THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 HINTS ON GOLF. 
 
 GOLF, IN BADMINTON LIBRARY. 
 
 CREATURES OF CIRCUMSTANCES. 
 
 PETER STEELE THE CRICKETER. 
 
 MY WIFE'S POLITICS. 
 
 CRICKETING SAWS AND STORIES. 
 
 THE BOOK OF GOLF AND GOLFERS. 
 
 LITTLE LADY MARY. 
 
 DREAMS AND THEIR MEANINGS. 
 
 A FRIEND OF NELSON. 
 
 BERT EDWARD, THE GOLF CADDIE. 
 
 CROWBOROUGH BEACON. 
 
 SHOOTING. 
 
 THE NEW FOREST. 
 
 GLENCAIRLY CASTLE. 
 
 Two MOODS OF A MAN. 
 
 AMELIA AND THE DOCTOR. 
 
 LETTERS AND RECOLLECTIONS OF SIR 
 
 WALTER SCOTT. 
 NATURE'S MOODS AND TENSES. 
 A SAGA OF THE " SUNBEAM "
 
 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 BY 
 
 HORACE G. HUTGHINSON 
 
 AUTHOR OF "A FRIKND OF NELSON," "CREATURES OF CIRCUMSTANCE 
 
 "CROWliOROUGH BEACON," "AMELIA AND THE DOCTOR," 
 "NATURE'S MOODS AND TENSES," ETC. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 SMITH, ELDER & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE 
 1911 
 
 All rights reserved
 
 PRINTED BY 
 
 WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, 
 LONDON AND BECCLES.;
 
 Q H 
 S/ 
 
 I have to thank the Proprietors 
 of the Cornhill, Longmans' and 
 Macmillaris Magazines, respectively, 
 for leave to re-print chapters of 
 this volume. 
 
 H. G. H. 
 
 9C8681
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER FACE 
 
 I. WHEN WE WERE BOYS i 
 
 II. INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY .... 25 
 
 III. BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK ... 43 
 
 IV. A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS .... 63 
 
 V. A DORMOUSE, A GULL, AND SOME ANGLING . 87 
 
 VI. THE SILVER OTTER 107 
 
 VII. FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN . . . .123 
 
 VIII. THE LONGSHORE GUNNER /. < . . . 149 
 
 IX. RABBITS, AND SOME GREY MULLET . . .172 
 
 X. SOME FOXES AND EIGHTY-TWO RATS . . 202 
 
 XL LUNDY ISLAND 223 
 
 XII. THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS . . .244 
 
 XIII. A VERY CURIOUS ACCOUNT OF THE ISLAND OF 
 
 ST. KILDA . . . . . . .265 
 
 XIV. LOST AND FOUND . . . . * . . 289 
 XV. ULTIMA THULE 296
 
 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 
 
 WHEN we were boys we used to find no season 
 of the year so trying as the weeks in which the 
 field or lawn before the house was sacredly kept 
 for mowing grass. We could see the finches fly 
 down into it from one or other of the three great 
 elm-trees which stood so proudly and threw 
 over it such immense shadows. The finches 
 would hover awhile, picking the seeds of the 
 taller grass, then plump down, invisible, unap- 
 proachable. 
 
 We were forbidden to set foot upon this 
 ground, sacred to the mower, worse still, for- 
 bidden to throw a stone which might injure the 
 scythe when the time came for cutting. We 
 could hear all day the cry of the corn-crakes, 
 sometimes coming almost to our feet, as it 
 
 B
 
 2 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 seemed, when we stood at the edge of this 
 world which was "great taboo" to us yet could 
 not move a step in search of them ; and at the 
 next crake they would be yards and yards away 
 in the sea of undulant grass. We would curi- 
 ously watch the swallows skimming closely and 
 swiftly over it, or the house-martins diving 
 down from the nests which they built under the 
 eaves of the house, eaves carefully so placed, 
 as it seemed to us, that from the top-storey 
 windows we could touch the nests with two 
 joints of a fishing-rod, yet could by no manner 
 of means arrive at a plan by which we might 
 look, or put our fingers, into them. The fate of 
 Tantalus seems to be the continual portion of a 
 boy. We used to hate these poor birds, who 
 built their nests just out of the reach of our 
 wicked little fingers, with the blind, unreasoning 
 fury of baffled tyrants, and hurl epithets of 
 boyish rage at the short white throat and tiny 
 black bill that lay over the ridge of the mud- 
 walled nest. Yet our hearts were tender enough 
 to bring big lumps into our throats and an 
 uncomfortable moisture into our eyes when one 
 of our caged pets came to an untimely end. 
 True, this might only have been selfish sorrow 
 over our personal loss, after all, there is a cer- 
 tain likeness between boys and human beings 
 but we have an idea that there was an admixture
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 3 
 
 of more noble, generous pity for the fate of 
 something we had loved. 
 
 But if the season of keeping the mowing 
 grass was one of trial to the flesh of boyhood, 
 the season of the actual mowing was one of the 
 purest delight. Early in the morning the cheery 
 sound of the whetted scythes would awaken us 
 to the knowledge that a busy day was before us. 
 For it was needful that we should follow the 
 steps of the mowers as they laid low wave upon 
 wave of the juicy ripe-eared grass, that sighed 
 to each sweep of the scythe like a wave falling 
 on a level beach. It was needful that we should 
 follow, for we could not tell but that each falling 
 wave might reveal the late nest of a corn-crake 
 or skylark, or a little mat of moss which held 
 humble bees and combs with honey. There 
 were others whose business it was to follow 
 the scythe-strokes no less assiduously, chaf- 
 finches and greenfinches coming to feast on the 
 falling seeds of grass. They were tame at these 
 times, not distinguishing the boy, fully armed 
 with catapult and swan-shot, from the mower 
 and his ordinary camp-following. It was a 
 season of great opportunities. Nests of field 
 mice were among the treasures which the 
 mowing was likely to reveal. In some fields, of 
 which we had heard, partridges' nests had been 
 thus discovered ; we had in our memories a
 
 4 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 tragic story of the head of a partridge being 
 taken sheer off, as she sat on her nest, by the 
 stroke of the scythe, but such fortune never fell 
 in our way. The swallows would come brushing 
 past us, sweeping very low over the cut grass 
 for the crowds of insects, invisible to us, which 
 this convulsion of their world sent swarming 
 into the air. They came so close that we almost 
 seemed to feel the stir of their wings in the still 
 summer air, and could distinctly hear the snap 
 of their bills as they closed them on an insect. 
 But though they flew so low, we might know 
 better than to draw therefrom any evil augury 
 for the weather, for the house-martins were 
 flying high up above the tallest trees ; and, 
 above again, cutting bolder circles and almost 
 lost in the radiance of the upper heaven, the 
 swifts coursed screaming. Now and again the 
 scythe of the mower, or his heavy foot, would 
 send disaster into a nest of ants, and the active 
 little creatures would appear carrying off to cool 
 underground regions the cocoons which the hot 
 sun would soon have baked. Boy-like, we loved 
 to add to their discomfort, stirring up their piled 
 hill with sticks, to watch their skurrying, until 
 bites in tender portions of our legs told us that 
 some of the out-pickets of the camp had found 
 their way up our knickerbockers for their re- 
 venge. We did not care for the bites of the
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 5 
 
 black ants, but believed (on the strength of some 
 groundless tradition) that the bites of the red 
 ant were poisonous. 
 
 Over and over again we tried the experiment 
 of burying in the ant-hill a box, with holes 
 punctured in it, containing the body of some 
 small dead thing, in the hope that the ants would 
 pick it for us and leave us a perfect skeleton. 
 We never found the results as they should have 
 been. The ants left fur or feather or gristle, or 
 something which would have been better away, 
 and in trying to scrape these off we always 
 brought the mechanism of slender bones to ruin. 
 We made other experiments with the ants, 
 however; assuredly the presumption of boys 
 is beyond all limits. We constituted ourselves 
 Heaven's executive and Nemesis on those wasps 
 which we caught endeavouring to invade the 
 hives of the bees. On no other wasps did we 
 deal out so evil a fate, but these, in our 
 boyish view of justice, seemed to deserve no 
 better. We caught them with some trouble in 
 small butterfly nets, greatly dreading the while 
 the stings of the bees who might not recognise 
 us as benefactors, and with yet greater trouble 
 transferred them to an inverted glass with a sheet 
 of cardboard across its mouth. In this glass 
 prison we bore them, buzzing with furious anger, 
 to the ant-hill, plumped glass and cardboard
 
 6 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 firmly on the yielding substance of the hill, 
 withdrew the cardboard, and watched events. 
 The ants, thronging up from their disturbed 
 passages, leaped upon the wasps like tigers. 
 The wasps might buzz up to the top of the 
 glass it was no use ; they did but bear with 
 them three or four of their assailants, who did 
 not cease to attack them tooth and nail. Five 
 minutes was enough to settle it. In that space 
 of time every wasp in the glass would have sur- 
 rendered to numbers, been put to death, and 
 dragged into hidden storehouses. The cruelty 
 of it is sickening; it is as bad as bull-fighting. 
 We are not sure that the fact of our discrimin- 
 ating, our presuming to act as instruments of 
 justice, does not throw a worse light, as of a 
 certain smug self-righteousness, over it all. It 
 is good to have made confession of that episode 
 of boyhood, that it may not have to be spoken of 
 again. 
 
 The great haunt of our wasps was the 
 stibbard tree which stood in the hedge dividing 
 the lawn in front of the house from the kitchen 
 garden. The stibbard is an early apple, earlier 
 even, we think, than the quarantin, softer and 
 not ruddy-faced like the quarantin, ripening 
 rather with a golden glow, but very sweet and 
 juicy. We loved the stibbards, and so did the 
 wasps. It was not without peril from their
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 7 
 
 stings that we endeavoured to knock or shake 
 down the stibbard that seemed to us most 
 golden-ripe. Sometimes better than any on 
 the tree would seem one which had fallen to 
 the ground of its own mellowness ; but we 
 would never pick up such an one without first 
 rolling it over with the foot, for often an apple 
 that looked perfect from the one side might have 
 a hole in the other, through which so many 
 wasps had passed to eat out its juicy substance 
 that beneath its seeming perfect skin it was 
 more wasp than apple. In this case, on turning 
 it over, the wasps would come tumbling out, 
 bustling over each other and scarcely able to fly 
 owing to the intoxicating effect on them of the 
 apple-juice. 
 
 A little farther down the path which edged 
 the lawn, and led past the stibbard tree, was a 
 poplar of the more spreading, less steeple-like 
 kind. It exuded a gummy humour, and around 
 this tree for the sake, as we believed, of a certain 
 sugariness in the gum, the wasps were always 
 humming. One year it was much beset by 
 hornets, so much so that we believed them to 
 have a nest somewhere in the tree, but we never 
 cared to climb it to examine closely. We had an 
 enormous respect, exaggerated very likely, for 
 a hornet. Three stings of a hornet, we had 
 been told, would kill a man ; and we were
 
 8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 always very ready to credit anything that had 
 in it an element of awe or horror. The sting of 
 a bee we dreaded too ; there was always such a 
 trouble in getting the sting out. We derived 
 immense satisfaction from the consideration that 
 with its sting the bee lost its life ; but still that 
 did not quite compensate us for the swelling and 
 discomfort. Wasps stung us so frequently that 
 after a while we grew to treat their stings with 
 little attention. They grew to hurt less, as it 
 seemed, and we believe in point of fact that one 
 does become so inoculated that the poison loses 
 much of its effect. Of course we should have 
 wished that a wasp should die, like a bee, after 
 stinging, but it was satisfactory to think that we 
 could generally catch the rascal and execute him 
 for ourselves. We tried various methods of 
 taking wasps' nests, but naphtha was the means 
 which we liked best. It stupefied them so 
 completely that you might dig out the nest 
 and have it perfect. If you dipped the nest 
 into boiling water, you would then kill all the 
 larvae and nymphs, and if you were careful in 
 picking them out afterwards could keep the nest 
 as a not too highly smelling trophy. If you take 
 the nest at night, as you should, it is not at all 
 wise to wait till the next morning before dipping 
 it into the scalding water. Our butler made this 
 mistake, but only once. Authority looked with
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 9 
 
 grace upon our crusade against wasps' nests ; 
 had actually expressed some interest and some 
 incredulity about our statement that more than 
 one queen could generally be found in a nest; 
 had finally even mentioned a wish to see a nest 
 as it was when dug out, always under our 
 guarantee that the wasps were thoroughly 
 stupefied beyond prospect of present revival. 
 There was no trouble in arranging this. The 
 rag soaked in naphtha was duly thrust within 
 the hole in the bank which was the outlet of the 
 nest, a match was put to the rag, a sod was put 
 over the hole. A little trouble might be given 
 by a few laggard wasps returning home late, as 
 they will on a warm, light night; but all who 
 were in bed and asleep were perfectly un- 
 conscious and harmless when we removed the 
 sod and dug them out. 
 
 It was a fine large nest, and we took special 
 pains to remove it unbroken; then we enclosed 
 it in a duster and triumphantly bore it into the 
 presence of Authority. It was a quaint scene 
 boyhood, with all the dirt associated with the 
 digging of a wasps' nest on itself and its worst 
 clothes, blinking in the glare of the bright lights 
 which were a startling contrast to the cool tones 
 of the summer night, proudly unfolding a corner 
 of the duster to exhibit our grimy prize to 
 Authority in spotless evening attire, which it
 
 io WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 withdrew with a rustling of the petticoats, and 
 fearful apprehensions lest the insects should not 
 be completely comatose. Authority showed a 
 discreet and complimentary interest, but an 
 interest which was quickly satisfied, and gave 
 place to a desire that both boyhood, in its 
 present condition, and wasps' nest in its present 
 or any other condition, should be removed from 
 its presence as soon as possible. Boyhood was 
 told that it was much too late to be out of doors, 
 and high time to leave off those dirty clothes 
 and go to bed. This, as was well understood, 
 was not to be taken as a special rebuke, for 
 Authority very well knew that wasps' nests 
 could not be taken except after sundown, and 
 the taking of wasps' nests it considered a good 
 work : it was only an expression of the general 
 attitude of Authority towards boyhood, the 
 attitude which has found its best-known illustra- 
 tion in the pointless joke of Punch, " Go and see 
 what Tommy is doing, and tell him he mustn't." 
 From Tommy's point of view there is no joke in 
 it whatever. 
 
 Boyhood, however, retired with a glad sense 
 of having done its duty, and the butler was 
 summoned to remove the wasps' nest. He was 
 a new butler who had lately come from London. 
 He knew nothing about wasps' nests; he did 
 not even know that wasps, according to the
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS n 
 
 Devonshire lingo, ought, properly speaking, to 
 be called "appledranes." Nevertheless he ought 
 to have known that it was his duty to do as he 
 was told. He did not do so. He was told to 
 take away the wasps' nest, and put it into 
 scalding water immediately. Especial stress 
 was laid upon that adverb immediately; but the 
 stress did not communicate itself to the mind of 
 the butler. He thought (a butler should never 
 think) that it would be enough if the wasps' nest 
 were put into the scalding water on the morrow 
 morning. For the night, he put it into the 
 pantry. He had quite forgotten about the 
 wasps' nest when he opened the pantry-door 
 the next morning, but was very quickly and 
 pointedly reminded of it. The entire pantry 
 was one angry buzz. Wasps swarming on the 
 window panes shut out the light of day. Wasps 
 angrily buzzing into the butler's face made him 
 close his eyes and rush blindly away, pursued 
 like Orestes, by a stream of Furies. Wasps 
 stinging him ferociously in every vulnerable 
 part might have suggested another classic 
 simile, the shirt of Nessus. The butler knew 
 nothing of these classic characters. Until the 
 previous evening he had known nothing of wasps. 
 Now, of a sudden he found his knowledge of them 
 much too intimate. He was stung fearfully all 
 over, as he reported, meaning, thereby, wherever
 
 12 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 a wasp was able to reach his unprotected skin to 
 sting it. The trouble did not end with the butler. 
 The wasps, following him from the pantry, 
 pervaded every room in the house. There were 
 few members of that domestic circle who 
 escaped being stung by them. In the end, 
 the coachman, with his life in his hand and his 
 person protected by the bridal arrangement of 
 muslins in which he was accustomed to hive a 
 swarm of bees, fought his way into the pantry 
 bearing a pail of scalding water, in which he 
 immersed the wasps' nest, and, opening the 
 windows, allowed the survivors to fly forth into 
 a homeless world. It was a tragic page in our 
 boyhood's history, bearing in fiery characters 
 the moral that one should always do as one is 
 told. Of course, the brunt of the blame, as was 
 but rational, fell upon the butler, who soon 
 afterwards gave warning ; but a portion of it, as 
 was but human, fell to the share of boyhood, 
 with an injunction in strictest terms never again 
 to bring a wasps' nest into the house. 
 
 We had great ambitions, which we never 
 arrived at gratifying, to have the nests of some 
 of these social insects (we did not much care 
 which) under glass, so that we might make a 
 study of their habits. Once we did go the 
 length of digging up a bumble bees' nest, 
 enclosing the whole mass of moss and comb
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 13 
 
 and hotly buzzing chestnut-coloured insects in 
 a muslin bag and transferring it to a box which 
 had been fitted with a glass back. We placed 
 the box on the window-sill of the room in which 
 were our birds, our white mice, skins, caterpillars, 
 and all the other captives of our bows and spears. 
 Then we withdrew the cork wherewith we had 
 closed the entrance-hole, which we had intended 
 to be the door of the hive. The bees so far 
 availed themselves of it as to find their way out 
 by this hole, but did not fulfil the second part of 
 our intention, which was that they should return 
 again by the same convenient passage. The 
 faithless insects abandoned their home and their 
 honeycomb, and we never set eyes on them 
 again. 
 
 It was a sad disappointment. We had indulged 
 in pleasant visions of beguiling the interminable 
 hours of the hopelessly wet days, which were 
 not uncommon in our western county, by watch- 
 ing the curious doings of the bees, and even 
 had visions of their making for us vast stores of 
 honey. In point of fact, the humble-bee (which 
 is a more correct name for it than the homely 
 " bumble ") makes very little honey, sufficient 
 only for the few individuals of which its societies 
 are composed, and that little of a poor earthy 
 flavour. 
 
 I have often speculated since, how long, by
 
 i 4 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 the adult measurement of time, a wet day is to 
 boyhood. Even a fine day was of measureless 
 length, and the six weeks' summer holidays a 
 virtual eternity, for their end was quite beyond 
 the horizon of our mental view. But on the wet 
 days, the really hopeless ones on which the 
 rooks knew that it was no good waiting for 
 better times, and that they must just come out 
 and chance colds and rheumatism if they meant 
 to pick up any dinner then, when the birds had 
 been cleaned and tended, and the cotton-wool 
 bed of the white mice renewed, and a few 
 finishing touches put to the stuffed birds which 
 were stiffening, with some supports, upon their 
 twigs, then what had the day to offer? One 
 could sit a whole half-hour or more over Wood's 
 "Natural History "or "The Dog Crusoe," but 
 even at the end of that great lapse of time there 
 remained enormously long hours unconsumed. 
 We would watch the cows munching steadily 
 with heads turned away from the rain, con- 
 firming the presage of the rooks. Had it been 
 going to clear they would have been clustered 
 beneath the trees awaiting the fine weather, but 
 they, like the rooks, knew that it was hopeless. 
 Flattening our noses on the panes and watching 
 the ceaseless drip was an entertainment which 
 palled after five minutes. It was too wet even 
 to go in search of food for the innumerable
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 15 
 
 caterpillars which we kept in boxes fronted with 
 perforated zinc. The hours were very blank. 
 
 Happily there always remained the stable- 
 loft. We mounted to it by a fixed ladder leading 
 up to a little door through which a boy could 
 pass almost without stooping. Inside it was 
 dark and musty. The only light came through 
 a little slit in the far wall, opposite which stood 
 the chaff-cutting machine with the shoot down 
 which the chaff slid into the harness-room. The 
 bulk of the long low room was filled with 
 bundles of hay, lying ready for the cutting. 
 Around and behind these bundles were the 
 most wondrous hiding-places, where an hour or 
 two of a wet day might pass without dragging. 
 For the secrecy appealed to our boyish reserve, 
 and the darkness favoured visions of the imagina- 
 tion, while underneath we could hear the horses 
 stamping and champing, the pigeons murmuring 
 to each other in their cote on the back wall of 
 the stables, and the pigs grunting and squealing 
 in their own place. Unless chaff-cutting was 
 going on, no one shared this dark, musty 
 solitude with us, except the stable cats. Doubt- 
 less they caught abundance of mice in the loft, 
 but our eyes, though they were sharp enough, 
 could not see mice in that twilight ; and though 
 spiders, earwigs, beetles and many queer insects 
 must have been constantly about us, we were
 
 16 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 aware of nothing but an occasional "yellow 
 
 underwing," who would rush with hurried flight 
 
 from the place of concealment from which we 
 
 had ousted him, immediately to disappear from 
 
 our sight so soon as ever he settled again and 
 
 closed the sober brown over-wings on the bright 
 
 yellow of the nether. The yellow underwing 
 
 was always an object of eager pursuit, though I 
 
 had several of his kind in my collection of moths. 
 
 We set a value on moths in some proportion 
 
 to their size, and, common though he was, we 
 
 found few bigger than the yellow underwing. 
 
 Once we had caught two privet hawk-moths on 
 
 the privet hedge around the elm-tree on which we 
 
 put out our young jackdaws ; but these were the 
 
 only specimens of the hawk moth which we ever 
 
 found. Of course I except the humming bird 
 
 hawk-moth, which is a day-flier, and which we 
 
 constantly caught as he poised, with wings 
 
 moving at an invisible speed, to suck the honey 
 
 from the heliotropes. We scarcely accounted 
 
 him a real moth, any more than we did the 
 
 gamma or the six-spot burnet, or any other of 
 
 the daylight-loving moths. But there was a 
 
 charm, a mystery and a fascination about going 
 
 out into the dark warm summer night with a 
 
 bull's-eye lantern and hawking with a butterfly 
 
 net, whether around the ivy blossom in the right 
 
 season or trees whose stems we had previously
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 17 
 
 anointed with a rich decoction of beer and sugar. 
 In these latter visits there was a peculiar charm, 
 and all the special excitement of the "stalk." 
 For of course it would not do to go along 
 with the eye of the lantern naked, as did Mr. 
 Pickwick on a memorable occasion. The light 
 would have alarmed the feasting moths at once, 
 and we should not have found one waiting for 
 us when we came to the anointed tree. The 
 plan was to creep along, in stealth and darkness, 
 until we had arrived at the very tree, then to fix 
 the net below the familiar place on which we 
 had hung the rag soaked in the sugared beer 
 and then turn on the lantern ! The tipsy moths, 
 hurriedly rushing from their feast of alcoholic 
 sweets, went reeling down into the receptive net. 
 A few escaped, like ghosts, over its edges, and, 
 vanishing, left us with the impression that fishes 
 leave with us when they break away, that they 
 were rarer, choicer, larger, than any which had 
 come into the net. And then began the hard 
 and delicate work of transferring the moths into 
 the somniferous fumes of the chloroform bottle, 
 a task which was rarely effected without some 
 harm to the delicate downy wings. It is through 
 the sense of smell that old memories are most 
 readily revived, and we cannot now smell the 
 peculiar, hot flavour of a lighted lantern without 
 recalling that odour of the sugared beer which
 
 i8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 was so often associated with it, and fancying 
 ourselves creeping, like Guy Fawkes, down the 
 byways of the orchard, with the warm night 
 airs playing upon us, and seeming to brush 
 us with the invisible wings of ghostly moths. 
 
 It is a charming memory. There is in it 
 an element of such sustained and progressive 
 excitement, beginning with the delightful un- 
 certainty whether there would be a moth at all 
 about the rag ; then, this uncertainty solved and 
 satisfied, there remained yet to be seen their 
 numbers and their kind ; and this latter question 
 could not be determined with any nicety out of 
 doors by the lantern's shifty light, but must be 
 the subject of further search in the pages of 
 Morris's " British Moths." And so, when all the 
 trees had been visited, we would go happily to 
 bed and dream magnificent and magnifying 
 dreams of the creatures who had gleamed down 
 into the net when the lantern's light struck them 
 off the trees, and were now sleeping a last sleep 
 in the big-necked, chloroform-befumed bottles. 
 We believe there would be the same delight in 
 it even now, could we go back to it. It would at 
 least be better than too much port-wine and 
 tobacco. 
 
 When we became of age to have a dog, the 
 delights of the stable-loft were not so peaceful. 
 He was a fox-terrier, white and black and tan,
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 19 
 
 with one ear that cocked and one that drooped. 
 Of course, his first proceeding was to dash 
 behind the hay-bundles.. Then there was a 
 skurry, a spit, and a swear, a further scamper 
 over the floor, and the slit of a window by the 
 chaff-cutting machine was momentarily darkened 
 by the passage of a fleeing cat, gone as soon as 
 seen, and leaving the dog jumping up with 
 whines and yelps of disappointed eagerness at 
 the window which had given it egress. It was 
 trying for the dog, yet he never seemed to tire 
 of the entertainment. It was perennially new 
 to him. 
 
 Cats, however, were by no means his only 
 quarry. From the tangle of the orchard hedge 
 he would often drag out, with fury, a great 
 round ball of leaves which examination showed 
 to enclose a hedgehog, marvellously well pro- 
 tected by its spines from his attack. A full- 
 grown hedgehog would last him half the day. 
 After we had succeeded in calling him away, he 
 would steal back, and from the house we would 
 hear his cries of mingled rage and anguish, as he 
 champed on the hard spines. After one of these 
 encounters he would lie on the ground open- 
 mouthed, and with his two forepaws pull spine 
 after spine out of his lips and gums. Did the 
 hedgehog miss the spines? A full-grown 
 " hedgy-boar " (such was the local name for the
 
 20 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 hedgehog) was too much for him. The old 
 fellows can roll themselves so tightly that not 
 one dog in twenty has the hardihood to search 
 shrewdly enough with his muzzle to reach their 
 unprotected under parts. The younger ones have 
 not the power of rolling themselves so tightly, 
 neither do their prickles grow so profusely, nor 
 so steely-hard. Any dog of average courage 
 will kill them, poor things, in no time. 
 
 Even as boys, however, we had no animosity 
 against the hedgehogs. Their utterly passive 
 attitude disarmed us. It is true we would urge 
 Viper on to the wiry spines of a full-grown 
 hedgehog ; but from a young one, on which he 
 was likely to be able to make his teeth fairly 
 meet, we called him off, reproaching his cruelty. 
 We have often wondered, since, whether Viper 
 thought us illogical. We suspect he did, but 
 believe that he understood us perfectly. He was 
 a very loyal dog, always on our side rather than 
 on that of Authority. Authority amused us often 
 by endeavouring to interfere in our treatment of 
 Viper. Viper was just as amused as we were. 
 Everything that Authority said, of course, was 
 perfectly true ; but interference between a boy 
 and his dog is like interference between husband 
 and wife. 
 
 About once every fortnight Viper used to be 
 lost. After some forty-eight hours he would
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 21 
 
 return, encrusted with dirt, red-eyed, weary. 
 We upbraided him, but the zeal in rabbiting 
 which had led him to these temporary entomb- 
 ments commanded our heartfelt respect. Once 
 he caught a very small rabbit, and laid out its 
 corpse triumphantly upon the drawing-room 
 sofa. Neither we nor Viper could quite under- 
 stand the disfavour with which Authority looked 
 upon this grand achievement. They said it 
 spoiled the sofa, but, even so (and it was not 
 " so "), was not one small rabbit worth many 
 sofas? It was most curious, the lack of sense 
 of proportion in Authority. 
 
