb riders. A child is often put on kaiilaback, its tiny bands clutching the silken neck, before it can walk. Sometimes a strap dangles back for a few feet from the throat loop. This is to be seized by the warrior who may have been struck from his mount,