 If any one had ever taken the trouble to 
 explain to us the relative financial values of 
 rabbits and sofas, we should have understood 
 the position, and would have entered into it at 
 once. But this is just one of those things which 
 Authority never does explain. It has never 
 occurred to Authority to put itself into our 
 position, or at once it must have seen that our 
 interest in rabbits was immense, our interest in 
 sofas nil, and therefore that the relative value of 
 rabbits, as compared with sofas, was infinitely 
 large in our eyes. But if Authority had taken 
 the trouble to express sofas in terms of rabbits, 
 pointing out to us that the price of a sofa would 
 buy, say, four hundred grown rabbits, and good- 
 ness knows how many of the size that Viper had
 
 22 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 slain, then we should at once have entered into 
 the matter from the standpoint of Authority, for 
 the financial argument appeals very strongly to 
 a boy. Problems of finance afflict him more 
 pressingly, as a rule, than any others, and he 
 can grasp questions into which sixpences and 
 shillings enter with a surprising avidity. It is 
 not much use to talk to him in terms of sove- 
 reigns, for the sum is too big to be familiar, and 
 only dazzles the brain by its magnitude. After 
 all, the whole problem of education resolves 
 itself into a question of the faculty to "put 
 yourself in his place." Unfortunately, it is a 
 faculty given to very, very few. 
 
 Viper had it. We cannot conceive how, 
 otherwise, he could have been so successful 
 as he was in catching moles. Very few dogs 
 have the knack. In all our life we have known 
 but four that were any good at it, and their 
 methods were always the same. Very stealthily 
 would they approach, attracted by the view of 
 the dark line of molehills, or by the scent of the 
 underground worker. Very slowly lifting each 
 foot with separate thought and care, with many 
 silent pauses in statuesque attitudes, they draw 
 up to the little mounds. Once among them, the 
 progress must be yet more studied and careful, 
 the statuesque moments of longer duration. 
 Gradually the attitude of stealthy advance is
 
 WHEN WE WERE BOYS 23 
 
 changed for the collected crouching preparatory 
 to a spring. Suddenly the dog leaps into the 
 air like a salmon jumping from a pool. Like a 
 salmon, too, the dog comes down again with a 
 headlong dive. With wide-open jaws and paws 
 together he lands, burying his muzzle in the 
 ground where it heaved above the tunnelling 
 mole, tearing away from the ground a great 
 mouthful of moss and grass and earth, and 
 amongst it all the little warm black body out 
 of which he is shaking the life. 
 
 Or it may be that the little warm black body 
 has altogether escaped him, so that his mouthful 
 is nothing but vain, disgusting earth and moss. 
 Then there is nothing for it but to shake the 
 earth out of one's mouth, and to claw away with 
 one's paws the grass, to spit out the moss, and 
 to go away with head and tail depressed, hoping 
 for better luck next time. It is no good going 
 on digging and scratching; the mole is much 
 quicker at that game ; and the vain digging and 
 scratching is the method of the other nine 
 hundred and ninety-nine dogs out of a thousand 
 who have not been given the excellent faculty 
 of putting themselves in the mole's place. For 
 without that indispensable gift, how was one to 
 know that the mole would take fright and retreat 
 at once into underground fortresses ? How was 
 one to know indeed that a little heaving of the
 
 24 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 earth, like an earthquake in miniature, meant a 
 mole at all, unless one had thought out the 
 manner in which the black villain, sedulously 
 digging, was likely to make his way beneath the 
 soil?
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 
 
 No doubt the greatest hero of our boyish, which 
 is but a way of saying our hero-worshipping, 
 days, was Tom Causey, rat and rabbit catcher in 
 ordinary, and poacher of pheasants, salmon, and 
 all else that came in his way on occasion. He 
 lived in an isolated cottage, East the Water, as 
 it was called that is to say, across the river 
 with a wife, many ferrets, and a number of dogs, 
 most of which, though well known in the neigh- 
 bourhood for years, were regularly returned as 
 pups under six months of age when the tax- 
 collector paid his annual visit. 
 
 It was not, however, in his cottage, East the 
 Water, that one commonly sought Causey for a 
 business interview, for he was more often to 
 be found at a familiar and more central haunt. 
 Thither I repaired to seek him one evening, and 
 was just in time to hear him concluding a twice- 
 told homily on the danger of putting ferrets into 
 the North Devon cliffs : " Us did put the verrets
 
 26 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 into the cliffs wan time, and wan of mun vailed 
 over, but 'e wasn't drownded, vor 'e swum over 
 to Lundy, and come 'ome in the skiff." 
 
 Now Lundy Island is a mere trifle of any- 
 thing between twenty and twenty-five miles 
 from the shore, at the point of which he was 
 speaking. Causey concluded this terrific tale 
 with an expression of countenance which was 
 more than grave. It was fierce, extraordinarily 
 fierce, so that not one of his auditors in the bar- 
 parlour of the " Ring o' Bells," which is at the 
 head of the town of Bidecombe, in Devon, dared 
 show a smile on his face by way of hint that 
 his credulity was insufficient to receive with 
 gratitude so large an offering. I had come into 
 the "Ring o' Bells" on a matter connected with 
 the purchase of a certain "old vitchie verret," as 
 Causey called it, which I could see even now 
 stirring in the pocket of one of the immense 
 tails of his ancient velveteen coat. "Vitchie 
 verret " was Causey's name in the vernacular for 
 a "fitch" or "fitchie" ferret, and "fitch" is just 
 another name for "polecat" ; indicating that this 
 particular ferret was of the original dark polecat 
 colour, almost of the hue of a sable, and not the 
 pink-eyed albino. Thus I had come in for the 
 recital of this tale, and hugged myself for my 
 good fortune, while I crossed the parlour to sit 
 beside Causey and talk of the ferret's merits in
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 27 
 
 a low voice, and see whether I could get him to 
 abate a shilling off the price. The shilling was 
 an affair of moment to a boy, and worth some 
 bargaining; also, Tom Causey's conversation 
 never failed to be informing ; and, finally, there 
 was the added joy that the very visit to a 
 public-house, even one so reputable as the 
 " Ring o' Bells," was a crime against Authority 
 in itself. 
 
 Causey drew the ferret from his pocket, and 
 petted it up against his great red cheek, while it 
 nuzzled with its little nose in the frizzled ringlets 
 which came down under his greasy felt hat. 
 "A proper beauty 'e be, sure enough," Causey 
 said, " and that gentle there, a lady might carry 
 'un in 'er muff." " Is he game, though ? " I asked, 
 for these blandishing qualities are not of the 
 essence of what is highest in ferret nature. 
 "Game!" said Causey with scorn; "a proper 
 tiger 'e be. I've seed this 'ere zame vitchie verret 
 vor take 'old teu a great rat and shake the very 
 life out of 'un, I have, very zame as 'e were a 
 dogue." That was better. "And will he not lie 
 up ? " "I wouldn't be vor saying," Causey said, 
 immensely candid, "as if there was a nest of 
 young rabbits in the earth with 'un as 'e mightn't 
 lie by a bit vor enjoy 'eeself like, as any verret 
 would ; but there ! lie up when 'twas a growed 
 rabbit as 'e was a-tackling, why, I'll lay as yer'll
 
 28 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 never know un deu no such thing till the days o' 
 Kingdom Come." 
 
 In the face of that it seemed hard to think of 
 bating the price of such an animal by a shilling. 
 In fact, as I took the ferret and Causey the money 
 I was made ashamed by his saying that it was 
 "all the zame as giving of 'ee such a verret as 
 that there vor take this money vor 'un." 
 
 Causey drank beer at intervals from a great 
 quart pot as we struck the bargain ; but his head 
 had seemed clear to discuss its points and the 
 merits of the ferret, so that I was surprised, 
 when we left the " Ring o' Bells " together, 
 Causey saying that he "was minded vor go 
 'ome early," to find his big body swaying on my 
 little one like a man far gone. There is only 
 one right way for a man to go from the " Ring 
 o' Bells" to Bidecombe Bridge, and so across 
 the water to where Causey lived, and that is the 
 plain and simple way down Cold Harbour Lane. 
 It is so steep that if Causey had lain on the 
 ground he would have rolled down it to the 
 bottom. Instead of that, though he rolled quite 
 enough, he did it on his two feet, and, for all I 
 could do, they insisted on taking him round by 
 Market Street and High Street, and so along the 
 quay. The greater distance was nothing, but 
 what was something was that kind of Carfax 
 where the High Street went to the quay, the
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 29 
 
 outlook place which Hutchings the policeman 
 always occupied. It gave him points of view 
 four ways, and every policeman in succession 
 took his natural post there. The last man in 
 the world that Causey ought to meet in his 
 present state was Hutchings. So I tugged and 
 pushed at his great carcase to make it go any 
 other way; but it was like a dinghy trying to 
 push a schooner, especially as all the ways were 
 downhill ways, and he went heaving and yawing, 
 with me vainly trying to steady him, down the 
 High Street, straight on to his fate. Some kind 
 of desperation had hold of him, so that he would 
 not even let himself be guided to the far side of 
 the road from the policeman, but must come 
 bearing right down on to him, blundering 
 actually up against him. It was no place for 
 me then any more, and I steered off out ol 
 danger and listened. 
 
 Joshua Hutchings was a man with a feeling 
 heart for the sinner. Causey, besides, was big 
 enough to be dangerous. I heard him say, " Oh 
 Lord, Tom! there yeu be again obstreperous. 
 Well, over the quay-head yeu will go, an' be 
 drownded, zure enough. I'll ' ave vor tak 'ee to 
 the lock-up, 'ees fai' I will, vor your awn zake 
 like." 
 
 I could see under the dim gas lamps, immense 
 novelty and splendour of Bidecombe of that era,
 
 3 o WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Causey clinging about the policeman with 
 maudlin affection rather than natural hostility. 
 The affection was just as bad for Hutchings as 
 the more normal condition would have been. I 
 heard Causey, with a thick incoherence, begging 
 to be taken to his own house rather than the 
 police cell, undertaking that he would go along 
 quiet, so he would, sure enough, if only Joshua 
 was to take him home, and more than hinting 
 that the walk would not be nearly such a 
 pleasant one if it had to finish in the lock-up. I 
 daresay Joshua Hutchings's motives were mixed 
 in the course he took finally, for Causey left no 
 motive without appeal ; but the last thing I saw, 
 following at a discreet distance, was Hutchings 
 leading him over, the bridge, by which I knew 
 that Causey had won his case, and was being 
 taken home, not to the cell, and Causey seeming 
 to redeem his pledge and going, in spite of his 
 natural lurchings, quietly. 
 
 We were busy the next day or two, making 
 trial of that famous fitchie ferret, and conse- 
 quently not well posted in the local news, or 
 should have heard sooner of big events happening, 
 of which Joe first told us saying : 
 
 "They've a-got th 1 old Tom Causey this 
 wance they 'ave, zure enough." 
 
 " How got him?" 
 
 " Well, they baint a-got 'ee, but they've a-got
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 31 
 
 th' old spud of 'un, what he left be'ind when he'd 
 mos' broke the young veller's leg with un." 
 
 All this was enigmatic, but it is the way 
 stories are told in Devon in pieces, like puzzles 
 which you have to fit together, and as a rule 
 they hand you the last piece first. The " young 
 fellow" whose leg had been "almost broke" 
 was Squire Hyde's under keeper, and the way it 
 had happened was that the keepers had heard 
 someone moving in the coverts by night, got a 
 sight of the man, kept him in sight while he 
 brought down a roosting pheasant off a tree 
 they thought it was a catapult that he brought it 
 down with, but would not swear to that engine 
 then they tried to close on him, but he saw them 
 or heard them and got a bit of a start. The head 
 keeper, an old man, did not make much of the 
 pursuit, but the young, fellow, slim and active, 
 caught the poacher up, and by his own showing 
 was going for his throat when the poacher 
 cracked him over the shin with a great stick. 
 " An' off 'e goes again, and the young veller not 
 over and above minded vor foller after 'un, 'cos 
 the leg of 'un was purty nigh broke, and besides 
 he'd seed purty well by that there who 'twas 
 th' old Tom Causey. An' what's more, when 'e 
 caught the young veller over the shin the stick 
 come right away out of 'ees 'and, so as they 
 found 'un afterwards, and there 'twas, th' old
 
 32 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 blackthorn stick, same as he always 'ath along 
 wi' 'un. Yeu know 'un, master, that there wi' 
 the spud to the end of 'un for diggee out 
 verrets." Of course I knew it well. 
 
 " Zo the warrant's out against 'un, and 'ath 
 been served on 'un, and th' old Tom'll be up 
 bevoor th' bench a fortnight come Teusday." 
 
 This was news of import and stood the light 
 of examination better than most of its kind. In 
 its salient points it was confirmed. Even Causey 
 had nothing to say against most of them. He 
 had been served with the summons. He had 
 lost his spud when he was ferreting " up along 
 that way " in the afternoon ; some " poachin' 
 rascal " must have picked it up and taken it 
 along. But the most salient point in the whole 
 story, as it was told by the keepers of Squire 
 Hyde and had found credence enough for a 
 warrant to be issued on it, he contradicted in the 
 most clear terms. It could not have been Causey 
 that was in Squire Hyde's woods that evening, 
 for the plain reason that no man, "'specially a 
 man o' my zize," as he said, can be in two 
 places at once, and "'tis plain for zure as I 
 couldn't a-been in th' old Squire 'Yde's coverts, 
 'cos I wass 'ome teu bed." 
 
 Asked whom he would find to give evidence 
 to that effect, in the event of the bench showing 
 such poor judgment as to prefer the evidence
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 33 
 
 of the young fellow with the cracked shin 
 to his, Causey replied readily that his wife 
 would give evidence. Rimehouse, the river 
 watcher, and naturally on the side of authority 
 against the poacher, bearing a personal grudge 
 against Causey beside, muttered that he supposed 
 she'd give evidence to anything; but no one 
 paid much attention to Rimehouse because he 
 was a South Devon man. 
 
 We tried to persuade Causey to have the 
 services of young Frant, the lawyer who always 
 opposed the magistrate's clerk on principle, 
 because he belonged to the rival firm in the 
 town and considered he ought to be clerk in- 
 stead; but Causey said he would conduct his 
 own case. He was big with mystery about it 
 all, giving dark hints and obscure answers when 
 questioned about the line of his defence. But 
 of course the idea of defence was not taken 
 seriously. There was the spud, and the young 
 keeper was confident of his identification. For 
 all that the case was opened in a crowded court 
 with a strong smell of velveteen and corduroy. 
 
 The young fellow with the cracked shin was 
 chief witness for the prosecution, and gave his 
 evidence on the lines expected. When he had 
 done Causey was asked by the bench whether 
 he would put him any questions. 
 
 " I'd like vor ask 'un this yer," said Causey. 
 
 D
 
 34 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 " 'Ow wass it when yeu come within vive yards 
 o' me, as yeu'm zaying yeu did supposin' as it 
 wass me 'ow wass it, when yeu wass come so 
 near as that there, as you couldn't say for zure 
 whether 'twas a catapult or no as I vired with at 
 the pheasant? 'Adn't been drinkin', 'ad 'ee?" 
 
 The young man was virtuously taken aback by 
 the idea. Drinking ! No. Had drunk nothing. 
 It was a main dark night, and at five yards (or it 
 may have been six or seven the bench would 
 understand that it was difficult to be accurate to 
 a yard or two " Quite so," from the Chairman 
 in the circumstances) it was easy to be mis- 
 taken. 
 
 " Be yeu sartain as 'twas any less nor vive- 
 and-twenty yards ? " Causey asked. 
 
 " Ees, I be sartain zure." 
 
 "Be 'ee now? It mus' 'ave been a terrible 
 dark night, zure enough. Zo 'appened," he 
 added, with an immense innocence, at which 
 the court, including the bench, laughed freely, 
 " as I wass 'ome that night." 
 
 "Ees 'twas," said the young man, a little 
 mugged in the head by the laughter, which 
 seemed to be against him "terrible dark." 
 
 Then he heaved a sigh of heavy relief on 
 permission given to leave the box, the opinion 
 of the court being that Causey " 'adn't a-made 
 very much of 'un."
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 35 
 
 Causey's own first witness was Mrs. Causey, 
 whom he spoke of as "the old 'oman," and could 
 not be prevailed on by any means to use any 
 other designation for her. Her evidence was to 
 the effect that Causey had come in " in a terrible 
 takin', zure enough," in the afternoon before the 
 night on which the poaching had been done, 
 saying that he had lost his spud somewhere up 
 among the gorse where he had been ferreting. 
 " An 1 didn't I tell 'ee, teu, as I'd seed a terrible 
 poachin'-like rascal of a veller hangin' about, and 
 made no doubt at all as 'twas 'e as 'ad a-taken 
 'un?" This was Causey's suggestion to his 
 lady, and perhaps there are courts of law in 
 which suggestion in this form put into a wit- 
 ness's mouth would not have been permitted ; 
 but there was no objection made in Bidecombe 
 court, even though the magistrate's clerk was 
 supposed to be against Causey. The fact was 
 that North Devon had acquired the habit of 
 taking Causey as a joke, and there did not seem 
 a serious element in all this defence. The bench 
 thought that they and the accused and the wit- 
 nesses and all understood each other perfectly ; 
 the only question really in their minds was the 
 penalty to be imposed. Among the things that 
 were understood was the fact that Mrs. Causey's 
 evidence could not be taken seriously when she 
 spoke for her husband. And what gave force to
 
 3 6 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 this was that Causey did not even go through 
 the form of asking her whether he had been 
 at home that night. He let her go out of the 
 box as soon as her evidence about the spud was 
 given. It was supposed that that was the end, 
 and the Chairman, thinking it was so, got on his 
 legs to ask Causey, as a matter of form, before 
 the bench considered their finding, whether he 
 had any more witnesses to call. Causey sur- 
 prised all the court by answering, " Ees fai' I 
 'ave. I calls Joshua 'Utchings." 
 
 It seemed so good a joke that Causey should 
 call the policeman, of all men, to speak on his 
 behalf that the court received it in a surprised 
 silence for a moment, and when it recovered from 
 the surprise it went into universal laughter, 
 during which Hutchings, most badly surprised 
 of all, got into the box and kissed the book, 
 mumbling, " The truth, the whole truth, and 
 nothing but the truth, so help me God," after 
 the clerk. But the court grew deadly silent then 
 to hear Causey's questions. 
 
 " Do yeu mind wan night teu or dree weeks 
 back as I 'appened fer meet 'ee teu the bottom 
 of th' 'Igh Street, and yeu wass so gude as vor 
 come 'ome 'long o' me?" 
 
 "Ees fai', I mind it well, Thomas, tho' I be 
 main surprised as you're willing fer call it up 
 teu mind in open coort."
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 37 
 
 " Be 'ee surprised, then ? Why be 'ee sur- 
 prised, Joshua ? " 
 
 "Zeeing the condition as yeu wass in, 
 Thomas." 
 
 " Condition then ! What be yeu meaning ? " 
 
 " I be meanin' this then, Tom Causey, as 
 yeu'm minded fer to 'ave it. It baint the vurst 
 time by many as I've seed 'ee in liquor, but I'm 
 blamed if I ever did zee 'ee zo var gone like as 
 yeu wass that night. There now, I wouldn't 'ave 
 told upon 'ee in open coort if so be as yeu 'adn't 
 a-vorced it out." 
 
 "Wass I that bad zure enough, Joshua?" 
 
 "Ees fai', Tom, yeu wass that. I seed 'ee 
 'ome, and I gave 'ee over to Mrs. Causey, and I 
 says ' Yeu mind 'un well, Mrs. Causey,' I says. 
 And 'er says to me, ' Thank'ee kindly, Mr. 
 'Utchings, for bringin' o' my poor Tom 'ome. 
 Oh lor' ! ' 'er says, ' 'twill take 'ee the best part o' 
 teu days,' 'er says, ' fer 'ee vor sleep off this yer,' 
 'er says." 
 
 The policeman waxed warm and eloquent. 
 
 "Teu days vor sleep it off," Tom Causey 
 repeated in a hang-dog penitence; "wass I that 
 bad zure enough ?" 
 
 " Ees fai' yeu wass, Tom," said the policeman. 
 
 " And what date was that 'ere day ? " Causey 
 asked the question with a degage air, of which he 
 increased the effect by sitting down as Hutchings
 
 38 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 said, " I can tell 'ee in a minute," and began lick- 
 ing his thumb to turn the pages of a big black 
 note-book which he brought from his pocket. 
 
 To me, a boy, listening in court, all eyes and 
 ears and admiration, there was not much mean- 
 ing attached to the date when the policeman did 
 produce it. "November 15, Thursday." 
 
 "An' what day wass it?" Causey asked, 
 standing up again with a sort of not-taking-much- 
 interest-in-what-was-going-on air about him 
 "what day wass it as this 'ere poachin' rascal 'it 
 the poor young veller across the shins in Squire 
 ' Yde's woods ? " Causey addressed this question 
 to the court generally, and every one in court 
 knowing the answer as well as Causey knew it 
 himself, half the court shouted together, " No- 
 vember 15, Thursday." And then about a quarter 
 of the court, taking the point, went into a guffaw 
 of broad laughter, sternly repressed. 
 
 Joshua Hutchings went out of the box, and 
 Causey took up his parable, beginning in the 
 tone of the penitent sinner as he addressed him- 
 self to the bench. 
 
 " I be afeared, gen'l'men, as it be treu as I'd 
 a-took a drop teu much that vexed I were, as 
 th' old 'oman 'ath a-told 'ee, vor lose that there 
 spud, as wass a prime favourite, an' I'd be obliged 
 to 'e vor make order as 'e shall be give back teu 
 me zo zoon as the coort rises. Well, there 'tis
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 39 
 
 I'd a-took a drop extra-like, an', mos' unfort'nit, 
 I come 'pon Josh 'Utchings, an' 'e, minded vor 
 deu ees duty as a Christian man, zees me 'ome, 
 an' th' old 'oman, 'er says to 'un, 'Well, there, 
 'twill take 'e teu days, an' zo 'twill, vor sleep off 
 this yer.' An' Josh, 'e wass minded zame way. 
 So there 'tis an' this yer young veller, what I 
 aren't got no quarrel wi', 'e zees a veller i' the 
 dark, zame night, i' th' old Squire 'Yde's woods, 
 and the veller catches 'un a great crack over the 
 shins wi' a stick, an' the stick flies out o' the 'and 
 of 'un, an' when they come vor pick'ee up 'tis that 
 there zame spud as I'd a-lost zame arternoon. 
 An' wi' that 'e puts teu and teu together an' 'e 
 makes vive out of mun, 'e does, vor 'e zays as 
 'twas me as wass in th' old Squire 'Yde's woods 
 and catched 'un the crack across the shins, vor 
 all 'twas a terrible dark night, as the young veller 
 zaid 'eeself, zo as 'e couldn't zee at no more'n 
 vive yards whether the veller was catapulting 
 down the pheasant or 'ow 'e wass knocking of 
 'un down, an' me the while laid by in bed, as 
 Josh 'Utchings 'ave a-told 'e, an' not like vor be 
 able to rise from 'un vor teu days. So there 'tis, 
 an' if yeu genTmen on the bench be gwine vor 
 zay as a man what wass brought 'ome blind 
 drunk to ees 'ouse at nine o'clock could be 
 knockin' down of the pheasants, let alone o' the 
 keepers, in Squire 'Yde's woods, vive mile away,
 
 40 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 avoor eleven, why, all I'm minded vor tell 'e is 
 as yeu'm better informed nor what I be 'bout 
 'ow the drink takes a man when it's got a hold 
 of 'un." 
 
 Causey sat down, and the bench left the court 
 to deliberate in private. Then Mr. Vine, land- 
 lord of the " Ring o' Bells," sitting two forms in 
 front of me in court, turned round and asked in 
 a thick whisper, "Wasn't that there the zame 
 evening as yeu come into the ' Ring o' Bells ' vor 
 ze Tom 'bout buying a vitchie verret ? " 
 
 "Yes," I said, "it was." 
 
 " An' didn't zeem to me," Mr. Vine went on, 
 " as Tom wass so var gone as all this yer, time 
 yeu wass talking and making a bargain like." 
 
 "That he did not, Mr. Vine," I said. "It 
 seemed to take him all suddenly as soon as we 
 got out into the street." And then I told him 
 how I had by no means been able to induce 
 Causey to go down the straight and natural way 
 by Cold Harbour Lane, but he must needs go 
 round by the High Street and so run foul of 
 Hutchings, going right out of his way to do it, 
 as if his destiny had hold of him. Then Mr. 
 Vine, who was one of those big fat men who 
 shake all over when they laugh, like a jelly when 
 the servant brings it in to table, began to wobble. 
 " That there Tom ! " he said with admiration. 
 " If this yer baint a proper masterpiece ! "
 
 INTRODUCING TOM CAUSEY 41 
 
 " What do you mean, Mr. Vine ? " I asked. 
 
 " Weren't no more drunk that night, Tom 
 weren't, nor yeu nor I be, master," and he turned 
 back again and went on wobbling and shaking 
 so that they had to pat him on the back to bring 
 him to. 
 
 Presently the bench came in, after deliberation, 
 and said that the case was one which presented 
 points of difficulty, but that after hearing the 
 evidence of Police Constable Hutchings it was 
 impossible to believe that Causey could have 
 been in Squire Hyde's woods at the time and 
 date stated, and that the young man must have 
 been mistaken. The finding of the spud was, no 
 doubt, suspicious, but it might have come there 
 as suggested by the defendant. The Chairman 
 was proceeding to improve the occasion by 
 pointing out to Causey the disgracefulness of 
 drunkenness and how nearly it had brought him 
 into trouble on this occasion, but was checked 
 by the clerk audibly whispering to him as on a 
 point of law that in the present instance it 
 was due to being brought home drunk and in- 
 capable that Causey was able to prove an alibi 
 and escape conviction ; so the Chairman ended, 
 rather more shortly than he had meant, with 
 " Oh ! ah ! Yes. Case dismissed. Next case." 
 
 Causey delayed a moment to get his spud, 
 returned by order, and came out of court cheek
 
 42 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 by jowl with the young fellow, the under-keeper, 
 who had given evidence against him. Causey 
 was looking at his spud carefully, to see whether 
 it had suffered injury ; then, noticing who it was 
 beside him, and seeing the young fellow still 
 limped : " I wass main sorry, Bill, vor give 'e 
 sich a clip as I did," he said, " but I wass main 
 hurried-like, vor zartain zure yeu'd a-'ad me by 
 the throat if I 'adn't a-caught 'e a purty good 
 clip about the legs. But I 'adn't meant vor catch 
 'e such a stout wan took th' old spud clean out 
 of my 'and it did, zo as I come purty nigh to 
 losing of 'un. I deu owe 'e zumthing, zure 
 enough, vor picking of 'un up, an" thank 'e 
 kindly."
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 
 
 IN the pursuits of boyhood, each season of the 
 year is defined just as clearly as in the calendar 
 of the farmer. 
 
 In the spring a boy's time is so occupied with 
 bird-nesting in all its branches, such as finding 
 the nests, climbing the trees, taking the nestlings, 
 blowing the eggs and classifying them, that he 
 is left little leisure for other things. In the high 
 summer he will be occupied in pursuing 
 whether it be butterflies with a net, or, failing 
 that, a cap, or the immature fledgelings of the 
 year, escaped from the nest which he has spared, 
 and giving him reasonable hopes of a successful 
 issue to expeditions with catapult or other 
 missile engines. The long autumn evenings 
 will be his opportunity for practising his 
 taxidermy, for skinning and stuffing the birds 
 which have lately fallen to his snares or 
 weapons. 
 
 Surely a very special providence watches
 
 44 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 over the boy who occupies his business with 
 bird-stuffing. In the first place, and before 
 more subtle dangers come to be enumerated, 
 he will of necessity have to work with a very 
 sharp cutting tool. If one spoke of the knife, 
 with which we skinned our birds, by that 
 monosyllabic name we were virtuously indig- 
 nant ; it was a scalpel. Then, if a boy escaped 
 the risk of lockjaw, or other serious results 
 of a cut from a knife when it was clean, by 
 how many times was his danger from incisions 
 multiplied when that knife had become encrusted 
 with the blood of a succession of victims, cleaned 
 from it according to a boy's idea of cleansing? 
 And if the operator were miraculously preserved, 
 and survived this danger from the microbes of 
 decomposition, there remained yet more positive 
 peril incurred in the handling of the poisons 
 which, must necessarily be used in curing the 
 skins. At the first, it is true, we had to do 
 all our curing with pepper and camphor ; 
 poisons were strictly prohibited. Once in 
 a pepper famine we tried salt as an alterna- 
 tive. It was to a starling's skin we applied 
 it ; that starling's skin kept ;moist, as the day 
 it was stripped, all through the summer and 
 to the following winter, when we threw it 
 away ; if any fragment of it be yet in existence 
 we are morally certain that it is moist still.
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 45 
 
 Salt is useless. Pepper, on the other hand, 
 if it be well rubbed in, is good for a long 
 while ; but in the end its effect wears off 
 and the moth will corrupt the skin notwith- 
 standing. After a month or two of the practice 
 of taxidermy with the assistance of pepper, the 
 vigilance of the authorities began to tire, and we 
 began with poisons in the shape of corrosive 
 sublimate. We do not recommend it ; it is so 
 liquid that its use is attended with inconvenience. 
 Arsenical soap is far better for a boy; it does 
 not spill, and if a thing can be spilled, a boy will 
 spill it. 
 
 As good luck would have it, our house was 
 far larger than our needs ; so when once we had 
 settled on a scantily furnished room down a little- 
 used passage, and had made it our own by 
 garnishing it with the skins of the birds and 
 the peculiar flavour of taxidermy and pre- 
 servatives, no one cared to dispute such an 
 excellent title. It was left in our undisturbed 
 possession, scarcely troubled even by a house- 
 maid. Indeed we had so far won over the 
 housemaid whose duty it was to keep this room 
 in the order which is duty's ideal, that far from 
 combating our messes she even aided and abetted 
 them by bringing us raw meat from the kitchen 
 for the young birds, or hard-boiled eggs to chop 
 up for those who needed more delicate diet.
 
 46 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 This room was a perpetual joy, for here we 
 could keep all the live creatures and dead 
 trophies banished by Authority from our bed- 
 room, such as the skins of the bigger birds, 
 which boyish fingers had not scraped with 
 sufficient care in the nooks and crannies rather 
 gruesome objects, in the eye of any but a boy, 
 but which according to his verdict "will be all 
 right in a day or two, when they have dried." 
 These, tyrannical Authority, acting on a specious 
 plea of regard for health, forbade from remaining 
 in a bed-chamber. The same power, on a similar 
 plea, fixed a limit to the number of live birds 
 which were permitted to share the bed-chamber 
 of boyhood. It was necessary that sundry 
 of them should be consigned at nightfall, in 
 company with the uncertain skins, to the less 
 honourable room on the ground floor. Here, 
 too, lived a family of white mice, in constant 
 apprehensions at the spasmodic movements of 
 a young thrush who, piping juvenilely and fed 
 from time to time on oatmeal, inhabited a 
 wicker cage at their side. From a packing-case, 
 on the floor, fronted with lathes nailed so as to 
 leave inch-wide interstices, two young jackdaws 
 said "Jack ! " all day long and most of the night ; 
 an exclamation only to be appeased by oatmeal 
 thrust so far down the gaping throat that there 
 seemed a danger of the finger being lost irrecover-
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 47 
 
 ably. Unvaried oatmeal was the food of the 
 nursling jackdaw, which perhaps accounts for the 
 monotony of its note ; whereas the thrush's food 
 might from time to time, on Joe's permission (Joe 
 was the coachman's boy), be relieved by small 
 junks of raw meat. There is a comfort, however, 
 about the solid merit of a jackdaw which contrasts 
 favourably with the more pretentious manners 
 of the young thrush. The jackdaw sits and says 
 "Jack," and does not pretend to say anything 
 else, consumes its simple food with gratitude, 
 and is contented with one perch through a whole 
 summer's day. We used to put them out in a 
 great elm tree by the gate of the stable-yard, and 
 there they would sit all through the afternoon 
 in perfect happiness. The young thrushes were 
 always restless, dissatisfied, their tails draggly, 
 jumping about as if they had hysterics, pining, 
 getting caught by cats, a perpetual thorn in 
 a boy's flesh. There is nothing so analogous 
 to the care of them, in the experience of later 
 life, as colouring a meerschaum pipe. Moreover, 
 the rearing of a songster is a constant tax on 
 the boy's faith. Its infantile notes give little 
 promise, and he has to believe that this creature 
 which constantly declines its food, which has to 
 be tempted and cherished like a malade imagin- 
 aire, will reward all these cares by glorious song 
 in the ensuing spring. But the jackdaw makes
 
 48 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 him no promises, raises no false hopes, begins on 
 the note which will last him all his life through 
 for expressing his gladness in living and the joy 
 of oatmeal. 
 
 It was neither in the garden nor in the wood 
 that we found our jackdaws. When one has left 
 the low-lying marshy home of the moor-hen, 
 and the lane with its crumbly wall beloved of the 
 blue-tits, one may proceed to climb up through 
 the alternate shades and sunshines of the wood 
 which was our great bird-nesting preserve. The 
 wood-argus will flit before us across the sunlit 
 spaces, the fritillary glance over the flashing 
 bracken, and finally we may arrive panting and 
 perspiring at the head of the hill-side. Here is 
 a bank, with a wonderful tangle of bramble and 
 honeysuckle over which the bees are humming, 
 and the little blue butterflies coming and going, 
 like gems, from the field of lucerne beyond it. 
 But when one climbs up the gap in the bank one 
 looks forth over a scene which at once takes the 
 eye from all the nearer objects. At two miles' 
 distance twinkle the waves of the Bristol Channel, 
 and the bay over which Mrs. Leigh looked so long 
 for the coming of the good ship Rose. The cliffs 
 on which the waves of that sea thundered were 
 the jackdaws' home ; they were two miles from 
 our home, and every bush and every turn of the 
 road in that two mile ramble was full of its own
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 49 
 
 associations. At the angle of the lane which led 
 from our house to the high road a little stream 
 creeps out on to the great thoroughfare, moist 
 even in the driest weather. Once, in a dry 
 spring, peeping cautiously round the corner, we 
 had seen a little covey of house-martins settled 
 in the oozy mud which that tiny rivulet afforded, 
 an oasis in the midst of surrounding dryness. 
 They were busy collecting mud for the nests 
 which they built beneath the eaves. We stole 
 back, for a stone; the martins saw the quick 
 movement of the arm, and rose as the stone 
 came to them, but it glanced from the ground at 
 an angle beyond the calculation of any house- 
 martin, and, on its ricochet, caught one of the 
 birds from beneath. It fell dead, and we rushed 
 out in triumph to secure it, with a joy which no 
 rocketing pheasant, cleanly killed, can bring to a 
 grown sportsman's heart. It was so beautiful 
 with its dark steel-blue back and snowy patch 
 over the tail and white under parts ! 
 
 Then the way led on past the home of a great 
 friend of ours who owned a single-barrelled gun, 
 and under the shade of great elm trees, where 
 once, for a whole summer, we had been in the habit 
 of seeing a chaffinch with three or four white 
 feathers in his tail, but had never been able to 
 secure him. Thereafter the road led off to the 
 left, and we were soon on high ground, whence 
 
 E
 
 50 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 we could see the sea sparkling on our right, and 
 where we scarcely ever failed to put up a yellow- 
 hammer whose habit was to go on along the 
 hedge before us in a succession of short flights, 
 perching continually on the top of some low 
 bush, and sending to us his plaintive song on 
 two notes. We could rely on him to furnish us 
 sport in this fashion for a quarter of a mile of 
 our road ; then he would tire of our persecutions 
 and turn back, low-flying, towards the place from 
 which we had started him. Thence the way 
 began to bend downwards. We had left all 
 houses behind us, and went between steep 
 gorse-clad banks with little in them that made 
 sport for us. Occasionally we would see a wren 
 creeping so close in the thick golden-blossomed 
 bushes as to be almost invisible; or a yellow- 
 hammer would perch on their tops, utter his 
 notes once, and then away whither we did not 
 care to follow him through the prickly thicket ; 
 or a thrush would rise from grubbing at the foot 
 of a bush and elude us in like manner. Presently 
 we reached the lower ground, where, from a little 
 grove of small roadside elms, a red-backed shrike 
 would fly out and go before us, much as the 
 yellow-hammer had done, but with longer flights 
 and greater shyness, now and again rattling out 
 his anger at our intrusion. The hedges here 
 were a very high and thick tangle of brambles
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 51 
 
 and wild-growing things. Somewhere among 
 them was the shrike's nest, doubtless, but it 
 never happened to us to find it, though we 
 searched often and long. After this all road and 
 hedges ceased, and we seemed to be coming to 
 the world's end, for there were no houses nor 
 any sign of cultivation only, on our left, a high 
 rising hill-side of gorse and, on the right, the 
 sea whose cliffs rose ever more steeply as we 
 went on. At two fields' distance or so we would 
 see rabbits sitting out on the short-nibbled grass 
 which grew on the narrowing level stretch be- 
 tween the furzy hillside and the cliffs ; but before 
 we came within measurable distance of them 
 they were gone, into the gorse or to their holes 
 in the cliff-side. But by this time we would 
 have seen many jackdaws passing us overhead, 
 going to or from their nests in the cliffs; the 
 clamour of many voices, joining in the simple 
 chorus of "Jack!" would be reaching us, and 
 soon, peering over the edge of the cliff, we 
 would see them coming and going like bees 
 round a hive. 
 
 By this time, too, they would be growing 
 aware of our approach, and the clamour would 
 increase by way of protest, a protest which 
 broke forth ten times more clamorous when we 
 rolled a stone down rattling among their homes ; 
 then their cries would grow deafening. From
 
 52 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 among them a dark thing would sometimes 
 sweep out like an arrow over the sea, as our 
 stone went down the cliff; and at the same 
 moment a shrill piercing cry would come from 
 high above our heads. The dark arrow would 
 slant upwards towards the cry, and as the light 
 of the sun caught it we would see it to be a hen 
 kestrel who had darted out from her cliff-home, 
 and gone aloft to remonstrate, together with 
 her spouse, on this invasion of their domesticity. 
 The kestrel's nest was rather beyond our 
 hopes. We could see it, a bigger heap of sticks 
 than any that the jackdaws had gathered, perched 
 on a pinnacle of cliff inaccessible equally from 
 above or from below. The sole means of getting 
 to it appeared to be by a rope from the top ; but 
 though we often discussed the project of lower- 
 ing each other over, we never put it into effect 
 by reason of the providential absence of a suit- 
 able rope. So at the kestrels we could only look 
 and wonder as at something beyond our best 
 ambitions. In the meantime we found sufficient 
 danger and delight in scrambling about the shaly 
 cliff in search of the more accessible jackdaws' 
 nests. One would be on a niche or platform of 
 the cliffs face, another in the mouth of a hole 
 which a rabbit had deserted for a more con- 
 venient dwelling. We found them in all ages 
 and stages ; youngsters almost able to fly, newly-
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 53 
 
 hatched nakednesses with hardly the rudiments 
 of tails, eggs hard set, and eggs newly laid. And 
 all the while that we were taking this census of 
 the younger population, the old ones would be 
 sweeping around us, almost brushing us with 
 their wings and threatening, with exclamations 
 of "Jack ! " in the most menacing key, to send us 
 hurtling down into the waters beneath. Indeed 
 it would have taken but a little impetus to do 
 this, for the cliff was of slaty shillet, bound here 
 and there by tussocks and platforms of grass, or 
 by tufts of the sea-pink. The shillet slipped 
 from beneath our feet and gave a very insecure 
 hold, but our nerve was perfect, and the school- 
 boy's special providence protected us, in which 
 saying likely enough there is some tautology. 
 Above, the shillet still cropped up from the 
 yellow grass, and was the well-beloved basking 
 place of grayling butterflies, who would rest 
 invisible on the grey lichen-grown boulders. 
 But we recked little of them when our hands, 
 our pockets, our caps were full of young jack- 
 daws crying piteously "Jack!" to which cries 
 the parents responded with deeper notes in the 
 same sense, pursuing us and beating around our 
 heads as the furies pursued and hunted Orestes. 
 But our hard little hearts were deaf to the pathos 
 of the mutual cries, and delightedly we bore off 
 the youngsters, who, sooth to say, soon accepted
 
 54 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 their orphanhood and their foster parents with 
 something like Oriental philosophy. They 
 would sit all day on the bough of the great elm 
 tree on which we had put them, outside the 
 doors of the stable yard, contented so long as 
 they might intermittently say "Jack!" and have 
 frequent globules of pasty oatmeal thrust down 
 their gullets. 
 
 We have said that we never succeeded in 
 taking the kestrels from these cliffs; but for all 
 that, we had more than one young kestrel as a 
 pet, the gift of a connection by marriage of Joe's 
 brother, who was " summat in the gaming way," 
 a phrase which might mean a gambler or a 
 gamekeeper, but, in its real sense, as we have 
 reason to believe, signified a poacher. They 
 were wild-eyed captives, these beautiful creatures, 
 with the richest chestnut plumage melting into 
 the most delicate pearl-ash grey. They were 
 not always thus. When they came to us they 
 were little balls of grey fluff, but even then 
 with an eye that was a thing to wonder at and a 
 beak which cleft chasms out of our small fingers. 
 Their demeanour alternated between passionate 
 struggles for freedom and an air of sullen 
 indifference, but they always in either mood 
 showed a healthy appetite for their raw meat. 
 We have heard that the experience of others 
 has been more fortunate; but, so far as our
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 55 
 
 knowledge of them went, we had no joy of 
 kestrels in captivity. 
 
 Of all birds which we tried in captivity (" as 
 pets," we used to call it for euphony,) none were 
 so successful as members of the corvine family, 
 jackdaws, magpies, and that small relation of the 
 crows, the starling. None of them ever talked, 
 though their education was the passion of our 
 young lives. We had been told that starlings 
 would talk only when their tongues had been 
 cleft by a sharp sixpence; but we could never 
 bring ourselves to the point of performing the 
 operation and moreover sixpences were rare. 
 But the starling, though he did not talk with 
 the tongues of men, was for ever chattering, 
 invincibly cheerful though he lived in a cage. 
 The jackdaws did not live in a cage, yet their 
 cheerfulness was not in proportion to their 
 wider liberty of the clipped wing. They, how- 
 ever, we were pleased to think, did talk. True 
 they said but the one word "Jack!" but they 
 said it very often ; there could be no mistake 
 about their mastery of it, and we longed for the 
 time when the years, bringing the philosophic 
 mind, should add wisdom and variety to their 
 tones. In youth they were as monotonous as 
 their language and as their manners, for after all 
 the jackdaw is deficient in social talent; his virtues 
 are sterling and respectable, but he does not charm.
 
 56 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Of all pets that were ever kept, the most 
 charming, certainly, was the magpie. It was 
 full of varying moods and humours, truly ; but 
 none of them in the least akin to melancholy, 
 whereas the normal disposition of the jackdaws 
 was undoubtedly sombre. At times the magpie 
 was as gay as the starling himself; but he did 
 not exhibit the same unreasonable and wearisome 
 cheerfulness. If he had been shut up in a cage 
 which wore out his tail feathers, he would have 
 bitten the wicker bars to splinters. He was 
 capable of very genuine anger, and inexhaustible 
 in his ingenuity for mischief. His shape and 
 movements, and the bright motley of his 
 plumage, were a joy to the eye; he was a 
 Cavalier to the jackdaw's Puritan. The starling 
 was handsome enough, with the sheen of his green 
 and purple-mottled back, but you had to come 
 close to his cage to appreciate him. The magpie 
 attracted you from afar, only gaining added 
 grace on a closer view which revealed a gloss 
 of gayer colours on what afar off had looked 
 like black; a near view was required, too, to 
 recognise the unspeakable spirit of mischief 
 which abode in his wicked grey eye. For months 
 he was to us a pure joy, to the gardeners 
 a joy not altogether unmixed, for he was for 
 ever playing harlequin to their pantaloon. Like 
 most practical jokers, he erred in going too far.
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 57 
 
 One day he amused himself most excellently in 
 uprooting a clump of geraniums just bedded 
 out. He was quite fearless, and it did not occur 
 to his free spirit to obliterate his three-pronged 
 footmarks on the newly-turned earth. Clipped 
 in the wing as he was, he was always a little too 
 fleet for the best of human pursuers. It was a 
 strange shambling, side-long progress, aided by 
 short flights of a few yards at a time, when his 
 wing had not been lately pruned; but it 
 generally served him well enough to take him 
 to some low-branched tree, and once there no 
 man had a chance of catching him. It needed 
 extraordinary ingenuity to capture him for his 
 periodical clipping, for his cunning was greater 
 even than his agility. Altogether he had fared 
 far better than most of our pets, and we looked 
 on him quite as a permanent fixture and a 
 perpetual joy, but two days after his little joke 
 with the geraniums he was missing. We called 
 for him and sought him high and low, in all his 
 favourite haunts, but we never heard again the 
 chuckling response with which he was wont to 
 greet us. To this day his fate remains veiled in 
 the deepest mystery, only we make no specific 
 charge against any one but it is significant that 
 his disappearance should have followed so closely 
 on his exploit with the geraniums. After all it 
 was but a little matter. What would they have
 
 58 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 said if we had had for a pet Charles Dickens's 
 raven which ate up a grand piano and the greater 
 part of the front staircase ? 
 
 We never had a raven. We used to see 
 ravens sometimes flying high above those cliffs 
 in which we found the jackdaws' nests. We 
 knew, as boys do know things, of their, inner 
 consciousness or some other unimpeachable testi- 
 mony (as a matter of fact we think Joe had said so) 
 that ravens actually did nest further along in 
 those cliffs, where they rose higher and more 
 sheer from the sea. But we never went so far 
 afield as those great precipices, and even if we 
 had reached their feet or summits we could no 
 more have arrived at the ravens' nests than if 
 they had been in another planet. The few 
 ravens we have seen in captivity behaved them- 
 selves rather after the staid manner of the jack- 
 daws ; they had none of the engaging social 
 qualities of the magpie. 
 
 Years afterwards Bob Burscough, my boy- 
 hood's best friend, acquired an exotic, which 
 was much the most amusing pet of our ac- 
 quaintance. He too was of the corvine tribe, 
 but, he came from Australia, was called, in fact, 
 an Australian magpie, though he looked more 
 like a saddle-backed crow. We were staying 
 in the house of his owner when he arrived. 
 A large plate of meat was set for him on the
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 59 
 
 terrace in front of the house; but he paid a 
 dilettante attention to the victuals, occupying 
 himself chiefly with a scrutiny of the house and 
 his new surroundings, while on his side he was 
 the cynosure of the eyes of all the family gazing 
 at the new pet from the drawing-room windows. 
 Other pets of the house were three very large 
 black cats, great favourites, immensely spoiled, 
 and very dignified and lazy. As we regarded 
 the antipodean somewhat scornfully dallying 
 with his dinner, we saw one of these solemn 
 black monsters advancing at its usual dignified 
 pace towards him. A cry arose from the 
 assembled family, "Oh, Tigris will kill the 
 magpie ! " The head of the family desired to 
 await developments. There was a painful sus- 
 pense of breath, as we watched the shaggy 
 black Persian advancing on the plate and the 
 magpie with a steady, unhurried step. The 
 magpie stood aside from the plate, and, with 
 head well on one side, watched the on-coming 
 robber. There was a world of meaning in the 
 glance of that wicked grey eye, but it was all 
 lost on the dignified composure of the Persian 
 who, without deigning to look at the magpie, 
 proceeded to sniff at the contents of the plate. 
 The bird, motionless as a statue, waited till the 
 black whiskers came inquiringly over the edge 
 of the plate; then he made one sudden hop,
 
 60 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 lunged once, with a lightning stroke of his beak, 
 at the beautiful glossy black muzzle, and was 
 back again in his watchful attitude so quickly 
 that one almost felt disposed to doubt if he had 
 ever left it. There was no doubt in the mind 
 of the cat. That lightning stroke of the beak 
 had much the same effect on the Persian as if a 
 bomb had burst somewhere in its middle. It 
 leaped with a yell five paces backward, its legs 
 extended, every separate hair of its long fur 
 standing off it at full length. When it reached 
 the ground it hesitated not for one moment ; no 
 fleeting notion of vengeance crossed its mind ; 
 with head and tail depressed, in manner as un- 
 like as possible to its dignified approach, it 
 retreated at a good round trot to the shrubbery 
 whence it had come. The magpie slowly relaxed 
 its attentive aspect, and as it addressed itself once 
 more to the plate of viands there were those 
 among the spectators at the window who were 
 ready to aver most solemnly that they saw it wink. 
 The comedy was not yet finished. Before our 
 laughter at the discomfiture of Tigris had died 
 away, a second Persian, Darius, emerged from 
 the shrubbery in the same stately fashion. The 
 bird at once resumed the statuesque pose. In 
 the same manner as before, the cat advanced; 
 the bird repeated its tactics with the same 
 triumphant results ; and within two minutes
 
 BIRD-STUFFING AND OTHER WORK 61 
 
 of its first advance the cat was retreating with 
 undignified haste to recover its composure in 
 the haven of the shrubbery. There was yet 
 another act. The third cat came on the scene, 
 approached the plate, met with a like reception ; 
 and he too rejoined his stricken companions in 
 the laurels. It was evident that the cats had 
 played the game in the spirit of those who go 
 into a " Hoax Exhibition " at a charitable bazaar, 
 the first comers revealing nothing to those who 
 follow them of the nature of the entertainment 
 which they will find within. 
 
 From this day forth, however, the Australian 
 magpie was headman of all the pets on the 
 premises, and none dared interfere with him 
 any more. His first success encouraged him 
 to further triumphs. He used to lie in wait, 
 screwed up in a corner, on the stone steps by 
 which the nursemaids, with the children, de- 
 scended the terrace. As they stepped past him 
 he would dash out, with a bark like a dog (though 
 we believe the native Australian dingo is voice- 
 less), and, with a dab of his vicious beak on the 
 unprotected ankles of the maids, so frighten 
 them that they almost dropped the babies. This 
 was his favourite pastime, until he had estab- 
 lished so complete a reign of terror that this 
 part at least of his occupation was gone. His 
 crowning impudence, however, was exhibited
 
 62 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 when the regimental band of the neighbouring 
 garrison came over to play at a garden-party. 
 The soldiers, arranged in the usual circle, were 
 discoursing popular airs under the conduct of a 
 glorious individual who beat time very impres- 
 sively in the centre. The display of martial 
 bravery should have been sufficient to inspire 
 reverence in any one, most of all, as might have 
 been thought, in a colonist. The magpie, how- 
 ever, utterly unimpressed, crept between the 
 legs of the cornet-a-piston, and, taking a position 
 within the circle opposite to the bandmaster, 
 began mimicking his rather pompous gestures 
 with so ludicrously successful a caricature that 
 the gallant tune came to an untimely end in the 
 uncontrollable laughter of the performers. This 
 was his last great effort. His talent for practical 
 joking brought him into so much disfavour that, 
 chiefly through the petticoated influence of the 
 nursery, he was expelled as remorselessly as 
 any other anarchist; and his genius now finds 
 fewer opportunities in the less congenial atmo- 
 sphere of the Zoological Gardens.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 
 
 TOM CAUSEY, a spaniel, two terriers of uncertain 
 breed, and the writer of the present narrative, 
 were watching Joe Gamerton, the cobbler of 
 Bidecombe, in Devon, as he hammered the iron 
 " clou " on the heel of a boot in a little shop of 
 Cold Harbour Lane, which leads down to the 
 quay. They watched, not because they had any 
 boots which wanted mending, nor any business 
 at all to occupy them in the shop, but out of 
 sheer idleness and the need of society. Tom 
 Causey was by nature a social man, and of the 
 number of those whose society is always enter- 
 taining. By profession, as already noticed, he 
 was rat and rabbit-catcher to all and sundry who 
 required such services, or assistance in them, on 
 their farms a fact which sufficiently explains 
 the spaniel and two terriers. In person he was 
 broad and burly, with a wide red face, and 
 narrow eyes sunken in his head between rolls of 
 fat flesh. Fringes of grizzling hair made a frame
 
 64 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 for this round red face. His nose, like the face, 
 was round and red, as of a man who was 
 generous in quenching a frequent thirst. His 
 coat was of velveteen, stained by much contact 
 with Mother Earth as he worked his ferrets, by 
 much of the honourable blood of the slain, and 
 by exposure to all sorts of weather. It had 
 voluminous flaps, with pockets constructed of a 
 liberal width and depth, so that no matter how 
 many rabbits he had stowed away in them there 
 was always room for just one more. His 
 breeches stuff was a corduroy, of as many 
 various shades as his coat itself, a pair of 
 weather-beaten leathern leggings meeting it. 
 His hat, somewhat green and greasy, was a 
 wideawake which had once been black, and in 
 its prime might have been worn with decorum 
 by a parson. Beneath it his dark, grizzled locks 
 crept out in little ringlets. There were ringlets, 
 also, of some base yellow metal in his ears, 
 bored at a time when he fancied that such 
 adornment would add to his attractions, which 
 might conceivably have been considerable, for 
 the ladies. His waistcoat buttons were of bright 
 brass, and a watch-chain of the same gay metal 
 lay across it. A horn dog-whistle hung by a 
 piece of stout cord from the buttonhole of the 
 velveteen coat. Across his shoulders was slung 
 a bag containing ferrets, among others that most
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 65 
 
 notorious and very large " string ferret," Belzy, 
 well known to fame in all the countryside ; and 
 in his hand he carried a strong ashen staff 
 terminated at the foot by an iron spud. It was 
 designed for the homely use of digging out 
 ferrets which had "laid up" with a nest of 
 young rats or rabbits, or with an adult rabbit 
 which had the queer taste to prefer being eaten 
 alive to bolting. It had once been lost and 
 recovered, in dramatic circumstances already 
 mentioned, in Squire Hyde's pheasant coverts. 
 Thus armed and equipped, the rabbit-catcher 
 made a formidable and something of a Falstaffian 
 figure as he stood blocking the evening sunlight 
 from the door of the cobbler's shop. 
 
 As for the cobbler, it would be a superfluous 
 compliment to describe him in any such detail 
 a little spare man, inconspicuously garbed, with 
 the complexion of one who works in a close 
 atmosphere, and whose chief beverage is from 
 the bowl which does not inebriate, and only 
 cheers to\ a moderate degree. He was as 
 marked a contrast with the other as you could 
 expect to find. 
 
 "And who be they vor?" asked Causey, 
 referring to the boots, after the merits, in their 
 various kind, of the dogs had been spoken of 
 enough. 
 
 "They'm Gearge Rimehouse's. It be 
 
 F
 
 66 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 scan'alous, sure enough, 'ow 'ee do wear the 
 zoles off mun, trap'sin' along th' old river bank." 
 
 Causey had been lounging in the doorway 
 with the slackened muscles and pose of a man 
 who has nothing to do but let the hours flow by 
 him as they will. Even his great burly frame 
 was tired by a long day after the rabbits, and he 
 had still a tramp of a mile and a half before he 
 would reach his ramshackle old cottage standing 
 above the river in the few fields of which he 
 managed to retain the tenancy in spite of a 
 chronic backwardness with the rent. Never- 
 theless, as he heard the name of Rimehouse 
 there came over his whole figure a certain 
 change of attitude, which Gamerton, the cobbler, 
 must have noticed if he had lifted his eyes from 
 the boot soles. It was the change from the loose 
 listlessness of indifference to the keen tautness 
 of aroused attention. His slack jowl and lips 
 tightened up, and the little eyes twinkled in their 
 slits between the rolls of flesh. For all that, 
 there was in his tone a studied indifference as 
 he answered, after a moment's pause : 
 
 "Gearge Rimehouse's ! Be they, zure 
 enough ? " 
 
 George Rimehouse, the river-watcher, had 
 the office of patrolling, in the joint interests and 
 at the joint expense of several different riparian 
 owners, some five or six miles of the river above
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 67 
 
 Bidecombe town, in order to see that no nefarious 
 deeds were done in the way of poaching the 
 salmon, to attend to the fences, stiles, bridges, 
 and footpaths, and generally to take cognisance 
 of anything that went at all amiss, whether due 
 to the hand of man or nature, along the river 
 bank. He was a conscientious man, from South 
 Devon. They said in the north that he did not 
 understand their ways, which were, no doubt, 
 difficult of comprehension for one not to the 
 manner born. But it is possible that those 
 riparian owners showed wisdom in their 
 generation when they imported from another 
 district this guardian of their fishy property. 
 
 Following Tom Causey's comment on the 
 boots being for Rimehouse, and the slight 
 stiffening to attention with which he received 
 the name, there came a pause for a moment in 
 the conversation, which was broken only by 
 the cobbler's hammering on the iron "clou." 
 Then the rabbit-catcher said, with no seeming 
 relevancy : 
 
 " It be easy work, zure enough, 'ammerin' in 
 them nails, same as you'm doin' now." 
 
 " It bain't main difficult for them as be used 
 to it," the cobbler assented, rather grudgingly, 
 as if jealous for the art of his trade. 
 
 " 'Tis work as I deu for myself most times," 
 Causey declared, "'ammerin' in them nails."
 
 68 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 " Like enough," was the cobbler's dry reply. 
 There was another trifling pause, and then 
 Causey said : 
 
 " Deu 'ee ever 'ave a mind, Joe, vor draw your 
 teeth into a rabburt?" At the mention of the 
 word the three dogs evinced a stiffening of 
 attention rather similar to that of their master 
 at the name of Rimehouse. 
 
 The suggestion had an attraction for the 
 cobbler also. He paused in his work to give 
 an expectant glance at his visitor. "I be main 
 fond of a rabburt. 'Ees fai', I be," he an- 
 swered. 
 
 "Well, then," said Causey, probing one hand 
 into the profundities of one of his coat pockets, 
 " 'tis a rabburt as I've a mind vor give 'ee, Joe. 
 See, there's a beauty, 'ee be," dragging one forth 
 as he spoke, and stroking the ruffled fur of the 
 dead creature into a semblance of sleekness; "a 
 vine rabburt vor dinner, zure enough. But 'tis 
 on'y supposin' as you'm minded vor deu me a 
 sarvice, Joe," he continued significantly. 
 
 " I be main obliged to 'ee, Tom, and zo I be," 
 said the cobbler gratefully. "An' what be the 
 sarvice as I can deu vor 'ee ? " 
 
 "'Tis no more'n jist rin up to the 'Ring o' 
 Bells' and vetch down a little dogue as I've 
 aleft there, 'case the tax-collector come roun' to 
 my 'ouse vor ask the licence vor un. 'Ee'th
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 69 
 
 made 'ees call on'y yesterday, zo I can 'ave un 
 'ome agin." 
 
 " An' zo I will, an' welcome," the cobbler said 
 heartily, leaving his work at the word, and pro- 
 ceeding to put on his coat to go on the errand. 
 
 " An', time you'm gone, I may all zo well be 
 fixin' in the nails to them there boots vor 'ee, zo 
 as you'll vind mun done, time you come back." 
 
 "Thank 'ee kindly, Tom. You may all zo 
 well deu that as sit still and deu nothin'." 
 
 No sooner had the cobbler gone than Tom 
 Causey set himself to work with a surprising 
 industry on the task he had undertaken. Laying 
 the bag of ferrets beside him on the floor, he 
 hammered the nails in diligently, taking a special 
 pride, as it appeared, in arranging them in a 
 peculiar fashion, of his own devising, about the 
 toe. When he had finished his task on the one 
 boot he applied himself with similar diligence to 
 the other. He worked with a feverish energy, 
 as though he deemed it a point of honour to have 
 the nailing of the boots completed before his 
 emissary could have gone to the " Ring of Bells,' 
 the public at the head of the town, and be back 
 with the unlicensed dog. When all the nails 
 were driven home he had not yet finished all he 
 had to do ; for, still with the same singular haste, 
 he tore two large pieces from a sheet of the 
 Bidecombe Weekly News, which he had chanced
 
 70 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 to find in the shop, and pressed one piece care- 
 fully over the sole of the left foot and the other 
 as carefully over the right in such a way that the 
 imprint of the nails was recorded accurately on 
 each. When he had done that he heaved a heavy 
 sigh, as of a man whose task is fairly accom- 
 plished, folded the pieces of paper neatly, and 
 bestowed them in another of the many pockets 
 of his coat from that which was the common 
 receptacle of the rabbits. Then he went to the 
 doorway and resumed his former air of otium 
 cum dignitate, awaiting the return of the master 
 of the shop. 
 
 "What are you doing all that for?" I asked, 
 when he was again at leisure. 
 
 " Oh you'm there, be 'ee ? " he said, as if he 
 had forgotten all about me. " Do 'ee know as I 
 once 'eerd tell of a man as made a great fortune ? " 
 
 " How was that ? " I asked. 
 
 " Why, 'twas by mindin'of 'ees own business. 
 There do 'ee see ? " 
 
 I saw sufficiently to know that I was rebuked, 
 and sat silent, caressing the least hostile of the 
 dogs, to await the next happening of interest. 
 
 Within a very few minutes the cobbler 
 reappeared, bearing in his arms a singularly 
 ill-favoured specimen of a broken-haired fox- 
 terrier, which the other dogs received with much 
 blandishment as a long-lost brother.
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 71 
 
 "A be'uty, bain't 'ee, zure enough?" said 
 Tom Causey, regarding him with pride. "An' 
 as for them there boots, I've a-fitted mun up 
 with the nails proper, an' zo I 'ave." 
 
 " An' zo you 'ave, zure enough," the cobbler 
 assented. " 'Tis a vunny little pattern as you've 
 a-made of mun about the toe, bain't it?" he 
 added a little doubtfully. 
 
 " There be wan thing," said Causey impres- 
 sively, taking no notice of this criticism. " You 
 bain't on no account vor tell Gearge Rimehouse 
 as 'twas me as 'ad the nailin' of mun. 'Twouldn't 
 be proper like, seein' as they was left vor you." 
 
 "You'm right, Tom," Gamerton averred, 
 recognizing the scrupulous delicacy of feeling 
 which prompted the caution. " You may go bail 
 as I'll never tell 'un. Well, good-night to 'ee, 
 Tom," as Causey made a move to be going. 
 " Good-night to 'ee, and thank 'ee kindly for the 
 rabburt." 
 
 "And mind as you don't say nothin' to un 
 neither, if so be as yeu should 'appen vor zee 
 un," said Causey to me, as we took our leave 
 together. 
 
 I gave him my word to be silent as the grave, 
 and I kept it, although for the ensuing part of 
 the story I was mainly indebted to the illuminat- 
 ing conversation of Rimehouse himself. 
 
 A few weeks later, that foreigner, as we
 
 72 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 deemed him, from the South, might have been 
 seen sitting by the river bank, the worst puzzled 
 man in North Devon. The place where he sat 
 was a very beautiful one, specially designed, as 
 one might fancy, to be the scene of a poet's 
 reveries, with the well-wooded cliff coming 
 almost sheer down behind to meet the white 
 sand washed up by the water into a little semi- 
 circular bay, and the river itself purling away in 
 front with sparkling flashes of foam as it leapt 
 over the rocks and deep amber translucencies 
 where it flowed unbroken. The reverie, how- 
 ever, which absorbed the river-watcher was not 
 at all a poetical one ; its subject was of the first 
 practical importance. He was, in fact, in the 
 engrossed study of a footprint, which engaged 
 all his attention. It is a picture which may 
 recall an historical scene in a story still more 
 widely known to fame than this, although the 
 present is sufficiently familiar in North Devon. 
 Robinson Crusoe regarding the naked footprint 
 on the sand of what he had hitherto believed to 
 be his solitary island could not have been more 
 strikingly arrested by its appearance than was 
 Rimehouse by the print of which he was now 
 endeavouring to decipher the significance. Un- 
 like the impression which had so thrilling an 
 effect on Defoe's illustrious derelict, this was the 
 impression of a booted, not of a naked foot. More
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 73 
 
 than that, it was the impression of a heavily- 
 nailed and iron-shod boot, such a boot as any 
 rustic of the countryside might be expected to 
 wear. But what gave it its arresting significance 
 in the eyes of Rimehouse was that its nails were 
 distributed exactly in the peculiar arrangement 
 of the nails in the pair of boots which he had 
 recently had repaired by Joe Gamerton the 
 cobbler in -the town of Bidecombe the very 
 pair, as it so happened, which he was wearing 
 at the moment when the startling impression 
 first presented itself to him. 
 
 At first sight it might not seem obvious why 
 Rimehouse should be so badly perturbed by 
 the appearance of one of his own footprints, for 
 it was his daily habit and business to peram- 
 bulate the banks of the river from one end to 
 the other of the beat over which his watching 
 extended, so that the print of his footsteps 
 imbedded on any part of it which was impres- 
 sionable had in general no reason to cause him 
 any surprise. But the fact which gave to this 
 particular impression its strange and inexplicable 
 interest was that he felt morally certain that he 
 had not set foot on this particular white-sanded 
 bay on the day before, and that two nights pre- 
 viously a lashing rain had fallen which would 
 certainly, unless all his former experience misled 
 him, have washed out from the soft sand the
 
 74 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 impression of even so large a foot as his. The 
 day before he had contented himself with walking 
 along the upper path, above the wooded cliff 
 which formed the real bank of the river at this 
 point, and had never come down to the actual 
 level of the shore. Yet here, before his eyes, 
 was proof which seemed positive that he must, 
 waking or sleeping, have descended to the very 
 edge of the water; and since he had no memory 
 of doing so in his waking state he began to 
 discuss in his mind the possibility that he had 
 come thither in his sleep. He had heard stories 
 of somnambulistic performances of the kind, of 
 which the sleeper was quite unconscious when 
 he awoke. On the whole, however, he was 
 inclined to reject this ingenious hypothesis, for 
 the sound reason that he had never hitherto 
 convicted himself of any such unnatural pro- 
 ceeding, and after musing for the best part of 
 half an hour over the puzzle presented to him 
 by the footprint, continued on his way down the 
 river, leaving the mystery still unsolved and 
 constantly recurring to his mind. 
 
 He had further troubles to annoy him. Until 
 the heavy rain of the night before last there had 
 been a drought quite unusual in that humid 
 climate for some weeks past and the river had 
 fallen abnormally low. It was a time when 
 every fish in every pool could be seen quite
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 75 
 
 clearly, so that the watcher knew exactly how 
 many there should be in each, for salmon do 
 not change their quarters when the water is in 
 this low state. Yet constantly, as he came to 
 examine the pools, he would find a fish or two 
 missing. None of the pools was ever recruited 
 by a new inmate, so he could be pretty confident 
 that the fish had not departed from their usual 
 habits and run into a higher pool from a lower 
 or drifted down; indeed the lowness of the 
 water made it hardly possible for them to do 
 so. There was no doubt that some one or some- 
 thing was taking out the fish. He suspected 
 otters, but could find no signs of them either in 
 the form of tracks or of any half-eaten remains 
 of fish. He had looked with care for the traces 
 of any fresh human footprints on any of the soft 
 places on the margins of the pools, but never 
 was able to find any but his own, which were 
 the more unmistakable on account of the singular 
 manner in which the nails had been set in his 
 boots by the cobbler of Bidecombe. The river- 
 watcher had an uneasy sense that things were 
 going against him ; he had even the feeling that 
 there was something " whisht," as he expressed 
 it to himself (which means in the Devonian 
 tongue something of an uncanny character), 
 happening, that had come to its culmination in 
 this unaccountable footprint of his which he had
 
 76 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 found in a place where it seemed impossible 
 that he could have impressed it in any natural 
 way. The problems of his life appeared too 
 hard for him. 
 
 There is that about this story of Rimehouse 
 which seems to connect him psychologically 
 with the great astronomers. One of the several 
 riparian owners in whose interest he served had 
 been inspired to present him with a watcher's 
 telescope, a plain but efficient instrument such 
 as is used by the gillies or stalkers on the 
 Scottish hills. It was something of a new toy 
 to Rimehouse, and as he sat on a high bluff 
 overlooking the river, about a mile or so further 
 than the spot at which he had perceived the 
 disquieting footmark, he pulled out his glass 
 and tried to divert his attention from the puzzle 
 which was perplexing him by following, through 
 the telescope, all that was visible of the river. 
 And as he so looked through it, there " swam into 
 his ken," as the stories of astronomical dis- 
 coveries have it, not, indeed, a new planet or a 
 comet, but the figure of a man sitting down and 
 curiously bent over and contorted. Had it not 
 been so Rimehouse always declared in his fre- 
 quent repetitions of the story that his mind at 
 the moment was greatly occupied with boots, 
 he would probably have been quite at a loss to
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 77 
 
 conceive what the man could be doing, but, 
 obsessed as he was with the puzzle of the foot- 
 print, the true significance of the attitude struck 
 him at once the man was changing his boots ! 
 No sooner had his sagacious brain received this 
 vivid impression than it was immediately followed 
 by another namely, that the bank of the river 
 was a very singular place to choose for this 
 thoroughly domestic action. Not that the change 
 was in process of operation in any exposed spot, 
 although by a curious coincidence Rimehouse's 
 telescopic sight had fastened on it from so great 
 a distance. On the contrary, so far as he could 
 judge, it was extremely sheltered, in a kind of 
 arbour formed by the surrounding boscage ; and 
 perhaps from no other place than that occupied 
 by Rimehouse would it have been open to 
 observation from without, and from any man's 
 natural vision unaided by a telescope it would 
 have been quite invisible even there. Never- 
 theless, in spite of this comparative privacy the 
 spot appeared to Rimehouse a curiously chosen 
 one for an act which is much more commonly 
 performed at home. 
 
 He held his glass glued with firm precision 
 on the man, thus singularly occupied. In a few 
 moments the change, as it appeared, was 
 completed, and the man, still under his observa- 
 tion, stood up. The figure even at that distance
 
 78 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 was familiar, not to be mistaken Tom Causey ! 
 The next moment he had taken a step which 
 interposed a screen of foliage between himself 
 and the telescope, but Rimehouse had seen 
 enough ; he shut up the glass with a click, and 
 went striding at his best pace down the hill. 
 
 He was a long, lank man, black-bearded, with 
 loose limbs, which took him over the ground at 
 a great speed. His figure did not carry much 
 promise of strength, but those who had tried a 
 fall with him at the Devonshire wrestling had 
 reason to remember the unexpected wiriness of 
 his muscle and his grip of steel. In a boxing 
 booth at Barnstaple fair he had knocked out the 
 professional champion, not by any great mastery 
 of the science of the noble art, but by the 
 immense length of his arm, which reached the 
 opponent's face while the other's fist came nearly 
 six inches short of his own. He did not know 
 as yet what he might find when he arrived at 
 the spot where he perceived Tom Causey making 
 this remarkable change of his footgear, but the 
 prospect of a rough-and-tumble fight crossed his 
 mind as a very possible part of the entertainment 
 and, big though Causey was, he did not quail 
 from it. He did not make the mistake of wasting 
 any time in trying to discover the direction in 
 which Causey might have gone. He assumed, 
 however, that the river would be the objective,
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 79 
 
 and with a careful note in his mind of the 
 exact bearings of the spot where the change of 
 boots had been accomplished, made a slight 
 detour inland, and came straight down upon it 
 from the side remote from the river. 
 
 He had located the place with accuracy by 
 its proximity to a tall ash, which is not a 
 very common tree in North Devon, and presently 
 stood on the very spot where he had watched 
 the unsuspecting Causey through his far-seeing 
 glass. All the impressions of the ground bore 
 witness to the justice of his conclusion that the 
 man he had seen had been changing his boots. 
 The grass was laid where the man had sat, there 
 were the marks of the boot-heels in a sandy patch, 
 the boots which had lately been taken off were 
 lying scarcely hidden by a tussock. Thrusting his 
 hand into one of them, Rimehouse found it yet 
 warm from the heat of the foot which it had 
 lately held. With his hand still stuck thus into 
 the great boot, his figure froze and stiffened with 
 intent astonishment for the second time that day 
 at sight of a footprint in the sand again his own 
 footprint, with that singular pattern of the nails 
 around the toe, and again in a place where he 
 knew that he had not set foot. 
 
 He stood and stared, and again that chill 
 sense that " whisht " things were about came 
 over him ; but it endured only for a short while.
 
 8o WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 By degrees the intentness of his look relaxed, as 
 a dawning intelligence of the meaning of it all 
 came to him. He even smiled to himself, 
 between anger and amusement, as a full con- 
 viction reached him of how he had been fooled. 
 
 "Tom Causey," he said, speaking softly to 
 himself, "you be a master vagabone, you be." 
 
 He meditated a moment as if uncertain how 
 best to deal with this "master vagabone," in 
 whose hands he felt himself to have been a fool 
 and plaything. The sight of the great boot still 
 in his hand seemed to bring inspiration. He 
 picked up its fellow, and crept back with the 
 pair into the bushes. Then he searched about 
 until he found a tree of blackthorn, off which he 
 broke a small twig or two. He felt the thorns, 
 like a connoisseur; they were sharp and strong. 
 He selected two of the twigs which bore, close 
 together, on an inch or two of their length, three 
 or four of the finest specimens of thorn, and then 
 he pushed them well home into the toes of the 
 boots. He thrust them so far that not until the 
 foot, forcing its way into the boot, had passed 
 that crucial point at which the heel sticks hardest, 
 and had gone with a thud well home into the 
 boot, would it be conscious of the presence of 
 the thorns at all. No doubt it was not quite a 
 nice thing to do ; but then Rimehouse was a 
 South Devon man.
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 81 
 
 And having set his trap in this manner, he 
 replaced the boots where he had found them ; 
 then he ensconced himself once more within the 
 bushes and waited for Tom Causey to return. 
 
 He had the best part of an hour to wait, but 
 never thought of quitting his post. He felt as 
 if he could sit there till the crack of doom, in 
 anticipation of the rich joy which would be his 
 when the big man changed his boots. Presently, 
 with a quiet tread marvellous for a person of his 
 bulk, and acquired only through the life-long 
 habit of walking as if a rabbit, sitting to be 
 pounced on, were immediately in front, Causey 
 came from the river, parting the bushes with a 
 right hand held high before his face ; and in that 
 right hand was something which might have 
 suggested to Rimehouse, had his mind been in 
 the imaginative mood, a gleaming sword. But 
 that mood had passed from him; he had ex- 
 hausted it in his dealings with the boots ; and now, 
 in the phase of hard practical observation, he 
 saw the thing in Causey's right fist clearly for 
 what it was a salmon held by the tail. And at 
 that his slow grin of expectation deepened the 
 enemy was completely delivered into his hands. 
 
 The broad face of Causey was very pleasant, 
 too, with satisfaction as he sat down heavily, 
 once more to change his footgear. His back, 
 as he sat, was towards Rimehouse, who was 
 
 G
 
 82 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 watching him intently ; but as he took off the first 
 boot he threw it beside him carelessly in such a 
 way that its sole was turned to Rimehouse, and 
 he saw, as he knew that he should see, the nails 
 arranged just in the pattern of those at his own 
 boot's toe. Then Causey took up the other boot 
 that with the nails on the sole of the toe set in 
 ordinary fashion, but with a certain quite novel 
 arrangement of spikes in the inside of which even 
 he, the owner of the boot, was still unconscious. 
 
 As Causey leant forward to put his foot into 
 the boot, Rimehouse raised his face above the 
 bushes to watch events. There was a moment's 
 pause that moment of effort while the heel was 
 pushing past the tightest part where the upper 
 of the boot goes round the ankle. Rimehouse 
 just saw the big figure of the other make its first 
 movement of relief and relaxing of the muscles 
 as his heel went past this tight place ; and then 
 there came a sudden, wild-beast roar. 
 
 This was the signal for which Rimehouse had 
 been waiting. He did not hurry himself, but 
 went forward quietly with his long, lounging 
 steps. 
 
 "Boots don't vit 'ee, I'm afeared, Tom," he 
 said, with pleasant sympathy. 
 
 He stooped with seeming carelessness to pick 
 up the salmon and the boot which Causey had 
 just taken off; yet, even so, it seemed that he
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 83 
 
 was on the watch against developments, for 
 when Causey, with a big curse, hurled at his 
 head the only boot still unappropriated he was 
 quite prepared to dodge it, if dodging had been 
 necessary. But it is difficult, with the best will 
 in the world, to throw straight when one is 
 sitting, and Rimehouse's head was in no danger. 
 
 "Thank 'ee kindly, Tom, vor that there. 
 Twas jest that t'other boot as I was a-wantin' 
 for make up the evidence like, when us comes 
 bevoor the coort. Shall 'ope for meet 'ee again 
 there soon, Tom." 
 
 During these observations, of which Causey 
 evidently appreciated the humour far less keenly 
 than their author, the big man was writhing in 
 an agony of mingled pain, fury, effort to get off 
 the boot, and desire to get at Rimehouse. But 
 it is hard for a man to pull off a boot quickly 
 when several spikes at its toe are running into 
 his foot with a keenness which causes him 
 intense anguish in the attempt to get the foot 
 into the position in which it can slip out of a 
 boot easily; and when he is divided between 
 this desire and an eagerness to be up and pursue 
 an enemy he presents that spectacle of a good 
 man struggling with adversity which has always 
 been deemed supremely edifying to the gods. 
 It was in this striking aspect that Causey now 
 exhibited himself to the gratified appreciation of
 
 84 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Rimehouse ; but as for any remarks which he 
 uttered, they are not to be repeated, for the 
 reason that for the most part they were inco- 
 herent, in his rage and agony, and for the rest, 
 as retailed by Rimehouse, not such as the young 
 person should read. Rimehouse did his best for 
 him, however, saying soothingly : 
 
 " I do beg 'ee, Tom, don't 'ee go work your- 
 self into a vit ; now don't 'ee. Ef you was vor 
 burst yourself and die, as it do zeem to me main 
 likely is what you mean vor do, bevoor you've 
 a-got off that there boot which zeems vor vex 
 'ee, why maybe as volks might think as 'ow I 
 was vor blame in it." 
 
 "An' serve 'ee well right ef you was vor 'ang 
 vor sech dirty trick as this yer, you scounnerel," 
 roared Causey, finding articulate voice for once. 
 
 " I reckon there's wan o' the present company 
 of two as '11 'ang avoor I shall, Tom," said the 
 river-watcher amiably. " Gude-bye to 'ee in the 
 meantime. Us'll meet again soon in the coort, 
 zure enough." 
 
 And with this pleasant anticipation Rime- 
 house pushed his way through the bushes, 
 carrying the salmon and the boots, leaving 
 Causey at leisure, and at such peace as he could 
 command, to extricate his foot from its horrid 
 prison. 
 
 The denouement is obvious enough and
 
 A MATTER OF FOOTPRINTS 85 
 
 simple. The salmon, by that time in a condition 
 which made its presence known throughout the 
 court, was produced with the boots before the 
 magistrates at their next meeting, Causey him- 
 self being present in obedience to a summons. 
 The fish showed signs of impalement by two of 
 the big hooks of one of those three-hooked 
 arrangements with which poachers commonly 
 snatch salmon. Causey had cross-summoned 
 Rimehouse for wounding with intent to do 
 grievous bodily harm, and had a huge piece of 
 evidence in support of his plea in shape of his 
 own foot swathed in enough bandages for a 
 whole mummy, which he was disappointed in 
 not being allowed to remove in order to show 
 his toe to the court. The magistrates un- 
 sympathetically nonsuited him, on the ground 
 advanced by Rimehouse that he had acted in 
 virtual self-defence in putting the thorns in the 
 boots, in order that Causey should be unable to 
 attack and pursue him. 
 
 When sentence was pronounced fine, with 
 alternative of imprisonment Causey produced 
 the money then and there out of a black leathern 
 purse, in court, with the pleasant sentiment that 
 he " 'oped as it might do the genelmen of the 
 bench much gude." 
 
 But though Rimehouse won the case, it is to 
 be doubted whether the whole story did not
 
 86 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 make more for the credit of Causey, because of 
 his ingenuity in nailing his boots on the pattern 
 of Rimehouse's, in the eyes of all reasonable men 
 of North Devon. They did not altogether like 
 Rimehouse's action throughout the case. It was 
 not so much the matter of putting the thorns 
 into the boots that was objected to ; that seemed 
 all fair enough, because blackthorn was a com- 
 mon tree and grew everywhere, and, besides, it 
 was noticed that Tom Causey walked a great 
 deal better on his bandaged foot as soon as the 
 case had been settled, although it had gone 
 against him, than when he thought that he might 
 have anything to gain by hobbling; but what 
 people did not quite like was the telescope. 
 That seemed to be taking an unfair and ultra- 
 scientific advantage hardly playing the game. 
 But, then, Rimehouse, after all, was a South 
 Devon man.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 A DORMOUSE, A GULL, AND SOME ANGLING 
 
 I SEE that in this narrative there is danger of 
 misapprehension arising from unguarded use 
 of that plural " we," which is the natural pre- 
 rogative of editors and other regal beings. But 
 that is not at all its sense in this connection. In 
 the retrospect of my boyhood I find that there 
 were always two of us so naturally at one in 
 our pursuits and interests as to jump together, 
 almost of necessity, to my mind's eye. In the 
 first place, to speak with egotism, there was 
 myself, and in the second Bob Burscough, just 
 of my own age, son of our neighbour, Colonel 
 Burscough, living on the hill; and as the 
 Colonel's was but a small house, having none 
 of the spacious amenities in the way of coverts 
 for small birds and even for rabbits, which we 
 were fortunate in possessing, it happened that 
 Bob was only too glad to avail himself of this 
 large hospitality which I was able to offer him, 
 and for my part I should have been only half 
 myself without his company. Our pets were
 
 88 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 our common property, he had the right of 
 coming and going in our house as if it were his 
 own. Authority, we admitted, was liberal-minded 
 in this we always tried to be fair in ascribing 
 to authority such little credit as was its due 
 and as for the authority on Bob's own side, his 
 uncle, the Colonel, seeing that he was a widower 
 and had volunteered to take charge of Bob for 
 his parents, who were in India, he was no doubt 
 only too thankful that the boy should be happily 
 busy and out of his way. At that time I under- 
 stood but little of the nature of the profession 
 in India of Bob's father, which was spoken of in 
 a picturesque and attractive metaphor by the 
 Colonel as " shaking the pagoda tree," but sub- 
 sequently that same shaking, proving prolific, 
 happened to make a considerable and agreeable 
 difference to a portion of my own life. That, 
 however, is all part of the later story. 
 
 The wood in which we had leave to roam 
 was not preserved, in the game-keeper's sense, 
 or else we should not have been allowed such 
 free right of its leafy ways. Nevertheless it hap- 
 pened to us, on glorious occasions, to put up 
 a far-wandering cock-pheasant, whose whirring 
 wings made our little hearts beat at such a rate 
 that we could scarcely see the wonder until it 
 had risen high above the tree-tops. Rabbits, 
 even, were so scarce that with all our searching
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 89 
 
 and digging we never came upon a nest, though 
 we used often to see them sitting in the field 
 outside the boundary-fence, or catch a glimpse 
 of them as they scudded from us through the 
 bushes. Our little weapons, catapults and the 
 like, were not sufficient for their destruction, 
 and we never became the possessors of any steel- 
 trap larger than those in which we caught the 
 poor small birds. Squirrels we used to see, and 
 persecute from tree to tree until they escaped 
 us behind a bough or in some dense leafy ob- 
 scurity. Fur, in fact, is always too big game for 
 boys, until they reach the gunning age. The 
 true quarry of boys is feather, and a sufficing 
 delight to them. Yet it did happen once that 
 fur fell in our way, once and once only, and 
 not in too satisfactory a manner. For, as we 
 wandered in the winter-time over the crackling 
 floor of red, dry leaves, we espied a tiny bundle 
 which looked for a moment as if it had been got 
 together for a purpose, looked like an edition, 
 on a very small scale, of those balls of leaves and 
 grass which the hedgehogs manage to roll round 
 themselves and in which we often found them, 
 both in our orchard-hedge and in the wood. We 
 took up this tiny bundle, and pulled off a leaf or 
 two; then, thinking it after all a mere chance 
 collection, threw it to the ground again. On 
 which Joe, the coachman's boy, who was of our
 
 90 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 party, more sapiently curious, picked it up and, 
 unrolling yet more coats of leaves, revealed 
 at last, within this snug nest, a coiled up tiny 
 red thing, a dormouse. This was its winter 
 home, in which it had promised itself to lie 
 asleep all the cold weather through. But our 
 quick eyes had detected it among surroundings 
 so like itself; and Joe, with greater patience, had 
 followed up our discovery to its culmination in 
 this little, warm, breathing, furry, sleeping thing. 
 Of course we claimed it, crying quickly that 
 we had found it, and demanding that we should 
 be allowed the immediate joy of having it in our 
 hand. To which Joe sturdily replied that we 
 had indeed found it, but had thrown it away as 
 of no worth, and that he had again found it ; 
 that it had become by our deed of rejection no 
 man's property; but that now it was in deed 
 and fact a man's property, namely his, and that 
 he meant to keep it. No doubt the most obvious 
 and ready way of settling the difficulty, as be- 
 tween boys, was the ordeal by battle ; but this, 
 having regard to the respective qualities of the 
 contesting parties, was inadmissible, for Joe 
 was our elder by two years and our superior in 
 physical strength, so that such a mode of de- 
 cision would have been grossly unfair ; whereas, 
 on the other hand, we were Joe's superior in 
 social station, so that he would have been
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 91 
 
 unwilling to lay a violent hand upon us. The 
 idea that we should set upon him together two 
 to one would have been quite impossible to our 
 strict code of honour. In this dilemma we even- 
 tually resolved to submit the decision to the 
 arbitrament of Fortune by the classical method 
 of spinning a coin, namely a halfpenny, which, 
 turning up a head, when we had called " tails," 
 gave to Joe the dormouse and to us a feeling of 
 unjust treatment which nearly found vent in 
 tears. The only other vent which it found was 
 in searching day after day for a whole week, and, 
 at intervals, for many weeks, among that rich 
 crackling carpet of dry leaves, but never again 
 did the same luck befall us. We never found 
 another dormouse, and probably we never shall. 
 We could find rabbits nearer home beside 
 the stream which coursed through the meadow 
 in which we flushed our first jacksnipe. Above 
 the stream a great bank, topped with a hedge, 
 sloped steeply up. In the bank were great holes, 
 originally wrought by rabbits, but enlarged by 
 the diggings of dogs and boys who strayed off 
 the adjacent foot-path. The few harassed rabbits 
 which made this bank their home were wary 
 from constant persecution; too wary, and we 
 could attempt nothing against them. Yet we 
 loved the whole length of this valley along 
 which the sluggish stream ran, from the pond
 
 92 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 formed for the cows to drink at (where once, 
 when some draining operations were going on, 
 we caught several eels of nine inches or a foot 
 long) to the great tidal estuary of the big river 
 where a few sand-pipers or dotterel were gener- 
 ally running at the edge of the water and a gull 
 or two hovering and settling along the water- 
 line. For part of its course this stream went 
 almost buried in a profuse tangle of bramble 
 and blackthorn and May, such as often goes in 
 the western counties to make what they simply 
 call a hedge. 
 
 In this tangle we did not fail to find at least 
 one blackbird's nest, and more than one thrush's. 
 A few elms grew up through it, and against the 
 stems of one of them, posted on a small out- 
 shooting branch, was the annual nest of a green- 
 finch. Nearer the cattle's drinking-place was a 
 slope enclosed as too steep for pasturage, and 
 within the enclosure were rhododendrons under 
 the shadow of big beeches. The stems of the 
 trees were covered with ivy, and in the ivy we 
 commonly found one or two nests of wrens. 
 
 The nests of wrens, and of all dome-building 
 birds, are a sad trial to boyhood, for it is scarcely 
 possible to see into them, and the intrusion of a 
 finger is apt to make the birds desert. But none 
 of these were so cruel an exasperation as the 
 mud-cups which the house martins built just
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 93 
 
 below the eaves and at such a height from the 
 third-story window that even by imperilling our 
 lives on the window-sill we failed to reach them. 
 Nothing therefore was more satisfactory to us 
 than the high-handed action of a pair of sparrows 
 in taking forcible possession of one of these 
 nests and using it for their own domestic pur- 
 poses. We did not know at what stage in the 
 domestic operations of the builders the sparrows 
 entered on their tenancy; we knew only that 
 one day a sparrow's broad head and strong beak 
 appeared peeping out over the mud wall and 
 held its own against the complaints and chal- 
 lenges not only of the builders, but of a mass 
 meeting of the unemployed of their kind which 
 they seemed to have called together for the 
 purpose of backing their protests. We then 
 began to look with interest for that which, 
 according to the teaching of our Natural His- 
 tories, ought to have followed, namely, the 
 walling-in of the sparrow by the martins and 
 all their friends, bringing beaks-ful of mud and 
 plastering it over the hole. But no such thing 
 ever happened; the martins never did more 
 than make a few noisy ineffectual demonstra- 
 tions. And, after all, that story in the books 
 did not sound a very likely one. One always 
 wondered what the sparrow, with his broad 
 bull head and great strong beak, could have
 
 94 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 been about all the time that the walling-in was 
 going on. We knew, of course, well enough 
 (for we had seen it) that a nut-hatch will plaster 
 up with mud a hole in a tree which leads to a 
 likely nesting-place, if it deems the hole bigger 
 than convenient; but in that case there would 
 be no inmate with a good beak to be reckoned 
 with while the plastering went on. 
 
 We had to believe, too, that bees will wall- 
 up, with bees'-wax, a snail that is injudicious 
 enough to crawl into the hive; for when a 
 certain hive of bees died off for lack of a queen 
 (a fearful example to Anarchy), we were shown 
 a lump, looking like a great wart, on the hive's 
 floor, and on dissecting the wart with a pen- 
 knife, found it to contain a snail, shell and all, 
 embalmed in bees'-wax. It was an extraordinarily 
 fresh snail, too, considering how long it had been 
 dead; and that, no doubt, was due to the her- 
 metical sealing-out of the air. 
 
 There was no difficulty in crediting this, even 
 had we not seen it ; for a snail has very poor 
 means of offence compared with a hive full of 
 bees. It was very different when it came to a 
 question of a house-sparrow against martins. 
 The beaks of the fly-feeding birds are not 
 weapons of war. This sparrow, at all events, 
 that fell under our observation, was undisturbed 
 in his forcible occupation of the martin's castle,
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 95 
 
 and brought up a flourishing family therein ; and 
 on his children there fell a Nemesis, with perfect 
 poetical justice. For we had a gull, a tame gull 
 with clipped wings, who would feed on fish if 
 we would give him any, failing fish on raw meat, 
 failing raw meat on worms and insects, and, 
 failing these, on anything, including sparrows. 
 It was the most fascinating entertainment to 
 give him an eel ; for he would toss the eel about 
 several ways, until it came to the position most 
 suitable for swallowing, when he would swallow 
 it; but the eel, not yet defeated, would often 
 wriggle up his gullet again, and this process 
 would be repeated many a time. So, if swallow- 
 ing be a delight, the pleasure which our gull 
 derived from the process, must have been 
 manifold. Eventually the eel would weary of 
 the vain ascent of the gull's gullet, and consent 
 to remain in contact with the juices of digestion. 
 Nature is a queer mother to her children. 
 
 One never knows how much the state of 
 domesticity affects creatures that ought to be 
 wild. In the natural state perhaps one swallow- 
 ing would have been enough for the gull, and 
 for the eel. He was a herring-gull, and it was 
 not until his fifth year that he arrived at the full 
 dignity of his white and pearly plumage. Before 
 that he was always dressed in some of the dingy, 
 dusky feathers of infancy. Yet in their wild
 
 96 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 state these gulls are said to arrive at the adult 
 plumage before the fifth year. 
 
 His gastronomic fondness for sparrows has 
 been mentioned. He was also fond of mice, 
 and had an extraordinary penchant for swallow- 
 ing them alive. The interior arrangements of 
 that bird were what an American would call a 
 cast-iron wonder; for consider, a mouse and a 
 gull ! If a mouse had a fair chance of a bite and 
 a scratch at the outside even of a gull he would 
 make things quite uncomfortable for the bird, 
 and yet the gull would swallow him with perfect 
 comfort, and digest him with unruffled pleasure. 
 The bird would pause a moment with a laugh in 
 his eye, to enjoy the agonized waving of the tail, 
 when the mouse's body was already well in the 
 entrance of the "red lane." Then down the tail 
 went after the body, and the mouse, unlike the 
 eel, never came back again. Generally he would 
 catch his mice for himself, but it appealed to his 
 subtle sense of humour to steal them from the 
 cat. He was good friends with the cat, a 
 friendship based on the firm ground of mutual 
 respect but this did not prevent his stealing 
 her mice. When she was engaged with one 
 after the feline manner, letting it out of her 
 grasp to run a foot or two, and then recovering 
 it with a prehensile paw, the gull would come 
 ambling up to her with every affectation of a
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 97 
 
 scientific and platonic interest. He would watch 
 the proceedings with perfect gravity for a minute 
 or two, and it was only when the mouse, eluding 
 the cat, was well within his reach that he would 
 give an appreciative chuckle, at the same time 
 stretching forward a great yellow bill cavernously 
 open, and receive down the yellow gulf the mouse 
 who seemed quite pleased to have discovered 
 such a refuge. Then the cat's face became a 
 study. She watched the waving of the tail, and, 
 when the last sign of it had disappeared, came 
 up nearer and examined the gull more closely. 
 She seemed to wish to find out by outward 
 inspection whether the mouse really was inside 
 that queer arrangement of beak and feathers. 
 But the gull did nothing but wink, and left the 
 cat in so great a state of perplexity that she was 
 no more careful than before when next the gull 
 sidled up to her as she was playing the game of 
 cat and mouse. 
 
 The mice were unoffending, and there was a 
 protest that was pathetic in the wave of the tail 
 with which they went down ; but the sparrows 
 came of a bad race and deserved their fate. 
 They suffered assimilation in the cast-iron 
 interior of the gull merely as a punishment for 
 their temerity in coming to steal his dinner. 
 We gave him a daily dinner of scraps, besides 
 occasional delicate morsels such as worms and
 
 98 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 fishes. These were an attraction to the sparrows, 
 especially to those sparrows who, looking down 
 from the vantage post of the martin's nest, could 
 see him day by day making a dish of scraps 
 disappear. It was tempting, no doubt, and the 
 young sparrows fell. They had inherited 
 burglarious tendencies, as has been shown, and 
 they were bold young robbers. They came out 
 into the world chirping and defiant. Had the 
 original makers of the mud-nest succeeded in 
 the design of bringing up therein their own 
 family, they would have needed to have given 
 that young family something more than en- 
 couragement before they brought them out into 
 the world. The youngsters would have dreaded 
 the first flight abroad, so that the parents would 
 have been compelled to take away beakful after 
 beakful of the nest-wall, even as they had built 
 it up, until there was no more left but a little 
 patch of mud on which the nestlings would no 
 longer care to perch, but would launch them- 
 selves, half hustled against their will, into the 
 air, and find to their surprise that they could 
 float and skim and soar through the sky just as 
 they saw their father and mother do. That is 
 the nature of house-martins, so fearful are they 
 of making their first trial. 
 
 But such was by no means the nature of the 
 house-sparrows. These were ready, after a very
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 99 
 
 little perching and chirping on the nest-wall, to 
 essay the long flight down on wings that would 
 not carry them as many yards as the young 
 house-martins' wings would carry them miles. 
 And once on the ground they soon learned to 
 peck for themselves in intervals of the meals 
 brought to them by their parents, who, with 
 all their faults, were undeniably kind to their 
 children. And with the pecking and tasting 
 came thoughts of the gull and of his dish of 
 scraps, and with young appetites they hopped 
 chirpingly towards it. The gull saw them; he 
 knew their intentions in a moment, and crouched, 
 as a "thick-knee" plover crouches so as to be- 
 come almost a part of the bare Norfolk ground. 
 The little birds came on ; and already a callow 
 bill was over the edge of the dish when a yellow 
 yawn came rushing at the fledgeling, and by the 
 time the yawn was finished there was a young 
 sparrow less in the world, unless the world be 
 taken to include the cast-iron interior of our 
 gull. 
 
 In this manner the marauding little sparrows 
 came to a bad end, bad for them, and bad, as 
 might have been thought, for our gull. But it 
 seemed as if nothing was too difficult for his 
 digestion, and all alike agreed with him. Head- 
 first and quite alive he swallowed any living 
 thing that was not too large to pass his gullet,
 
 ioo WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 and he was looked on with favour by Authority 
 for his service of ridding the garden of every 
 sort of vermin. Best of all he loved small fishes 
 or the worms that live in the salt mud which the 
 tide left bare ; and we spent many hours hunting, 
 for his sake, the big-headed little fishes in the 
 pools among the rocks, or digging, ankle deep in 
 the ooze, for worms in the mudbanks of the river. 
 Even the little green crabs were not amiss to him. 
 He would crash the armour of their backs with 
 one dig of his great yellow bill, peck out the soft 
 body of the crab at his leisure and proceed to 
 the discussion of the limbs, until nothing was 
 left but some shelly fragments which might have 
 been the relics of a thrush's feast around a snail- 
 breaking stone. 
 
 On a sad morning he was found dead, rent 
 asunder and mangled. There was little doubt 
 about the manner of his death; the cat had 
 stolen upon him unawares in his sleep, and 
 disabled him at the first onset. It seemed 
 certain that he had been taken unawares, for the 
 cat knew him too well to meet him in open 
 fight. She behaved badly to him with feline 
 treachery ; but, after all, she had been very 
 much tried. We were convinced it was not so 
 much animosity, nor hunger, that moved her to 
 treat him thus, but rather a curiosity, that was 
 half scientific and half gastronomic, to ascertain
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 101 
 
 if those mice which disappeared so quickly 
 and so marvellously were really to be found 
 inside him. This would explain the process of 
 dissection to which she had subjected his body ; 
 but it is very doubtful, knowing what one does 
 of his digestion, if she found an atom of evidence, 
 in the shape of unassimilated food, to satisfy 
 her thirst for knowledge. 
 
 It was not only in the service of the gull as 
 aforesaid that we went digging in the river-mud 
 for the worms. Using the worms as bait, we 
 could, at certain seasons of the year and states 
 of the tide, catch the little sea-bass which pene- 
 trated much farther than this up the tidal river. 
 Farther down, nearer the river's mouth, we could 
 catch much bigger bass, throwing a fly for them 
 from a boat, or trailing a spinning-bait behind. 
 But such an expedition meant a walk of two 
 miles with the payment of a boatman and the 
 hire of a boat at the end of it, and thus met with 
 no encouragement from Authority, who always 
 looked upon fishing somewhat with the eyes of 
 Doctor Johnson ; and without the assistance of 
 Authority the hire of boat and boatman was hard 
 to come by. 
 
 But far out on a promontory of rock jutting 
 into the river, not half a mile from our home, we 
 could sit with rod and line, "a worm at one
 
 102 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 end and " well, ourselves at the other; and 
 
 at the lowest of the tide the little silvery 
 bass would sometimes take the worms greedily, 
 so that we often brought home quite a good 
 basket. There was no nonsense of playing 
 the fish, or anything of that kind about it; the 
 float went under, we struck, we said " Come, 
 fish!" hoisted him into the air and swung him 
 back to fall with a sound whack on the rock 
 behind us. Then there was the joy of dis- 
 engaging the fish from the hook and putting on 
 another worm ; then again, the otium cum digni- 
 tate of sitting and watching the float, with the 
 proud knowledge of a fish already caught 
 awaiting us in the basket. 
 
 The most troublesome part of this sport was 
 the digging for the worms. Far away, by the 
 shores of the sea, it was possible to find these 
 worms without the trouble of digging for them 
 in the soft filthy ooze ; for there, just where the 
 rock-bed joined the flat golden sand, was a mass 
 of coral-like formation. It looked much like 
 honeycomb, only, when the comb, which was 
 very friable, was broken, instead of bee-grubs 
 and honey, it was seen to contain worms very 
 like those which we got with much greater 
 labour in the mud flats. Certainly the bass did 
 not seem to know the difference. But if the 
 labour of digging was saved, we had the labour
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 103 
 
 of a two mile walk to reach the sandy-coral, and 
 moreover, unless we hit off nicely the lowest 
 state of the tide, we found the coral covered. 
 
 This fishing for the bass was of common 
 enough kind, nor was the capture of the bigger 
 bass from the boat in any way unusual. Also, 
 when Authority sometimes took us long drives 
 and set us on the bank of a trout-stream with 
 rod and artificial fly, the result was much hooking 
 of clothes and of trees and very little hooking of 
 fish ; in short, such a result as the early efforts 
 of the fly-fisher familiarly produce. But there 
 was a fishing in which we took certain part that 
 was rather out of the common kind. It was 
 introduced to us by the coastguard-men, who 
 had often practised it from ship-board. 
 
 The enterprise of certain capitalists, who had 
 vainly sought to spoil our beautiful marshland 
 and gorse-clad hills into a watering-place, had 
 built an ineffectual pier out into the sea; 
 ineffectual because, by reason of the waves, 
 the rocks, and the ridge-boulders, it was im- 
 possible for a boat to come to it oftener than 
 three days on an average in the year. But it 
 was charming to bathe off. The same arrange- 
 ment of rocks and weather which made it hard 
 for a boat to come to land made the task of the 
 coast-guard almost one of supererogation. The 
 poor men grew fat to corpulence and it must
 
 io 4 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 have been weary, in the winter-time, pacing 
 along those cliffs with never the remotest 
 prospect of a smuggler. So then they spied 
 this pier, and it occurred to them to fish from 
 it as they had used to do from the ship's deck. 
 This would help to pass the nights, for the fish 
 bite best at night ; and it was necessary that they 
 should be kept awake in the night somehow, or 
 they would not have been able to sleep all day. 
 
 The way of the fishing was this : the tackle 
 was stout and the hook large and strong, for the 
 fish had to be hauled from the water right up to 
 the pier-head ; the bait was the side of a herring, 
 or one of those little big-headed fish which we 
 caught in the pools of the rocks. As near the 
 hook as you dared to put it was a heavy plumb 
 of lead. The coast-guard would have his line 
 (something between the thickness of blind-cord 
 and of a lady's little finger) lying in a coil at his 
 feet. Then, when he had got his hook baited, 
 and all ready, he would sing out " Stand clear ! " 
 and all of us who were tending to other lines 
 would stand back from his scene of action. He 
 would begin by swinging the lead-plumb to and 
 fro like a pendulum until he had given it sufficient 
 impetus, when he would begin to whirl it round 
 his head, gradually letting out more line and 
 increasing the circle, until it was flying round and 
 round at a tremendous pace; he would then let it
 
 A DORMOUSE, GULL, AND ANGLING 105 
 
 go, with a whizz, as the Gauchos in our books 
 hurled their bolas, and it flew hurtling out to sea, 
 uncoiling the line as it went. Into the water it 
 plunged with a plop, taking down with it the 
 baited hook, and so you left it until a spasmodic 
 pulling told your excited nerves that a foolish 
 fish had hooked itself. 
 
 All this we saw dimly, in a mysterious gloom 
 that heightened its interest, either by the light 
 of the moon or, when the night was dark, by the 
 ray of a bull's-eye lantern. Sometimes, when 
 fish would not bite, we lowered a lantern by a 
 rope to the water's edge, in the hope that its 
 glare would attract the prey ; but we seldom 
 found the fish unwilling, provided we hit off the 
 right state of the tide, namely, an hour before 
 or after its highest. We had about two hours 
 and a half, in all, of profitable fishing, and in 
 that time would have hauled up all sorts of 
 wonders, great big congers, skates of mighty 
 breadth, rock-cod, and dog-fish more than 
 enough. When the dog-fish were in great 
 plenty we seldom caught other fish, these shark- 
 like demons seeming to scare away the rest. 
 These were great nights, though sometimes the 
 wind blew cruelly ; but Authority did not often 
 permit us to enjoy them. If the height of the 
 tide fell early, no objections were made ; but if 
 the fishing-hours were among the small ones of
 
 106 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 the morning a wise veto was put on our joining 
 in the sport. In those unhappy seasons we 
 would often stroll down in the course of the 
 following day and, if the cold were not too 
 nipping, would go diving down into the water 
 at the pier's end to fetch up a dog-fish or two for 
 our tame gull, whose healthy appetite made no 
 distinction between the species of fishes. No 
 one else would eat the dog-fish. The coastguard- 
 men contented themselves with battering in their 
 heads and throwing them over the pier-rails to 
 serve as ground-bait : but nothing came amiss to 
 our gull.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE SILVER OTTER 
 
 ONE of the brightest days in all our retrospect is 
 that of which we spoke for many a year after as 
 " The Silver Otter Day." He was a very famous 
 beast on one of those streams within reach of our 
 home, which the otter-hounds sometimes visited, 
 and again and again he had been hunted, been 
 viewed, and had eluded them. 
 
 Old and wise as Satan, and by repute scarcely 
 less wicked, it did not seem that the biggest or 
 wiliest of the trout or peal could escape him. 
 He was a connoisseur of connoisseurs. The 
 very daintiest bit of the shoulder was his portion, 
 the rest he left to scavengers, such as water-rats. 
 There was no bend or holt of the river which he 
 had not tried ; not a lady throughout all its 
 course to whom he had not paid his addresses. 
 And who was likely to refuse them? That 
 silvery grey patch on the left ear whereby he 
 was known to all of them, which had earned him 
 his name with the humans who came to hunt 
 him who could withstand it ?
 
 io8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 And now he had taken his abode beneath the 
 stump and roots of a tree which had been felled 
 beside the river bank, where the stream runs 
 deepest and with muddiest bottom. There he 
 can laugh at humans and canines. 
 
 Four miles down the stream a strange con- 
 course, of which ourselves, in our own opinion, 
 make no inconsiderable part, is gathering in the 
 meadow still pearly with the dew of dawn. 
 There are men in queer garments, in blue coats 
 with red waistcoats, blue breeches and red 
 stockings. In front of each blue cap is an otter's 
 pad. There are seven couples of hounds, too 
 a motley crowd, for the most part foxhounds, 
 but a few have the deep bloodhound-like jowl, 
 the high-peaked head, the drooping ears, and the 
 rough, harsh coats of the real old otter hound. 
 There are two or three terriers tearing at the 
 chains by which men hold them. Some of the 
 men have poles, iron-tipped ; one, the whip, has 
 a crop ; one, the huntsman, a horn. This is the 
 active contingent. 
 
 Besides, there is a crowd of camp-followers, 
 men in tweed breeches and knickerbockers, 
 labourers in fustian and corduroy; even ladies, 
 some of them in the uniform of the Hunt, all in 
 short skirts, and not one of them above helping 
 to stop a ford to block the otter back. 
 
 All this four miles down the stream.
 
 THE SILVER OTTER 109 
 
 Meanwhile our friend with the silver ear is at 
 home from his night's outing, purring in the 
 holt beneath the felled tree. Neither party 
 knows much about the other's presence, though 
 each may be thinking a deal. 
 
 Then the man with the horn blows a blast, 
 and the hounds flock away to him to the river- 
 side. Away after them, on either bank, come 
 the men in blue and scarlet, the ladies, the camp- 
 followers, all walking at best speed. Of the 
 hounds the more eager dash into the water, the 
 wiser and cooler deem it enough to nose each 
 bush and likely crevice on this side the river or 
 that. So, over two fields of pasture, the ladies 
 climbing the stout fences manfully, and the 
 bullocks coming down in an aggressive phalanx 
 on the hounds, then turning and breaking as 
 they find the enemy advance in their despite. 
 Still the hounds are mute, save for the stricken 
 yelp of a laggard corrected by whip-cord. 
 
 But now there is a whimper, and another, and 
 a little "tow rowing" to which the hounds all 
 gather and dash at score across a neck of pasture 
 left by the looping river. There is a great 
 scrambling of hounds and splashing around a 
 fallen pollard, but no real, bounding, full-throated 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 "Been 'ere teu nights agone," says an old 
 oracle sagely.
 
 i io WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 " Two nights, Causey, is it ? " asks one of the 
 Hunt. " How do you know that ? Isn't that the 
 night I saw you coming out of the ' Ring o' Bells'?" 
 Causey is half otter himself. A fisherman all 
 his days and nights too, when he is not ferreting 
 nor poaching, a cunning man at the tieing of 
 flies, for sale, at the concoction of other baits for 
 personal use, at making a "gentleman from 
 London " believe he is showing him the best fish- 
 ing in the river, and in keeping the best of his 
 knowledge to himself. 
 
 He scornfully passes over the reference to 
 the " Ring o' Bells." "Tis larnin' as does it," he 
 answers, " larnin', and a knowledge of the ways 
 of the dumb brutes." 
 
 " Do you think that old silver otter's up here 
 this year ? " 
 
 " 'E might be, sir," Causey answers, again with 
 the greatest solemnity. " Or again 'e might not. 
 There's no dependence on un." 
 
 "How do you mean, Causey?" for the old 
 man's tone had been full of significance. 
 
 u 'Tis according as the zilver otter wishes, sir. 
 Ef he wishes, 'e '11 be 'ere; ef he don't wish, 
 'e '11 be somewheres else. And," sinking his 
 voice to a low whisper, " ef 'tis 'im as we'm come 
 out after, us may all as well go 'ome." 
 
 "Why's that, Causey? Do you think he's a 
 witch?"
 
 THE SILVER OTTER in 
 
 " I don't think it, sir I knows it." 
 
 " How do you know it ? " 
 
 But Causey will not part with the sources of 
 his knowledge. He has stated the fact, and that 
 should be enough. If sundry nods and winks 
 and lip-pursings are not sufficient enlightenment, 
 the world will get no more. 
 
 So the chase goes on. More " tow rowing " 
 in spasmodic intervals, more fence-climbing for 
 the ladies, more bullocks half-heartedly charging 
 in close column. Meanwhile the scene and the 
 morning meadow scents are glorious ; the 
 rippling river and the dashing hounds give life 
 to it. The excitement is growing, too, as across 
 now one and now another promontory of the 
 meadow the hounds dash with a chorus which 
 grows louder as they go. 
 
 " That's a last night's trail for sure," says one 
 who knows, as the melody breaks forth in a more 
 emphatic crash. "Those foxhounds never lie." 
 
 They have all the best of it, those foxhounds. 
 They are quicker, surer; dash with more elan 
 into the water. Only, one would not willingly 
 part with the wise, uncouth aspect of the otter- 
 hounds and their tremendous bloodhound melody. 
 Has the old fellow with the silver ear heard it 
 yet beneath the great tree-stump? 
 
 But now the hounds are dashing with a great 
 strong scent up a side watercourse, to the
 
 ii2 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 despair of the hunters on the far side of the main 
 stream. A few stalwart ones ford it and haste 
 after the rest, who are close following the hounds, 
 for if by chance the quarry should have lain up 
 here, in this little trickle of a stream, his days are 
 numbered. 
 
 " Pooh," says one, " he's not here. He's gone 
 up into the decoy." 
 
 For, a field or two off, there is a duck decoy, 
 now disused, and this watercourse is the outlet 
 of its waters to the main stream. 
 
 A hound makes a hungry dash at a moorhen, 
 distressed at finding herself so far up-country. 
 But he misses her by six inches with his snap, 
 and on he goes with the rest on over the 
 breadth of a pasture field which a road bounds. 
 The watercourse dives through a broad made 
 drain, and peeps up, like Arethusa, beyond it. 
 The hounds are through it, in full tongue, but 
 the field are checked caught up in a brambly 
 fence on this side or that of the road. All, with 
 infinite pain, struggle over ; whereon the deep- 
 throated music stops, dead short, like an un- 
 finished song. The huntsman lets his hounds 
 cast, by themselves, up the watercourse to no 
 purpose. He summons them to him with blast 
 of the horn, and tries the field on either side of 
 the stream. All is sad silence. 
 
 " He's found it too dry and gone back," says
 
 THE SILVER OTTER 113 
 
 one, and the theory finds reluctant accept- 
 ance. 
 
 Back again, then, over the two stiff fences, 
 and so to the main stream, to the joy of the 
 laggards on its further bank. Then up the course 
 of the river once more, and soon, with voices 
 growing more clamorous, the hounds are again 
 on the true scent up nearer and nearer to the 
 holt of the old silver-eared one beneath the great 
 tree-stump. Again and again a hound dashes, 
 boldly leaping, into mid-stream, startling into 
 flashing life a darkly slumbering pool. Every 
 great bole of pollard willow is hunted with 
 curious care. The hounds would fain dash on, 
 in full cry, across the promontories of the many- 
 looping river; but the cautious huntsman calls 
 them back with his horn. It may be the cunning 
 beast has gone up stream across one of the 
 necks of land, then turned back and be lying in 
 some favourite home in the bend. It is better to 
 make all good as we go up. 
 
 Still there is no life of any amphibious thing 
 in view, save here and there a moorhen flapping, 
 with trailing feet, over the water, or a water-rat 
 busily swimming for his hole. But now at length 
 we are coming to the great stump, and he within 
 is pricking up that short rounded silvery ear as 
 the music grows nearer, louder, till the storm of 
 canine fury breaks upon the strong doors of his 
 
 i
 
 ii4 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 house, and the hounds are clamouring, digging, 
 hustling one another at every one of its land- 
 gates or water-gates, the bolt holes above the 
 water-line or below it. 
 
 He laughs, for he is not afraid. The roots of 
 the great tree are his rafters, which will need 
 mighty digging, not only with spade and pick- 
 axe, but even with the cleaving axe. The stream 
 is deep, too, before his water-gates, and its bed 
 muddy; there is no foothold for a man to stand 
 and dig, or to poke at him with long sticks, as is 
 the well-known vexatious way of men. So he 
 bides his time and does not budge, in spite of all 
 the clamour; in spite, too, that men come to- 
 gether and stamp in unison over the rafters of 
 his home, then retire, calling off the hounds, to 
 see if he can be tempted out to discover what 
 earthquakes are occurring. He knows these 
 well-worn tricks too well. He waits. 
 
 Then they come back, hounds and men, again, 
 casting up stream and down in case he shall have 
 slipped out by an under-water way, unseen. But 
 they return unsatisfied. Next one of the tugging, 
 yelping terriers is loosed. Down the dark hole 
 he goes as if shot from a cannon. The silver- 
 eared one has his tactics for him too. He 
 presents a pair of snake-like jaws, grips his 
 guest, as in a rat-trap, across the jowl; then 
 looses him, to speed his parting. An angry
 
 THE SILVER OTTER 115 
 
 growl or two is his answer, and then the terrier, 
 for he is game, closes for the second round. 
 This time he gets a pinch of otter skin a pinch, 
 no more, for in a moment he is shaken off, and 
 pinned in scientific fashion, to make the pattern 
 even, on the other jowl. Again he retires, 
 expostulating but disinclined for action, bethinks 
 him that he is short of breath, and makes for 
 change of air outside. 
 
 Another guest, of similar manners, meets 
 with a like reception, and retires, sooner satis- 
 fied. But now, from the neighbouring farm, 
 men come with spades, with picks, with axes. 
 They dig until they come to the hard root- 
 rafters ; then chop and chop with the axe. Still 
 the old fellow with silver ear listens and makes 
 no move. His defences will hold out a while 
 yet. Round and about the great stem, now in 
 the water, now out, the hounds keep baying, the 
 otter hounds digging with a more steady per- 
 sistency, as their nature is, than the foxhounds. 
 
 At length the crumbling earth about him, and 
 the close sounding strokes of the pick, wake the 
 silver ear to quicker apprehension. The time is 
 come, he thinks. By the lowest of his water- 
 gates, where the stream is most opaquely stirred 
 from its muddy depths, he dives silently out 
 silently, unperceived. For a while the digging 
 and the clamour of the hounds stays about the
 
 ii6 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 tree-stump ; but soon, by chance or fate, a hound 
 comes on his scent; for even he, old and wily 
 and silver-eared as he is, is bound to breathe out 
 from his lungs as he goes beneath the water. 
 Then, as the discovery is proclaimed, the pack 
 close round, and dashing into the mid-stream 
 swim downwards after him. 
 
 "Gone away," is the human echo of their cry, 
 and now men post themselves, leaning over the 
 stream, by each overhanging bush or pollard, 
 where is most likelihood of his coming up for 
 breath. Little enough of him will most see, 
 scarcely even that silver ear, for a nostril above 
 the stream's surface will suffice him for taking 
 the air he needs. But he has found for himself 
 a halcyon place, as he thinks it, amidst some 
 thick-growing sedges. There he dares to lift 
 from the water all that cunning head of his, to 
 gaze a moment, unseen as he deems, at his 
 enemies, and to listen to their war-cry. Long 
 ago, before ever the digging and battering at 
 the otter's house roof began, old Causey had 
 stationed himself on the bank opposite that bed 
 of sedges; and as the low grey head raised itself 
 gently among their shelter old Causey raised 
 himself too, as gently, on his elbow. The old 
 otter spied him, and in an instant was under 
 water, but Causey "Tally-hoed," and "Tally- 
 hoed " again with an emphasis which no ordinary
 
 THE SILVER OTTER 117 
 
 occasion would have wrung from so old a sports- 
 man. 
 
 " Tis 'im, sir ! " he cried. " Tis 'im again ! " 
 as the huntsman with the horn hurried to his 
 halloo. "Tis th' old witch, th' old zilver otter 
 again. Zure's fate it is." 
 
 "Where did you see him, Causey? exactly 
 where ? " 
 
 "Jist there, sir. Bezide the big zedge, sir. 
 Jist there, as zure's fate. Us may all as well 
 go 'ome. 'Tis the same one." 
 
 " Go home be everythinged ! " the master 
 yelled, hunting his hounds to the spot shown. 
 And now they are in the water again and among 
 the sedges, dashing great flags this way and that 
 with joyous music. Down stream again he is, 
 and as the hounds swing off, in a long trailing 
 line, another man views him again below but 
 no grey head and silver ear this time, only the 
 black tip of a nose gently thrust above the 
 surface. 
 
 And so on, up and down the stream the 
 hounds go now baying with the clear voice of 
 full conviction, now swimming or dashing along 
 the bank, silently at fault, continually drawn this 
 way or that as a man views the quarry. Below, 
 the hunters are arrayed in a long line across the 
 shallows to prevent his breaking down ; but the 
 silver-eared one has no need to do that. In the
 
 n8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 broad, deep, muddy pool outside his house door 
 he may find safe hiding enough for a while yet. 
 Once he is viewed low down, almost down to 
 the shallow ; but the next view of him is away 
 up stream, and not a hound has as yet had a nip 
 at him. 
 
 After that there is a long spell of silence, 
 neither hounds have scented him nor men 
 viewed him. They have tried back at the old 
 holt again ; but there is no sufficient clamour 
 of the hounds to prove more than his recent 
 occupation. Where can he be? Causey does 
 not know, all the more willing than ever since 
 this disappearance to advance the theory of his 
 witchcraft. All are at fault. 
 
 Further up stream they had been making 
 hay, until the joy of hunting the silver-eared one 
 had drawn them away from their occupation. 
 An occasional carelessly tossed wisp came 
 floating down the stream. A little gleaning had 
 clung round the trailing boughs of a drooping 
 pollard. 
 
 "Will 'ee lend me yer pole a moment?" 
 Causey asked a member of the Hunt. " Thank 
 'ee, sir." 
 
 He leaned out over the slanting stem, reached 
 to the wisp of sodden hay, and lifted it, like the 
 tress of a drowned woman's hair, on the pole's 
 end.
 
 THE SILVER OTTER 119 
 
 " I told ee zo ! " 
 
 Now Causey had not told a single soul about 
 it; but his action gave him every justification 
 for the use of the famous phrase, for there, 
 instantly as he lifted the draggled wisp, sank 
 out of view the tiny bright eyes and the silver 
 ear. 
 
 "Tally-ho! Tally-ho! 'Ewunkatme. Sure's 
 fate he wunk." 
 
 Then away went hounds and huntsmen again, 
 and away all the field, down stream, following 
 a bright line of silvery bubbles rising from the 
 surface. And now they had him at a certain 
 disadvantage, for he was caught in the bend of 
 the river, cornered as it seemed. He had stayed 
 there, beneath that wisp of hay, who could say 
 how long, breathing at his ease, while the sodden 
 hay scent baffled the hounds; and there might 
 have stayed till evening came, had Causey only 
 been in his accustomed seat at the Ring o' Bells. 
 But now he was startled out, and his enemies 
 were close upon him, leaping after him in the 
 shallows, driving him to the bank. So up the 
 bank he ran, amidst the wild shouts of the field 
 as they noted his famous markings, up the bank 
 a little way and even into the meadow for a yard 
 or two. That was enough for him. He knew 
 he was no match for his foes on foot, but by that 
 movement he had turned their flank and stole
 
 120 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 into water again below the nose of the lowest 
 hound. 
 
 And now a loose-running terrier, who had 
 sighted him on land, came racing after him, and 
 with one bound was on his back as he entered 
 the water. He turned deftly, and with a grip of 
 his jaws made the dog, less amphibious, loose 
 his hold. But it took an instant's time, and in 
 that instant a hound closed on him ; but could 
 not hold him; and again the silvery bubbles 
 went gaily down the stream, and all hounds and 
 field in chorus after them. 
 
 Then there was silence. No one viewed him ; 
 no hound spoke to him with any emphasis of 
 conviction. Low down, after a while, a boy 
 "tally-hoed" him, but later confessed with 
 shame that it might have been a water-rat. 
 
 At length, when despair and gloom were 
 settling on field and hounds alike, there came 
 again a cheering halloo. This time it was high, 
 high up, close to the great tree-stem again and 
 it was out of the thickness of some water weeds 
 that they had seen the black snout peep up. So 
 again all was joy and clamour, and they hunted 
 and dashed, and again a hound got a nip, but 
 they never viewed him again by head-mark ; 
 and then, yet again, all was silence. 
 
 Now men were very tired and very hungry, 
 for it was four o'clock and there had been no
 
 THE SILVER OTTER 121 
 
 pause for luncheon, and the hounds shared in 
 their mood and hunted listlessly; and it was clear 
 that if an end was to be made it must be 
 speedily. Some said the otter had been badly 
 nipped likely, they said, he was drowned. The 
 miller should be asked to let off the water, 
 then they would find him in the river bed. 
 Causey sniffed. 
 
 So all went and feasted under a great tree. 
 Men changed certain nether garments, under 
 cover of a hedge ; ladies, some said, changed 
 theirs under cover of another ; but this is one of 
 those mysteries which no man knows. 
 
 In the meantime the miller let off all the 
 water, and the river bed grew quite dry. Then 
 they found, drowned, as had been surmised, and 
 stranded, an otter indeed but such an otter ! 
 He had no size to boast of young pads, feeble 
 jaw, above all no silver ear. 
 
 " I told you he was drowned, Causey," the 
 master said. 
 
 " What's drownded ? " Causey asked sourly. 
 
 " The otter, of course. There he is." 
 
 "The otter! What otter?" 
 
 " We must have changed him, of course. 
 There must have been two otters under that 
 tree stem. The silver-eared chap must have 
 gone back in that last long check and turned out 
 another."
 
 122 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 "Do ee think zo?" said Causey with sour 
 scorn. " I tell ee there was no teu otters. Us 
 never changed otters. 'Twas the zilver otter 
 he changed hisself." 
 
 And whether he did or no, it is on the record 
 that he was never seen again.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 
 
 WHEN we were boys the season of the year 
 which promised the most glorious possibilities 
 was that inclement time of mid-winter in which 
 it was likely that we might be blessed with a 
 heavy fall of snow. The cold weather drives 
 most wild things nearer the haunts of man and 
 the crumbs thrown, in charity, from his window 
 and the scraps, in carelessness, from his back- 
 door. The big woods then are but skeletons, 
 save for the perennial foliage of an occasional 
 fir. The wealth of their leafage is stripped, and 
 the birds find better covert in those great fences 
 of the western counties where the yellow grasses 
 make a tangle with the bare limbs of thorn and 
 hazel and bramble. 
 
 At such a season each sheltered nook of the 
 hedge-banks, where the overhanging grass gave 
 some sort of a shelter from the east wind, would 
 be occupied by a field-fare or red-wing feebly 
 scratching where the soil was least frostbound,
 
 i2 4 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 feebly flying thence with stiff wings over the 
 snow, soon to return to the sheltering bank, and 
 again to be hunted forth. In a hard winter we 
 would kill many, would find many dead already, 
 without any effort of ours, dead of cold and of 
 lack of food. How was food to be got by these 
 creatures with their soft bills, when all the 
 world was iron-bound in frost beneath a coverlet 
 of snow? Then, too, it was that we might hope 
 to track to its form a rabbit, and running to our 
 friend, the gardener of our next neighbour (our 
 close and well-beloved friend, because he had a 
 gun), bring him to steal over the snow and shoot 
 the rabbit in his form, even as he sat. We had 
 not the slightest doubt that this friend of ours 
 was one of the very finest shots ; in fact, it is 
 not too much to say that we deemed him the 
 finest shot in all the world, with his single- 
 barrelled muzzle-loader which he loaded with 
 such infinite care and pain. In the first place he 
 quite gave us to understand that there were no 
 better shots; and in the second place we cannot 
 recall that we ever saw him miss, which is a 
 great deal to say. It is true that one can now 
 recognise that his ambition was moderate; he 
 never committed the imprudence of risking his 
 reputation by firing at an object that moved ; he 
 always waited until it stopped. Neither did he 
 fire then without prolonged aim, the gun being
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 125 
 
 very slowly raised, held to the shoulder an 
 immensely long time, with the left eye hermeti- 
 cally closed the while. A wider knowledge has 
 led us to place others before him merely as 
 marksmen; but as a stalker he was certainly 
 skilful, for, though a very large, heavy man, he 
 would creep down a hedge-side making himself 
 " as small as a rat," according to his own simile, 
 or, at all events, so small that the wood-pigeon, 
 contemplating the face of nature from the top 
 branches of the high elm-tree which grew out of 
 the hedge-bank, did not observe him neither 
 while he crept down along the hedge, nor while 
 he slowly raised his single-barrelled gun and 
 took his long, monocular aim ; nor, indeed, was 
 aware of any hostile presence until it found 
 itself, in response to the thundering discharge 
 of the heavily-loaded piece, tumbling head- 
 downwards through the tree, with a wonderful 
 inability to avoid the branches and a refusal on 
 the part of its wings to give it any sort of aerial 
 support. So the deadly marksman picked it up 
 and finished it off by giving its head a few taps 
 on the gun-barrel, while we hurried up to com- 
 pliment him as his skill deserved and to admire 
 the beautiful pearly tints on the pigeon's neck. 
 Had these been his only achievements, the 
 killing of the wood-pigeons and of the rabbits 
 which we marked down for him in the snow
 
 126 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 we might have thought less highly of his prowess 
 than we did, for on these occasions he always 
 took the quarry. But in return he would always 
 shoot for us any bird whose bright plumage or 
 other qualities (which were not edible) made it 
 precious to us. All quarry useful for the pot 
 he took home with him to cheer his little red- 
 cheeked children; but he was always ready to 
 expend powder and shot, in economical measure, 
 on small birds for our museum of Natural 
 History. 
 
 The appearance of the red-wings and field- 
 fares coincidently with the severe weather from 
 which they seemed to suffer so badly, gave us 
 much food for speculation. We could under- 
 stand the ways of the swallows and warblers, 
 who came to us in the summer, and flew for the 
 winter to warmer lands; we could even have 
 understood the manners of these migratory 
 thrushes if they had seemed to enjoy the cold. 
 But clearly they did not : multitudes died of the 
 severe weather; yet we were told that in the 
 summer time, when our weather was warm, 
 these birds sought colder climes. It all seemed 
 very inexplicable then, and we could only con- 
 jecture that these were very foolish creatures 
 who did not know what was good for them. 
 Later we grew to learn that the movements of 
 birds are determined by questions of food rather
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 127 
 
 than of temperature; though doubtless the 
 supplies of food are under the influence of 
 temperature, and so too, indirectly, the birds. 
 And we might have known further, had we ever 
 read the newspapers, and had the papers of that 
 date taken to publishing the weather-reports 
 among their daily news, that the thrushes did 
 not congregate in our neighbourhood only when 
 our weather was cold, but also, and more par- 
 ticularly, when it was cold weather to the east- 
 ward, and generally over the island. Then, 
 finding the ground hard to their bills, they 
 would keep pushing down to the milder climate 
 of the western counties where they would be 
 more likely to find their food in a soil that was 
 not iron-bound. This question of supply seems 
 to be at the root of most of the movements of 
 birds, and if thoroughly understood might ex- 
 plain much that is yet obscure. No one, for 
 instance, has yet explained (to the satisfaction 
 of any but himself) the hard and fast line which 
 the nightingale has drawn across England as the 
 western boundary of his migration ; and though 
 he sings night and day he tells us nothing of his 
 reasons. 
 
 It is with shame we have to confess that we 
 cannot remember the first occasion of our firing 
 a gun, though we can well recall the manner in 
 which it was pressed to the right shoulder by a
 
 128 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 grown man standing behind, while his arm 
 guided us to hold the barrel at the proper angle. 
 Our dog, Viper, remembers those first great 
 occasions, looking back out of the dim shadow- 
 land of the dog's hereafter ; we can be confident 
 that he remembers, for his wild excitement over 
 them, his yelps and bounds, are sensible presences 
 to us now. Whether we killed or no, is also 
 forgotten, and the nature of the quarry we aimed 
 at. But there remains a conviction that we kept 
 our eyes open, unlike our friend the gardener; 
 and that was even more creditable in those days 
 than it is now, for if the cap fitted loosely you 
 were very likely to get some stray powder 
 blown into your eye. 
 
 The loading of a gun was no small thing for 
 a boy to learn at that remote period. It was 
 not a mere matter of opening the breech and 
 fitting in a cartridge. First the powder had to 
 be poured in, and a wad rammed down upon 
 that ; then the shot and another wad ; finally the 
 cap had to be put on the nipple, after carefully 
 noting that the nipple-hole was not blocked, and 
 that the grains of powder were peeping up ready 
 for ignition. If the hole was in any way blocked 
 it was necessary to search out the obstruction 
 with a pin. It was highly desirable, moreover, 
 that each step in the loading should be taken in 
 its own order. Obviously it was a bad plan to
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 129 
 
 pour in the shot before the powder, or ram down 
 a wad first of all; but it was above all things 
 impressed upon us that the cap should be put 
 on last. Authority very properly represented 
 that, if the hammers should be released by the 
 jar of ramming, no harm would be done if the 
 detonating cap were not on the nipple ; whereas, 
 if the hammer descended on the cap while we 
 were in process of ramming home, it was likely 
 that the ramrod would be fired right through the 
 rammer's body, so far as that body should remain 
 recognisable. In point of fact we never did 
 know a hammer to be released by the ramming, 
 but no doubt there was a chance of it in cheap 
 guns with inferior locks. Authority had every 
 justification of its wisdom in this regard. 
 
 It was a tedious business, this loading, in 
 ordinary ; but how immensely more exasperating 
 when one was in the middle of a covey nicely 
 scattered among the turnips, and getting up, one 
 by one, all round. Not that any such fortune as 
 this was ever ours in the early days of our 
 shooting with the gun. The first mark at which 
 we practised was the flame of a candle in a room. 
 We soon learned to snuff this out with the blow 
 of the cap at a considerable number of paces. 
 Next we began to wage war against all the small 
 birds in the familiar haunts, and, shooting them 
 sitting without any sense of shame, soon found 
 
 K
 
 130 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 our hands more than full of taxidermy. We 
 recognised one disadvantage in the use of the 
 gun, namely that the quarry that fell to it was 
 usually more badly mangled than had been the 
 case with the victims of the catapult. The latter 
 fell to a single pellet ; the former often received 
 a dozen. Nevertheless we appreciated that the 
 muzzle-loader was a far more deadly weapon, 
 though by this time the sticks of our favourite 
 catapults were so jagged with commemorative 
 notches, that they felt something like the surface 
 of a fir-cone. But with the gun one might hope 
 for such large quarry! Rabbits and wood- 
 pigeons were now no longer above our ambitions. 
 A wood-pigeon, indeed, was one of our earliest 
 triumphs. At the foot of the kitchen-garden 
 was a bed of winter cabbages, and whenever 
 the snow made other food hard to come by the 
 wood-pigeons loved to settle among those juicy 
 leaves. The upper windows of the house com- 
 manded this bed, and if from that point of vantage 
 one saw certain grey forms moving among the 
 cab \age-tops as they peeped up through their 
 coveMet of snow, then forthwith, rushing to that 
 beloved room on the ground floor, one would 
 proceed to the hasty loading of the gun with its 
 heaviest charge of powder and biggest shot, 
 for wood-pigeons were very large game indeed, 
 and their feathers strong and bony. Of course,
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 131 
 
 in four cases out of five, by the time this long 
 process had been accomplished, the pigeons had 
 been frightened away; or Viper, defeating all 
 attempts to elude him, would come barking with 
 joy at the sight of the gun ; or Authority would 
 throw open a window (with noise enough to 
 scare away every bird within miles) just to ask, 
 out of sheer idle impertinence, where one was 
 going. But on the fifth attempt none of these 
 exasperating misadventures happened. Boy- 
 hood crept unnoticed of Authority, of Viper, 
 or of pigeons, over the snowy lawn, up to the 
 quickset thorn hedge of the kitchen-garden, 
 peeped through a partial gap in the fence, saw 
 three beautiful wood-pigeons (more big and 
 beautiful, to Boyhood's seeming, than pigeons 
 had ever appeared before), quietly, contentedly, 
 and unsuspiciously walking hither and thither 
 among the cabbages and picking wedges out of 
 the leaves. Then Boyhood, with its heart going 
 at a prodigious pace, raised the gun, and, poking 
 it through the gap, brought it to bear on the 
 nearest pigeon. Bang! and there is a flapping 
 of great wings ; pigeons go cleaving their way 
 up into the grey sky, only two pigeons, and on 
 the ground there had been three ! The smoke is 
 clearing ; yes there a pigeon really lies ! Even 
 from here the red line can be seen pulsing from 
 his neck and staining the snow. It is infinitely
 
 132 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 tantalising to have to run round a hundred yards, 
 for this quickset hedge is not negotiable ; it is 
 very hard to believe (so accustomed does Boy- 
 hood grow to disappointment) that the pigeon 
 really will be there by the time the cabbages are 
 reached. Yet there the pigeon is, sure enough : 
 no miracle, as one had expected, had been 
 wrought to carry it away; and Boyhood soon 
 is assured by holding in eager hands its warm, 
 beautiful, solid body. There is no doubt about 
 it ; Boyhood has killed a wood-pigeon, and 
 henceforward will go about among its fellows 
 feeling at least two inches taller. It is wonder- 
 ful what a sufficing joy that wood-pigeon affords 
 for a whole day at least. One does not so much 
 want to go forth and kill another as to stay at 
 home and look at this one, to stroke it and feel 
 it, and make sure that it is real. One is so 
 busied, for the day, with admiration, that not 
 until the morrow can one find time for the more 
 practical business of skinning it. The cook has 
 promised that she will dress the body afterwards, 
 though she consents with a certain shamefaced- 
 ness, as though she deemed it a little indelicate 
 to exercise her professional functions on a 
 carcase thus denuded. But after the pigeon 
 has been skinned, and his body eaten, Boyhood 
 awakes to the fact that there are still other 
 wood-pigeons in the world : the one that has
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 133 
 
 been killed becomes merely a delightful memory ; 
 and wood-pigeons in the flesh and feathers, still 
 to be killed, are once again the great realities of 
 life. 
 
 No step in life appears so great as this, in the 
 retrospect, since the day that one killed one's 
 first small bird. That former step was biggest 
 of all ; for by it one became, out of a boy who 
 had killed nothing, a boy who had killed a bird. 
 The latter step made a boy who had killed a 
 wood-pigeon out of a boy who had killed black- 
 birds and thrushes ; it was immense, but it did 
 not add so infinitely to one's self-respect as the 
 other. By the former, one became something, 
 whereas one had been nothing ; but by the latter 
 one merely became something bigger, whereas 
 one had been something less. The former step 
 made a difference in kind ; the latter, merely in 
 degree. 
 
 But it was a difference not merely in degree, 
 but in kind, to have become a boy whose natural 
 weapon was the gun, instead of a boy whose 
 natural weapon was the catapult. For the 
 present the world seemed to have nothing to 
 offer us that was not within our reach. Our 
 ambition took wings. Hitherto the modest 
 circuit of the garden, the orchard, and the neigh- 
 bouring fields, with occasional excursions to a 
 certain well-beloved wood, had sufficed for us.
 
 134 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Now, fully armed with a double-barrelled gun, 
 this restricted area seemed quite insufficient. 
 There was, at times, much to attract one even in 
 these few fields. Starlings would come in big 
 flocks in the winter-thne : there were wood- 
 pigeons, as has been seen, to be had jfor the 
 stalking ; and there were a few rabbits in the 
 great bank of the stream which wandered down 
 to the river, but these rabbits, from constant 
 hunting, were of preternatural acuteness. Yet 
 all these were attractive quarry, and edible, 
 which was an added charm, for nothing is more 
 fascinating to Boyhood than to find itself being 
 fed and satisfied by the prey that has fallen to 
 its own hunting ; it puts Boyhood into immedi- 
 ate touch and kinship with the hunters and 
 trappers of the story-books. In the hard weather, 
 too, there were the field-fares and the red-wings, 
 which were an easy prey and excellent for the 
 pot. Times begin to be hard for the kitchen- 
 maid when Boyhood goes gunning in the winter 
 and expects all that he kills to be plucked. 
 
 Our favourite wood, though we were given 
 free access to it for bird-nesting, and though 
 tacitly we were permitted to do our worst in it 
 with the catapult, was great Taboo to the gun. 
 But some two miles from home, where the river 
 goes out into the sea, was a great marshy common 
 or burrows, with sand-hills on the seaward side,
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 135 
 
 which seemed as if it were made to be a per- 
 petual joy to gunning Boyhood. Being common- 
 land, all had a right of access and of shooting ; 
 there was no preservation. And if the birds 
 and creatures that frequented it were made 
 wondrous cunning by the constant persecutions 
 of the long-shore gunners, their wiliness made 
 them only the more attractive quarry to a boy 
 to whom a snipe and a brace of sandpipers 
 seemed a tolerable reward for a day of toil. 
 Had this been the maximum of the possible bag 
 it is likely, indeed, that even Boyhood at its 
 keenest might have wearied. The delightful 
 thing about it was that there was no maximum, 
 no limit ; one might kill any number of things ; 
 the prospect was infinite. For besides the com- 
 mon-land proper, there were marshy meadows 
 adjoining, over which one had virtually an equal 
 right of shooting, for they were so far from 
 houses that we were little likely to be interfered 
 with. And in some of these meadows we had 
 known of a covey of partridges which Boyhood 
 could pursue, with beating heart and utter 
 unconcern of such mundane restrictions as 
 game-licenses, a whole day long. Once, even, 
 a far-wandering cock-pheasant had been seen in 
 one of the tangled hedgerows. Then, away out 
 at the other side of the common was a great 
 bed of tall sharp rushes whose stems were
 
 136 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 multitudinously adorned with cocoons of the six- 
 spot burnet moth ; and among these one has seen, 
 in fleeting glimpses, the form of a hare (" as big as 
 a great donkey," in Joe's phrase), has seen, but 
 has never slain, so that there remains the con- 
 tinual expectation of seeing again. Among the 
 sand-hills, too, were many burrows of rabbits 
 and some of them not untenanted. Some of them 
 had curious tenants, not of the furry four-footed 
 nature of their excavators, but duck-billed, 
 mottled, web-footed birds ; sheldrakes, in fact, 
 which in that country are called burrow-ducks 
 for choice. 
 
 In the midst of this great common of marsh- 
 land was a big shallow pond fed by the streams 
 which came down from the furze-clad steeps 
 above the cliffs from which we took the jackdaws. 
 A sluggish, muddy-bottomed river led from this 
 pond to the estuary. It was in this pond that, 
 long ago, before coming to years of gunning dis- 
 cretion, we had been wading after eels, while 
 Viper looked on uneasily, like a hen at its duck- 
 lings, from the bank. A wedge-shaped ripple in 
 the water came towards us, led by a black dot ; 
 the whole arrangement meaning a swimming 
 water-rat, whose head formed the dot at the 
 apex. A hand gripped at him, missed his head 
 and his body, but grabbed him fast by the tail. 
 He turned and gripped the small hand of the
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 137 
 
 grabber ; but the grabber held tight, and so did 
 the rat. Viper's excitement was fever-hot; so 
 hot as nearly, but not quite, to induce him to 
 take to the water, for which he had an almost 
 feline distaste. Boy and rat came to the bank 
 together, and not till Viper had the rat across 
 the back did the little beast let go. Afterwards 
 Boyhood got much praise for not letting the rat 
 go when he was bit, though what harm he did 
 any one in that pond is not evident. That, how- 
 ever, is the way of Authority ; the generalities 
 of Authority know no exception ; rats are to be 
 killed, boys are to be scolded, the devil is to be 
 resisted universally. Even in this sentence 
 one has committed a serious error, for one used 
 to be told that it showed "lack of reverence" to 
 write the name of his Satanic majesty, in our 
 Sunday exercises, with a small " d." 
 
 But neither rats nor eels had a monopoly of this 
 great pond. Scarcely at anytime could one look 
 down upon it, as one came from the higher levels 
 towards the marshland, that one did not see a 
 heron standing sentinel-like in its shallows, 
 motionless, but armed with deadly bayonet-bill, 
 as numberless small eels and sticklebacks would 
 find to their cost. In winter, if no shepherd or 
 gunner had lately passed, there would be usually 
 some mallard or widgeon, which even at a dis- 
 tance one might know from the tame ducks that
 
 138 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 sometimes frequented it, by the apprehensive 
 elevation of the heads. In very severe weather 
 the black-necked geese would visit it, but this 
 happened rarely. At such severe seasons, too, 
 one would be very sure of finding snipe, some- 
 times in big whisps, in one of the meadows near 
 by the common. We often thought that there 
 must have been some peculiar warmth in the 
 water of the little stream which sprang up in the 
 midst of luxuriant cress and herbage in that 
 meadow ; for there the ground was always soft 
 and boggy, even when iron-bound by the black 
 frost elsewhere. Doubtless it was this quality 
 that gave it its popularity with the snipe in the 
 severest frost; they could scoop in safety here 
 (for snipe do scoop rather than probe) in the 
 assured hope of finding food without bruising 
 their soft bills. When the snipe were most 
 plentiful (that is to say, when they were in 
 whisps) it was generally very difficult to get 
 good shooting. They would rise, scolding with 
 one voice, in such bewildering numbers that two 
 barrels generally sent their contents among them 
 harmlessly, and drove the birds climbing high 
 into the air with wide wheelings, after which 
 they would depart, once and for all, to some 
 similar warm, wet place elsewhere. Sometimes 
 they would continue for a while dashing back- 
 wards and forwards over one's head, giving
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 139 
 
 chances of repeated shots, but all difficult ones ; 
 the driven snipe is not an easy mark. It was 
 more to be wished that there should be some 
 half-dozen snipe, say, in the meadow. Then they 
 would rise, not all together, like packed grouse, 
 but one by one, allowing nice time for reloading ; 
 and it was perhaps Boyhood's greatest triumph 
 that in this meadow we killed five snipe, all jacks, 
 without a miss, in so short a space that all were 
 on the ground at a time ; we killed the last before 
 we picked up the first. And we found them all ! 
 That was not the least part of the triumph, with- 
 out a dog, in the thickest of all that lush herbage ! 
 On the whole, a dog was more of a trial than 
 a joy in the course of those expeditions. Here 
 and there, it is true, he might be useful. On the 
 way down to the common (just below the spot 
 dear to our catapulting days, where the road- 
 side stream was the constant haunt of a pied 
 wagtail and, more rarely, of a yellow one) the 
 tangle of hedge comes down very densely over 
 the stream. Thence a dog has once or twice 
 put up for us a moorhen, put out would rather 
 be the way to say it, for there was not much 
 altitude about the bird's fluttering, scuttling 
 progress. One could not depend on finding the 
 moorhen here, for this was not his abiding- 
 place ; he only came here occasionally, following 
 the course of this tributary of the bigger stream
 
 i 4 o WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 that went beside the boundary-hedge of the 
 common. In this stream, which was just of 
 such breadth as is difficult to jump across, grew 
 some very tall bulrushes, besides irises which 
 were gloriously golden at the blossoming season, 
 and a tangle of smaller water-weeds. Here was 
 the real home of the moorhen, and here, too, 
 snipe hid themselves, and could not be forced 
 to quit cover without the help of a dog. In a 
 stream which coursed over the common, parallel 
 to this one, we have killed a dabchick, and have 
 seen a grey phalarope which had been killed 
 upon it; but never had the luck to see the latter 
 rare bird alive. This was the stream that led 
 down to the big river from the pond to which 
 the wild duck loved to come. There was no 
 growth of weed about it, and any bird-life that 
 moved upon it had either swum down from the 
 pond or up from the river. 
 
 Yet that is not an exact statement, if a king- 
 fisher, fleeting like a blue flash over its surface, 
 can be said to have moved upon it; for two 
 bridges spanned the stream at distances of half 
 a mile from each other, and from one of them 
 the passer-by would always scare a king-fisher 
 to send him scudding in a line of blue light to 
 the shelter of the other. Often and often we 
 fired at him ; and though the shot has seemed 
 sometimes to make a circular pattern on the
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 141 
 
 water with the blue body just above it for its 
 centre, that blue body has ever gone on flashing 
 down the stream, as if it created for itself a 
 halcyon in the midst of leaden pellets like that 
 the ancients used to say it made for itself among 
 the waves. We held the superstition, which 
 probably every boy shared with us, that the 
 British Museum would give 100 for a perfect 
 nest of the king-fisher; and often did we go 
 a-wading in the shallow water, but deep mud, 
 under those two bridges, in search of our golden 
 prize. Of course we never found it. Likely 
 enough the king-fisher nested there, but down 
 some long hole among the stones to which our 
 hands could not penetrate and which we soon 
 tired of seeking in the discomfort and dirt of our 
 wading. After all, as later experience and the 
 South Kensington Natural History Museum has 
 shown us, we should have discovered nothing 
 really worthy of being called a nest, had we 
 ever succeeded in invading the king-fisher's 
 nursery. For his lodging seems to be on the 
 cold ground, save for the embellishment of the 
 few chance fish-bones which he, or his wife, or 
 his children have been unable to digest; so 
 that the superstition which sent us searching 
 for these nests was about as useful as the advice 
 to children to hold up a guinea-pig by the tail in 
 order to see its eyes drop out.
 
 142 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Now all this great common was a game- 
 preserve, according to the reckoning of game in 
 a boy's category ; for innumerable flocks of 
 dunlins and the small ringed plover used to 
 frequent it, and were not too wild to afford a 
 shot, a good family shot, too, into the brown 
 of the flock, such as a boy loves. It took a quick 
 eye to see these little birds at any distance, 
 running over the ground, running all in the 
 same direction, nearly always up-wind. Some- 
 times they would permit one to approach close 
 enough for a shot on the ground, if one came to 
 them not directly, but in a slanting direction, 
 as 'if one meant to pass them by. But more 
 often they would begin to raise their whistling 
 cry, and run a little more quickly, just before 
 gun-shot range was reached; then they would 
 rise up, flying low for a yard or two in the 
 wind's teeth, then drift away down it, showing 
 the silvery sheen of their under parts. The 
 moment of rising was the best at which to take 
 them, if they were within range, for then they 
 had their wings outstretched and the unpro- 
 tected parts of their little bodies exposed to the 
 shot; whereas, when on the ground, the strong 
 wing-feathers were folded over them as a shield. 
 But after the first shot the whole flock would 
 rise up into the air and wheel about as if obe- 
 dient to the word of command, at one moment
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 143 
 
 nearly invisible, when their dusky backs were 
 towards the gunner ; the next, flashing silver, as 
 all showed their breasts in a simultaneous turn. 
 In stormy weather, when the force of the wind 
 made the exact angle of flight hard to determine, 
 the flocks would sometimes come flashing close 
 past one with lightning speed, making the whole 
 air alive with their whistle and their movement. 
 Then, a lucky snap-shot into their midst would 
 sometimes bring down three or four to a single 
 barrel; or sometimes, again, the shot would 
 pass harmlessly through the midst of them as 
 though they were under the special protection 
 of a Providence unkindly to the boy. 
 
 Dunlins and small plover were not always 
 the only quarry. Among them we would some- 
 times see noble forms, lifting their heads proudly 
 aloft over the flock of smaller game, which we 
 recognised, with beating hearts, for golden 
 plover ; but these great birds, speaking rela- 
 tively, were always wilder, so that it scarcely 
 ever (happened to us to come within range of 
 them. Occasionally, too, there were grey plover, 
 and often starlings, but these latter we reckoned 
 inferior quarry even to the dunlins. 
 
 After a while we began to study the manners 
 of these birds more closely, and to observe that 
 they came up to the common from the foreshore 
 at certain times, namely when the inflowing tide
 
 144 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 began to cover up the mud flats on which they 
 had made such a tracery of lace-work with the 
 impressions of their delicate feet. Then we 
 began to lie in wait for them in their flight, 
 ambushed in the scattered clumps of rushes 
 which lay away from the big bed. Over these 
 the flocks used to sweep in wheeling, snipe-like 
 flight, affording us a chance of a quick shot at 
 them as they went by. Curlew used occasionally 
 to settle on the open spaces of the common, the 
 wildest and wariest of all birds. There was but 
 one way of coming near them, and that way 
 failed fifty times for once that it succeeded. If 
 you hid yourself seaward of the tall birds and 
 sent a man to walk up to them, not starting 
 from your ambush, but from a point some 
 hundred yards or so to one side of it there 
 was a chance that they would swing back over 
 your head. For this was their custom, to rise at 
 a distance of many gunshots and come swinging 
 round on one or other side of the source of 
 their fear, as if to examine it somewhat more 
 closely but from the better and safer vantage- 
 point which was given by being on the wing. 
 In this way we killed one of the big curlew, and 
 several of the lesser or whimbrel. At certain 
 seasons of the year a small flock of these lesser 
 curlew used to haunt the common and to be 
 quite indifferent to our approach, so that we
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 145 
 
 could throw a stone among them ; but this only 
 happened just before the breeding season, when 
 their thoughts were occupied with the great 
 business of pairing, to the exclusion of all 
 emotions of fear and ordinary prudence. We 
 credited them with knowing that we had a 
 conscience which forbade our shooting them at 
 such a time ; but probably this was assigning to 
 them more than their due intelligence. 
 
 It will be sufficiently clear that these enter- 
 prises were not of the nature of those in which 
 the assistance of a dog is at all useful ; and even 
 in the great rushes, which formed a thick enough 
 covert in all conscience, a dog was rather a 
 hindrance than a help. For all this country was 
 common-ground, with a public right of shooting 
 over it, and the result was that even the snipe 
 and occasional hares which resorted to the big 
 rush-bed were in such a state of watchfulness 
 and wildness that the trouble was always rather 
 to go delicately enough to avoid putting up the 
 game at a distance than to get it to quit covert. 
 In the rushes a good retriever, trained to keep 
 well to heel, might have been useful, but such 
 trained canine intelligence was never at our 
 disposal. 
 
 South of the big rush-bed a step over a 
 gravelly bank brought us to the foreshore. At 
 spring-tides the salt water of the estuary came 
 
 L
 
 146 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 right up to this bank, but at ordinary high-tides 
 the mud flats were bare for a hundred yards or 
 more, and were clothed with a growth of low, 
 soft, succulent weed which was the favourite 
 haunt of flocks of linnets We disdained to 
 waste powder and shot on such small game; 
 but once in the winter time we saw, among the 
 linnets, a bird much of their own size, in 
 reality, as we found afterwards, it was some- 
 what larger which was not one of them and 
 seemed altogether unfamiliar to us. On the 
 first occasion of their rising we did not fire at 
 this stranger in their midst, but when we 
 followed them after they had plumped down 
 again, with innumerable twitterings, according 
 to .the manner of linnets, again the unfamiliar 
 bird rose among them. This time one of us 
 fired at him, and with true aim, for he fell among 
 the weeds of the mud flat. When we picked 
 him up we found him a bird altogether beyond 
 our ken. The colouring of his upper parts was 
 somewhat like a skylark's, and we knew enough 
 of ornithology to class him at once among the 
 larks by the great length of the claw upon his 
 hindmost toe. But all the front of his breast 
 was of a bright yellow, quite unlike any lark or 
 pipit of which we had knowledge, and, half 
 encircling his neck, was a black crescent with a 
 horn pointing upwards on either side. We had
 
 FIRST DAYS WITH THE GUN 147 
 
 not a notion what the bird might be, never 
 having seen him hitherto in the flesh, nor in 
 the pictures in the bird books. We were 
 greatly excited when we took him home, and 
 still more elated when at length we succeeded 
 in identifying him. He was a shore-lark ; there 
 was no possibility of mistaking such distinctive 
 markings; and the book (let us refrain from 
 mentioning its title) in which we discovered 
 him, said that only four times had the shore-lark 
 been recorded as killed in Great Britain. We 
 wrote to " The Field," announcing our claim to 
 fame as the fifth observer to make so rare a find, 
 and were slightly disappointed by an editorial 
 note to the effect that, though the bird was truly 
 a rare visitor to Great Britain, the book in 
 question was in error in saying that it had only 
 four times been observed in this country, and 
 that this error had been commented on in "The 
 Field's" review of the book. Nevertheless it 
 was a rare bird, the rarest which ever fell to any 
 weapon of our wielding, and we were not a little 
 proud of it. We have often regretted since, that 
 we did not entrust its setting-up to hands more 
 skilful than ours ; but for many years it 
 inhabited, a precious possession, a box with a 
 glass front of our own fitting, and it is only 
 lately that we have been compelled, with great 
 reluctance, to confess that time has told too
 
 i 4 8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 heavily on our preservatives, and that all 
 reasons, including sanitary ones, made it desir- 
 able that the shore-lark should be consigned to 
 the ignominy of the dust-bin.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 
 
 THERE was one strange character among the 
 heroes of our boyhood, whom we used often to 
 meet of an evening on our way home from that 
 stretch of common and foreshore described in 
 the last chapter. It was at that mysterious hour 
 that he would generally be faring forth, with his 
 long gun over his shoulder, from his cottage on 
 the edge of the common. He was a rough- 
 looking fellow, with curls of very black hair, 
 tinged here and there with grey, escaping from 
 beneath the fur cap that he often wore. When 
 the weather was at its wildest and coldest, a 
 "sou- wester" would replace the cap of fur. A 
 velveteen coat, of voluminous tail-pockets, clad 
 his upper man, and his legs were encased in 
 trousers of common serviceable corduroy. His 
 face was brown with the sunburn by day and 
 buffeting of night winds, but its striking feature 
 was the pair of dark and marvellously keen eyes, 
 which shot one glance at us as he passed in 
 silence.
 
 i5o WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 He passed always in silence. We never won 
 a word in response to our timid " Good evening," 
 or wish that he might have good sport. Just the 
 one glance was all he deigned us, then passed 
 on, on his solitary way, over the dreary common. 
 We knew where he was going, to a cache among 
 the sandhills fronting the sea, where he would 
 lie in wait, warm in the hole he had dug in the 
 soft white sand, and lined, like a nest, with 
 the yellow bent grass that grew from it, until 
 the ducks came flighting in, or a wandering 
 curlew or plover might venture within reach of 
 the long muzzle-loader. The village boys would 
 look after him curiously, yet even the boldest 
 and most cheeky would never dare to say a 
 chaffing word of him, even when he had passed 
 out of earshot, as was their way with folks whom 
 they knew better or respected less. 
 
 But, in a sense, there could be no one whom 
 they did know much better, for they had seen 
 this solitary ever since the world began, as it 
 seemed to them that is to say, for as long as 
 the memories of their brief lives could carry 
 back. They had known him thus long, as long 
 as they had known anything, and yet had never 
 come to any closer personal knowledge of him 
 than we had gathered from the sight of his 
 figure and the single glance of his keen eyes. 
 About him, by hearsay, they had learnt much,
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 151 
 
 nor were chary at all, on a little encouragement, 
 of passing on to us what others, their elders, had 
 told them. For the whole of his story I have 
 to trust a good deal to hints picked up, and 
 evidence on hearsay, so that I can relate it a 
 great deal more succinctly than I gathered it. 
 
 This man, James Gordon the very name 
 was strange and outlandish in that corner of 
 the country had come into possession of his 
 cottage on the common's verge at the death of 
 an uncle. There he came and lived, and for a 
 while was the gayest of the gay and the wildest 
 of the wild, according to the gaiety and wildness 
 of the little village. At the Red Lion bar his 
 was the most joyous voice in song, the free-est 
 hand in standing treat, the hardest head under 
 the assaults of the insidious pots of small beer. 
 At the annual Whitsun revel he was the favour- 
 ite, and most bedecked with ribbons of the 
 maidens. And when he took to wife the blue- 
 eyed daughter of the village joiner, all were 
 ready to prophesy, with happiest augury, of 
 their union. 
 
 For, despite his wildness, his heart was good. 
 So they all said, willing to forgive him, for his 
 grace and manliness, faults that might have 
 been named vices in one less forgivable. He 
 had a temper, it was well known. True, but 
 that was a manly attribute. What is a man
 
 152 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 worth without a temper? And he had out- 
 grown the wildness of his earlier years, for 
 when he married he was of the mature age of 
 one-and-thirty. 
 
 All promised fairly, and for a while the young 
 wife knew no sorrow at the lonely cottage on 
 the common, save in the long hours of her hus- 
 band's absence, when he was at the business he 
 loved of ferreting out the rats from the houses 
 of the neighbouring gentry and farmers, or 
 aiding with his pack of mongrels in all the rabbit 
 hunts in the country. For these services he was 
 rewarded with a handsomer wage than many a 
 more regular walk in life would have won for 
 him. It was work after his own heart, and 
 James Gordon and his dogs and ferrets became 
 a standing institution in the countryside. The 
 ferreting of rats and rabbits is a business that 
 cannot be pursued all the year round ; but for 
 moles there is no close season, and in the spring 
 and summer Gordon found a means of livelihood 
 after his heart in trapping these burrowing 
 vermin for the farmers, whose fields they harried 
 with unsightly mounds. 
 
 He had his "country," as they would say of 
 a pack of fox-hounds, as clearly defined as 
 Causey's on the other side of Bidecombe. They 
 never thought of crossing each other's boundaries. 
 
 Such was his mode of life, and for three years
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 153 
 
 from the date of their marriage his young wife 
 found no fault with it. It was lonesome at the 
 cottage on the common, but her husband's ardent 
 affection when he returned consoled her for his 
 long absences. Then followed that which the 
 more foreseeing might have feared for a childless 
 woman. The novelty of the marriage state wore 
 off; it may be that there was a suspicion of less 
 warmth in their mutual love. For one reason 
 or another the hours of her husband's absence 
 began to grow very irksome to her. In the 
 village it had all been so different. There, one 
 had but to open the door, and there were neigh- 
 bours ready for a gossip ; but here, scarcely a 
 soul passed in the twenty-four hours, and the 
 village was half a mile or more away. Never- 
 theless, as the months wore on, and the wife 
 became more conscious of the loneliness, she 
 grew more and more into the way of traversing 
 this long half-mile for the sake of the society 
 that she found at the end of it. And in this 
 there might have been no manner of harm if the 
 hours of her husband's work had been constant 
 and regular. But there was no constancy nor 
 regularity about his comings and goings. He 
 would go forth at all sorts of odd hours, when, 
 as he said, "the ducks would be beginning to be 
 on the move." How he knew the times of their 
 movements he could not have explained to the
 
 154 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 wife even had she been willing to listen to an 
 explanation. He looked forth and there would 
 be a haze to windward, or a sign of wind in the 
 sky, or signs more subtle than these, which one 
 could not put into words; and indeed James 
 Gordon himself was emotionally and instinct- 
 ively, rather than rationally, conscious of them. 
 He J "elt that it was the time for the ducks' coming 
 in, and that was all that he could tell one felt it 
 by some curious sympathy with them that he 
 had acquired from studying their ways and 
 sharing their weather. It was a halting explana- 
 tion enough, and so the young wife felt it. 
 Naturally she did not understand it, and 
 equally naturally, perhaps she did not believe 
 it. She believed only that he went out when 
 the fancy seized him. Equally little did she be- 
 lieve in his reply when she asked him for how 
 long he would be away, and he answered that it 
 depended on the birds he could not tell. He 
 could tell if he chose, she believed, and his 
 absence depended not at all upon the birds, but 
 on his moods. Nevertheless, it was all quite 
 true. He could not tell. And sometimes he 
 would be out all night, "because he had expected 
 a good flight of ducks at the dawning." He 
 could not explain his grounds for the expecta- 
 tion, nor why it would sometimes seem good 
 to him to return shortly after dusk, and at
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 155 
 
 others to sit out all the moonlit autumn night. 
 She believed, naturally enough, that it was pure 
 caprice that governed his movements. 
 
 And such being their uncertainty, by day no 
 less than by night, it was natural enough, further, 
 that she should not be able to time her own 
 comings and goings to and from the village 
 exactly with his. Once or twice on his home- 
 coming he found her absent, and forbore to 
 complain when she returned. But with his 
 quick temper, forbearance soon came to an 
 end. And as she was absent more frequently, 
 while the frequency of her visits to the village 
 increased, he chided her, on each occasion more 
 hotly ; on which, after a while, her own temper 
 took fire, and she answered him back with words 
 as hot as his. 
 
 "What was she to do," she asked, "during all 
 the hours that he was away ? He came in and 
 went out as the fancy took him ; why should she 
 be less free?" 
 
 Then he began to take her to task. "Why 
 was she not as other women, who are content 
 to wait patiently at home in their husband's 
 absence?" 
 
 To which she replied that other women lived 
 in the village among their friends ; and besides, 
 she added, they had children at home to take 
 their attention and their affection.
 
 156 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 The reference to their childless state was 
 unfortunate. It aroused the slumbering fury in 
 the man. Their childlessness had been as sore 
 a grief to him as to her, for at heart his nature 
 was an affectionate one. He began to say quick, 
 bitter things; hinted at suspicions, that he did 
 not for a moment entertain, of the object of her 
 visits to the village. She answered in like vein, 
 " How did she know what he was doing all the 
 hours that he pretended to spend on the common 
 or foreshore? What guarantee had she that 
 the wild fowl were the only objects of his 
 attention?" 
 
 The storm of reviling grew, with answer 
 upon answer, until James Gordon could control 
 himself no longer. With a step he reached the 
 gun that stood beside the chimney-piece, and 
 seizing it by the barrel, raised it to strike her 
 with the heavy butt. The girl came of a staunch 
 race, and stood with cheeks blazing and eyes 
 defiant, daring him to touch her. Even in the 
 very act, it was said, he repented, and would 
 have stayed the blow ; but it was too late. The 
 butt fell, not indeed on the wife's fair head on 
 which it had been his purpose, when he raised 
 it, that it should fall his change of mood saved 
 them from that final tragedy but, with crushing 
 force, on the girl's delicate shoulder, and bore 
 her heavily to the floor. Then James Gordon,
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 157 
 
 fearful to trust himself with her any more, strode 
 out, without a word, into the night, still grasping 
 the gun in his hand. 
 
 All that night he strode on, stumbling and 
 heedless, here and there, over the common. The 
 plover or the curlew that he roused to fly, with 
 plaintive note, unseen through the darkness, was 
 never noticed nor heard. Many times he fell 
 into the small ditches that were cut for draining 
 the surface water ; then pulled himself up, with 
 a curse, and so on again through the night. At 
 the dawn of day he came back, tired out and 
 sobered in possession of his right mind again 
 to the lonely cottage. He was terribly afraid of 
 what he might find within. His mind was 
 occupied with the vision of his wife as he had 
 seen her, prone and helpless on the floor. He 
 feared that he might find her dead. 
 
 Instead, he found the cottage empty. The 
 wife had gone. There were few rooms to 
 search. The conclusion was soon reached. 
 All day long he sat there waiting for her, but 
 still she did not come back. In the evening he 
 went up to the village and inquired at her 
 father's house if she had been seen. All de- 
 clared they had not seen her. He knew by 
 their faces that they were lying, but he was too 
 proud to press his questions. Their faces 
 showed him another thing that they were
 
 158 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 afraid of him ; and when he went home to his 
 solitary cottage, a glance at the little looking- 
 glass told him that their fear had not been 
 without reason. His drawn gaunt visage was 
 like the face of a madman. He scarcely knew 
 it for his own, and himself feared to regard it 
 again in the glass. 
 
 From that night forward he was a changed 
 man. His wife did not return to him. He 
 abjured the society of his fellows, and no longer 
 resorted to the Red Lion and other places of 
 meeting in the village. He did but go thither 
 very early of a morning to chuck in the birds that 
 he had shot, receiving payment for them with- 
 out a word, and so back to the lonely cottage and 
 his silent life. 
 
 Once a rumour reached him that his wife was 
 living with some relatives somewhere on the 
 Coombe side, but he paid no heed to it ; and 
 when, a few months later, a message came to 
 him, purporting to be from her, he returned no 
 answer to the man who bore the message, and 
 strode off in silence. 
 
 Such was the story of the man whom we used 
 to see faring out over the common towards sun- 
 set as we came home reluctantly in obedience to 
 the orders of Authority. 
 
 On a certain fine evening in October, nearly 
 two years after his wife had left him, he resorted
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 159 
 
 as usual to his hiding-place among the sandhills. 
 The cache was on the summit of a small hill, 
 whence he could command a free view over the 
 open sea and the estuary of the big river on the 
 right hand. It was a clear peaceful evening, with 
 a light wind from the south which came in gentle 
 whispers through the tresses of dry bent grass 
 that fringed his nest. The gulls had ceased their 
 clamour on the foreshore, and were winging 
 their way in a straggling procession over the 
 sea towards their roosting places on the west- 
 ward cliffs. The sea came rippling up nearly to 
 the base of the sandhills. In the middle distance 
 he saw the white breakers racing on the river's 
 bar. Just ioutside the line of breakers a little 
 boat, with a tanned sail that caught the sunset 
 light redly, was standing in and off in a purpose- 
 less fashion. Gordon idly wondered what it 
 might be doing there, then dismissed the specu- 
 lation shortly from his mind, concluding it to be 
 the boat of some pleasure tripper from the little 
 hamlet of Coombe, whose white houses he could 
 just see streaking down the cliffs to the eastward, 
 beyond the river's estuary. The choiring larks 
 were beginning to settle down for the night 
 among the bents, but still, from the lower shore, 
 came the piping of dotterel, and, oyster-catchers, 
 and curlew, and all the shrill-voiced tribes of 
 wading birds.
 
 160 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Suddenly, appearing out of the blue, after 
 their manner, came a flight of five golden plover 
 swiftly 'scudding past him over the sandhill's 
 crest. Gordon fired after them a hurried shot, 
 and the last bird fell. It fell, out of his sight, 
 over a little knoll of bent-fringed sand. He 
 marked the spot, and lifted himself out of the 
 pit to go to it, while a chorus of shrill clamour, 
 raised by the gun's report, came from the waders 
 on the beach. He took no heed of the piping, 
 which was the familiar response to the sound 
 of- his gun, and was about to step down the 
 yielding bank when, close to him beneath, as it 
 seemed, his very feet came up a cry, shrill as 
 that of the piping birds, yet altogether distinct 
 from theirs in tone. Almost from beneath his 
 feet the cry came, and for a moment he stood 
 still, there, where he was, arrested, trembling 
 with a vague fear of what, he knew not. The 
 cry repeated itself was sustained, rather and 
 Gordon, with a short laugh, threw off the 
 influence of his first uncanny fear, yet still 
 trembled, with an element of curosity now 
 mingling with the first vague terror, as he took 
 a few steps down on the seaward side to the 
 spot whence the cry seemed to issue; and there 
 he saw, in a hole dug in the soft sand a hole 
 similar to that in which he was wont to lie 
 hidden for the birds, though smaller a little
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 161 
 
 child. It lay wrapt in a chequered shawl folded 
 about a fisherman's blue jersey sizes too large 
 for the tiny body. The little face was contorted 
 with fear, which the child expressed by crying 
 as if its heart were breaking. 
 
 " Poor thing, then ! " said Gordon, pitifully ; 
 " did the gun frighten 'ee ? " 
 
 But this conciliatory address found no favour. 
 The babe continued to cry in the hole where it 
 lay, and Gordon, standing helplessly regarding 
 it, could find no better word to say than 
 
 " Poor thing, then ! Where be your 
 mammy ? " 
 
 And still the answer was the same, the plain- 
 tive, pitiable crying. 
 
 Gordon began to realize that his aspect, per- 
 haps, was not reassuring. He laid his gun aside, 
 in sign of friendly intentions. Then, summon- 
 ing a winning smile to his dark face, bent over 
 the little mite and said coaxingly 
 
 "Come. Come then, dearie; don't 'ee cry 
 then, don't 'ee." 
 
 But even this adjuration failed to charm. The 
 babyish misery continued. 
 
 " Come then, dearie," the man pursued, re- 
 sorting to further blandishment. "Come into 
 t'other pit with me then. Come." 
 
 And heedless of the persistently expressed 
 objections he took the little bundle up in his 
 
 M
 
 162 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 strong arms and bore it very tenderly to his own 
 pit on the top of the sandhills. There he held 
 it to him, soothing it and crooning to it till 
 gradually he won it to some passive acceptance 
 of the situation, the convulsive sobs died down 
 and gradually ceased, and finally the child closed 
 its weary little eyes, and its soft breath came 
 regularly. It slept. 
 
 Then, and not till then, James Gordon began 
 to ask himself what he was doing. Further, he 
 began to ask what was the child doing there 
 there in a sand-hole, like a young wheatear? 
 Where was the parent bird ? By what means 
 had the child been brought, and wherefor had it 
 been left? For left it undoubtedly had been. 
 The gloaming was falling fast, and it was certain 
 that any picnicers who might have been taking 
 an al fresco tea among the sandhills would have 
 gone home long ago. The child had been 
 abandoned. It was very certain, too, that it had 
 been left deliberately not accidentally forgotten. 
 The hole, recently dug, in which it had been 
 placed, was evidence of this, as well as the 
 multitude of wrappings by which it was pro- 
 tected from the evening dews. Moreover, a 
 second visit to the child's nest discovered provi- 
 sion in the shape of a bottle of milk left in the 
 sandpit a bottle with the cork in, which the 
 child could not possibly have withdrawn, even
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 163 
 
 if it had been possible that it should have the 
 intelligence to attempt it. As well as Gordon 
 could make the estimate, he judged the age of 
 the child to be some two years. When he 
 revisited the child's sandpit he left the baby 
 asleep in the corner of his own higher nest. The 
 light was failing every moment, but he could 
 still see distinctly tracks of feet that had ap- 
 proached the sandhill from the beach. It 
 appeared that these were the tracks of two 
 persons, of a man and of a child or woman. 
 The larger tracks were made by boots without 
 nails, as he observed from an impression on the 
 hard wet sand just above thewaterline probably, 
 he thought, by a fisherman's boots. And the 
 tracks were fresh. He looked doubtfully out 
 over the sea towards the race of white waves on 
 the bar where the boat with tanned sail could 
 still be seen, bobbing up and down in the dis- 
 turbed water. 
 
 Then he bethought him of his plover, and had 
 no trouble in finding it as it lay dead on the 
 white sand with a few ruddy drops welling from 
 it and caking in the sand. He came back to his 
 pit where the child still slept peacefully. He 
 looked doubtfully back at his cottage, dimly 
 visible across the flat mile or so of common. It 
 was a rough walk home ; ordinarily he did not 
 fear it on the darkest night, but this evening his
 
 1 64 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 " bag " was not ordinarily precious, for he had 
 to carry home the child. 
 
 She did not wake, only made a little stir and 
 murmur, then snoozled down on his shoulder 
 more confidingly than ever as he lifted her up 
 and placed her in the crook of his arm. A cur- 
 lew passed close over their heads as he was 
 setting forth, with a shrill pipe of alarm, to find 
 itself so close to them, that he feared might 
 awake the child; but she slept on peacefully, 
 untroubled. Once on the way home, after the 
 dusk had overtaken them, a flight of duck came 
 quacking high over-head, and Gordon, forgetful 
 for a moment, with the instinct born of habit, 
 made a sudden movement with his gun. At 
 which the little girl stirred again, so that he 
 feared she was about to wake, and he began 
 singing her a low lullaby which soothed her 
 down again with such success that he continued 
 his song in a musical rough baritone. 
 
 A company-keeping couple, who had wandered 
 down towards the common, spread surprise 
 among the village gossips next morning by the 
 news that James Gordon had been heard sing- 
 ing on his way home to his cottage. The wonder 
 grew on the report of Mrs. Pengelly at "the 
 shop," that Gordon, instead of making his 
 small purchases with his usual taciturnity, had 
 been putting to her, that morning, some most
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 165 
 
 strange questions as to the right food for 
 children. 
 
 " I don't know a great sight about mun, Mrs. 
 Pengelly," he admitted, humbly. " If it'd been 
 young ferrets or that kind 'twould be different." 
 
 Mrs. Pengelly, it needs not to say, itched to 
 ask him what interest he had in children, but of 
 late James Gordon had not been the sort of man 
 of whom one readily asks questions about his 
 affairs. 
 
 Later in the day Gordon appeared again in 
 the village, and then Mrs. Pengelly had her 
 heart's fill of gossip. The truth was that he had 
 found himself unable to copei single-handed with 
 this new inmate of his little home. He felt, very 
 sorely, the need of feminine help ; and, knowing 
 no other way, determined to take Mrs. Pengelly 
 into his confidence. He told her of the finding 
 of the child on the sandhills, of his bringing her 
 home, and of the night passed, not without some 
 disturbance, with the child in his bed. In course 
 of one of these disturbances he was ready .to 
 swear that, glancing towards the window, he had 
 seen a pale face pressed against the pane ; but, 
 on rushing out, as if in a panic that some one 
 had come to rob him of his newly-found treasure, 
 could see no one there, and was forced to con- 
 clude that it had been a vision of his fancy. It 
 was not till the morning that he realized the full
 
 166 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 measure of his incapacity. It had been a sad 
 awakening that struggle with refractory small 
 strings and garments and the passionately tearful 
 child. The feminine presence was peremptorily 
 needed in that little cottage. When a thing is 
 needed, where else does one go in search of it 
 but to "the shop"? Had Mrs. Pengelly the 
 needed article? 
 
 Mrs. Pengelly was doubtful interested 
 enormously, and sure she could manage some- 
 thing temporarily, but as a permanence well ! 
 Suggested that the child should be sent up, for 
 her safekeeping, to the shop, a suggestion at 
 which the James Gordon of the old role blazed 
 up again with sudden anger. Mrs. Pengelly 
 hurriedly withdrew the suggestion, promising 
 to provide something temporarily, and eventually 
 James Gordon returned to his cottage accom- 
 panied by a discreet widow of a certain age. 
 
 The day passed peacefully. The little girl, 
 under the feminine influence, began to grow 
 accustomed to her surroundings. Gordon said 
 he would be thankful to the widow if she would 
 stay with the child while he went forth at the dusk, 
 wild-fowling, for the single plover of the previous 
 even did not go far to meet the expenses of his 
 household on its extended scale. After that he 
 would not trouble her, he could manage by 
 himself for the night.
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 167 
 
 When he arrived at the sandhills he found, to 
 his surprise, other tracks leading from the water's 
 edge to the cache in which the child had been 
 left. The tracks were similar to the smaller 
 ones that he had seen before, but even these 
 new tracks were not fresh ; they had been made, 
 he thought, the previous night. Then he 
 observed that they did not stop at the cache, they 
 went on inland. And again the thought of the 
 pale face pressed against the pane recurred to 
 him, and he wondered. 
 
 This evening was not like the previous one. 
 It was warm and quiet, but whereas on the 
 former he had clearly seen to Coombe and to 
 the cliffs beyond it, he could now scarcely make 
 out the line of breakers on the bar. A close 
 haze had come up in the evening with the east 
 wind. It was a night on which the birds, if they 
 came at all, would come low-flying and tame, but 
 it was not a night on which they were likely to 
 be actively on the move. Suddenly a dark object 
 loomed out of the haze, seaward, at a distance of 
 a few hundred yards. It grew larger and clearer, 
 and soon he knew it for the boat with the tanned 
 sail that he had seen the previous evening lying 
 in and off outside the white foam on the bar. 
 As he looked at it and wondered what it should 
 be doing so near shore, a man stood up in the 
 stern, and raising a telescope, took a long steady
 
 168 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 look towards the sandhill in which was Gordon's 
 pit. For a moment, with his quick temper, 
 Gordon felt inclined to resent the impertinence ; 
 the next moment he caught the flutter of a 
 woman's shawl in the bows, and it flashed upon 
 him that now he was about to know the meaning 
 of the child's being left where he had found it. 
 He remained quiet in his pit while the boat, with 
 a light wind, drove slowly in towards the shore. 
 Nearer and nearer it came till the keel grated 
 softly on the gently shelving beach. The man 
 let the small sail run down, while the woman, 
 her shoes and stockings held in her hand, and 
 her dress kirtled high, stepped down into the 
 shallow water and waded to the shore. 
 
 Gordon gave a great start as he saw her 
 figure. He half turned, as if to move out of his 
 pit and away; but some feeling stronger than 
 his will seemed to hold him prisoner, and he 
 stood, with his arms resting on the edge of the 
 pit, watching the woman as she walked straight 
 up towards him over the sand. When she was 
 almost come to him, he bowed his head, for very 
 shame, upon his arms, and so awaited her. 
 
 She laid a hand gently on his shoulder. 
 
 "Jem," she said, "do 'ee not mind me?" 
 
 "Mind 'ee?" he groaned. "Do 'ee think 'tis 
 likely as I should not mind 'ee? Do 'ee think as 
 I've forgotten 'ee ? "
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 169 
 
 " Why don't 'ee look up then, Jem, and say as 
 you'm pleased for see me? Or be 'ee pleased, 
 sure enough ? " 
 
 Could a man resist such sweet coquetry ? 
 
 " Be I pleased ? Oh, lass," and at length he 
 raised his dark face from his arms to look at 
 her. " Oh, lass, 'tis more to me than heaven and 
 earth for see 'ee again." 
 
 "Then why did 'ee wait so long, Jem ? Why 
 didn't 'ee send no answer when I sent 'ee the 
 message ? " 
 
 " What message, then ? " 
 
 "The message 'bout the baby." 
 
 "I dunno," Gordon answered stupidly. "I 
 didn't take no notice. I thought 'twas all foolish- 
 ness. Has us got a child then, sure enough ? " 
 
 " Why, you did ought to know, Jem, I should 
 think. What have 'ee a-done with her? " 
 
 " Done with un ? Done wi' what ? " 
 
 "Wi 1 the baby, Jem the little girl? Oh, 
 Jem," and the glad wife burst into a merry 
 laugh. "I seed 'ee through the window pane 
 las' night. Oh, dear sakes, but you was real 
 mannish foolish, you was, wi' the little un." 
 
 "Well," said he, shamedly, "'tis the first time, 
 you know, lass. But, say, be it really ourn then, 
 sure enough ? " 
 
 "Really ourn; whose else would it be then, 
 Jem?"
 
 i;o WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 " Well there, then, whoever would 'a thought 
 it?" 
 
 " Say then, Jem, shall us go home to un ? " 
 
 " Ees, fai', then, that us will." 
 
 "What's that for, then?" Gordon asked 
 with a spasm of jealousy as she turned and 
 waved her kerchief, before going, towards the 
 boat. 
 
 " Only for tell Cousin Joe as he can go back, 
 same way as he come, to Coombe. Oh, you'ld 'a 
 laughed fine, you would, Jem, if you could 'a seen 
 us las' evening how us laughed at 'ee finding the 
 little un, and taking of un up and marching off 
 with un. Oh, us had 'ee fine, us had, with uncle's 
 old ship's spy-glass." 
 
 "You was watching of me all the while ? " 
 
 " Ees, fai', us was." 
 
 "And then you followed up right over the 
 common for see how I was getting along wi' the 
 little un?" 
 
 "'A course I did. Did 'ee think I was going 
 for leave the little un to 'ee afore I seed." 
 
 "Shall us go home to un now, lass, right 
 away ? " 
 
 " Ees, fai', then ; let us go." 
 
 So, hand in hand, or with arm round waist, 
 lover-like, over the common they went through 
 the gathering darkness. 
 
 At a certain point Gordon, making a great
 
 THE 'LONG-SHORE GUNNER 171 
 
 effort, touched his wife softly on the shoulder 
 where the butt of the gun had fallen. 
 
 "Is it," he asked. "Tell me, lass, is it do 
 'ee feel it ever at all ? " 
 
 " Never at all, Jem, nor think of it neither," 
 she answered lightly; "and, Jem," she added, 
 whispering, "I shan't never want for go up in 
 the village now, when you'm away, now as we 
 has the little un." 
 
 "No, nor I won't ever be out so much neither 
 I promise 'ee that, lass." 
 
 That was how James Gordon's wife came 
 home again.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 
 
 Now and again, when we felt extraordinarily 
 energetic, we used to get up at a very early 
 hour of a fine summer's morning and go forth 
 with gun to stalk the rabbits at their morning 
 meal. There was a peculiar quality of delight in 
 getting up while all indoors was still a-hush, 
 though the dawn was peeping in through the 
 window, and the birds were choiring their 
 morning hymn. It was fascinating to steal on tip- 
 toe down through the sleeping house down even 
 to the very larder, there to cut off a hunk of bread, 
 and perhaps a roast chicken's leg, to serve as 
 an early breakfast. Then, shouldering gun and 
 slinging on powder flask and shot-belt, one 
 might go striding along the roads and meet 
 never a soul. Authority did not look with 
 disfavour on this pilfering from the larder, for 
 the object of all the labour and early rising was 
 to shoot something rabbits, to wit that might 
 more than make good the pilfering, and prove
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 173 
 
 that the early-rising labourer was worthy of 
 his breakfast. 
 
 There was no time for the rabbits like the 
 early morning, for then they would all be out on 
 the feed engrossed with their feeding, not 
 restless and watchful, as they are apt to be in 
 the evening, when every neighbouring road was 
 noisy with passing carts. Moreover, we were 
 not over and above sure of our permission to 
 shoot on the nearest and best of our hunting 
 grounds. On some of the fields we were 
 welcome, but our rights over others were 
 debatably expressed by the phrase that we 
 " didn't think old So-and-so would say anything 
 if he did see us." And, our licence being of this 
 rather doubtful kind, it was obviously the better 
 part of valour to arrange matters so that " old 
 So-and-so" should not see us, and this he was 
 exceedingly unlikely to do at three or four 
 o'clock in the morning. No house or farm 
 was sufficiently near for its inmates to be 
 aroused by the shots. A high road went along 
 beside most of these fields that very high road 
 on which, in days then looked back on with the 
 supremest contempt, we used to chase and 
 persecute the yellow-hammers ; but it was not 
 a populous highway at any time, and in the 
 smaller hours of the morning not a soul passed 
 along it. So we would boldly tramp it, with
 
 174 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 gun on shoulder, until we had left all the 
 outskirting houses of the village in which lived 
 Joe's friends, the village blacksmith who had 
 made the climbing-irons, and the carpenter who 
 had given us the wire-netting for the magpies' 
 cage. Then we would climb the first gate off 
 the road and steal across the grass field to the 
 farther hedge. 
 
 Rabbits, appearing suddenly to start out of 
 the ground, would dart from the grass and into 
 the brambly hedge which was the boundary 
 of a great steep furze-covert sloping down 
 towards the common. But these we let 
 judiciously alone. Unless we killed the quarry 
 stone-dead he would drag his poor crippled 
 body through the hedge into the furze-break, 
 and we should see no more of him. (Of course 
 we could not take our dog Viper on an expedi- 
 tion of this kind, where all success must be due 
 to stealthy stalking.) We had other views than 
 to startle every rabbit within hearing by a 
 chance shot at one galloping full speed across 
 us. Moreover, since it was summer-time, it was 
 not all the rabbits, by any means that were fit 
 for eating ; and ours was essentially a pot- 
 hunting expedition, for it was by its success 
 or failure from that point of view that it would 
 be estimated by Authority on our return 
 home. Of course, it might be as great a feat of
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 175 
 
 sportsmanship to kill one rabbit going at full 
 speed into covert as two sitting out in the grass 
 field ; but we always found Authority to be more 
 readily impressed by tangible and edible results 
 than by the very best of reasons for their 
 absence. And just over the hedge that ran cross- 
 ways up the road, we knew that, peering through 
 the tangle of bramble and honeysuckle and wild 
 convolvulus, we were very sure to see quite 
 close to us, half-hidden by the long, dry windle- 
 straws, a pair or two of long brown ears lying 
 back confidingly on a grey-brown little head 
 that nodded gently as its owner nibbled the soft 
 juicy undergrass. Then we would have to 
 pause a moment, reckoning whether this pair 
 of ears or that belonged to a bunny of the size 
 and age we were looking for, namely, three-parts 
 grown. It was a hard matter to determine, but 
 generally, before we had fully decided the point 
 to our satisfaction, one of us would make a light 
 rustle in the hedge, as a coat was clutched by the 
 thorn of a bramble. This tiny noise would be the 
 signal for each pair of ears to erect themselves 
 timorously ; heads were lifted for an apprehen- 
 sive look round, and other quite unsuspected 
 rabbits revealed themselves as they repeated 
 this gesture. Some, in their interest, sat up on 
 their haunches, with dropping forepaws, like a 
 dog begging.
 
 i;6 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 This was our opportunity ; and if we waited 
 longer we might lose it, for already one or two of 
 the bunnies, not satisfied by their look around, 
 had slipped quietly into cover. We would level 
 at one which, after ambling two steps towards 
 the hedge, had halted again to look beggingly 
 towards us, and shown himself by this manoeuvre 
 to be just of the size we wanted. Meanwhile we 
 would have marked another of likely size farther 
 up the field, who might serve for the second 
 barrel. 
 
 " Bang ! " the begging bunny stretched himself 
 out with a kick, white stomach upward. There 
 was a stampede of scurrying brown forms 
 towards the hedge, in which we quite lost sight 
 of the intended victim of the left barrel. We 
 would fire incontinently at one who sat at gaze 
 a moment at the very edge of the covert. A 
 shrill squeal answered. In a moment we had 
 thrown ourselves into the thorny, tangled thicket 
 that called itself a hedge, torn our way through 
 it, rushed to where the poor wounded little 
 bunny in our hurry we would sometimes shoot 
 by mistake a very little one was dragging him- 
 self painfully under the arching cover of brambles, 
 jumped on him, regardless of prickles, and in a 
 very few moments had put an end to his suffer- 
 ing. The other which we had shot sitting, would 
 generally be stone-dead ; it would have been
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 177 
 
 difficult to fail to kill him. And we had 
 breathing time and a sense of infinite triumph 
 as we surveyed the beginnings of the bag. 
 
 The further early-morning exploits had a 
 great likeness to the first. There were more 
 fields to be walked over, where the bunnies at 
 our approach raced for the covert of the great 
 furze brake, more hedges to be cautiously 
 approached and peered over, more selection of 
 the fitting victim, and more hurried firing of the 
 second barrel. 
 
 By the time that the bag had reached the 
 respectable size, and the rather uncomfortable 
 weight, of half a dozen or so of rabbits we 
 would be above the furze-clad slope which went 
 down to the cliffs of the jackdaws, and about at 
 the limit of our zeal and of our hunting ground. 
 Beyond lay the property of a friend, indeed, but 
 a friend who often gave us a day's rabbit shooting 
 under quite different conditions. Our poaching 
 little consciences were tender about the rabbits 
 of one who was so truly our benefactor. Also, 
 we were now two good miles from home, the 
 sun was beginning to put forth its strength upon 
 backs already wearied with the weight of all the 
 game, and we would turn homeward well satis- 
 fied with the morning's work. Our feet would 
 be sopping wet with the heavy dew ; for all 
 this while they had been rending the thick,
 
 i;8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 dew-bespangled gossamers which lay over all the 
 fields as if the spray of a waterfall had been 
 woven into a coverlet and thrown on them. The 
 sun came glinting off them, so that it dazzled the 
 eye, and the calm sea of the bay was like a golden 
 mirror under its beams. Looking back, we could 
 see the track that our feet had made through 
 the sheeny gossamer, and the track was marked 
 of every rabbit that had come or gone to or fro 
 the hedge. These mornings of summer are a 
 revelation of beauty and freshness ; but our 
 limbs were none too fresh, and ourselves all too 
 hot and tired, for much appreciation of beauty 
 by the time we had reached home and put our- 
 selves to bed again for an hour or two's sleep 
 before breakfast. 
 
 Viper hated these early-morning expeditions. 
 He could not understand the meaning of our 
 stealing out of bed without bidding him jump off 
 and accompany us ; and when we ultimately left 
 the room, after putting on our worst and oldest 
 suits of clothes, in which Viper and we alike 
 delighted, with unmistakable indications of an 
 intention to go a-shooting, we had to shut the 
 door on much canine bewailing. Poor Viper! 
 It really was only a mixed joy to him when we 
 returned with a bag which he had not helped in 
 filling. These days were not Viper's days; 
 nevertheless, like other dogs, Viper had his day
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 179 
 
 occasionally days when our neighbour, whose 
 rabbits we respected, gave us shooting, and 
 bade to the shoot every dog, broken or un- 
 broken, that would chase a rabbit. And, to say 
 truth, the unbroken the utterly unbroken 
 were in a very large majority; nor, even had 
 one been perfect after the culture of all the 
 schools, could he have been expected to retain 
 his culture 'midst the evil influences of example 
 and precept which were rife in those rabbit 
 hunts. For the most part the covert consisted 
 of gorse-beds lying in patches of various 
 dimensions on the hillsides facing the sea 
 hillsides bare, for the most part, of all growth 
 save a very scanty and wiry grass, but inter- 
 sected, for inscrutable reasons, by a network of 
 the great, broad, straggling arrangements in 
 earthwork, bramble, stunted hedge-elm, and 
 various thorny growths which go in the West 
 to make up a "bank." Often a watercourse 
 would be running down one side of them. From 
 the point of view of the scientific farmer these 
 banks must have been a terrible waste of labour 
 in the construction, and of land presuming the 
 land to have a value in their maintenance. But 
 the rabbits delighted in them, so did Boyhood, 
 and so did Viper. 
 
 Viper was what we called a good "hedge 
 dog." That is to say, that if you put him into a
 
 1 8o WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 hedge, either by indicating to him a "run" 
 through the tangle by which he might force 
 himself to the top of the bank, or by the more 
 summary method, in the absence of a " run," of 
 throwing him into the tangle at the top, then he 
 would continue hunting along the top of the 
 hedge, using the "run" along the ridge made by 
 the rabbits, and would never leave it until he 
 had convinced himself that there was no rabbit 
 sitting out on top of the hedge. These great 
 overgrown banks very often had ditches on 
 either side, and in that case it was necessary 
 that a dog should hunt down each of these. 
 The ideal method of procedure was that one or 
 two dogs for two noses are better than one 
 should hunt along the top of the bank, one dog 
 along either ditch, and at least one dog altogether 
 outside the hedge and ditch, on either side. The 
 hunters on top would occasionally push an 
 inquiring nose down, and the ditchers occasion- 
 ally extend their researches upward, if they 
 suspected any of the holes with which the 
 bank would be honeycombed of concealing a 
 rabbit. On this plan, if its practice had been 
 as perfect as its theory, it is hard to see 
 how a rabbit could have escaped detection. 
 Unfortunately, it did not always "work." The 
 dog's progress along the top of the bank could 
 not be conducted at a regular rate : it was
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 181 
 
 spasmodic. The run made by the rabbits, and 
 enlarged by dogs at many previous hunts, was 
 continually choked by the undergrowth. For a 
 few paces the dogs would go forward quickly, 
 then stop, brought up by a tangle of hedge- 
 growth and coarse grass. "Hie on, there, 
 Viper ! " we would cry, as the dog, crouching 
 before the barricade, looked out through the 
 thicket with eyes that seemed asking for en- 
 couragement. Then he would draw back a 
 pace or two, and, bursting through the barricade 
 with a rush, go on with a free course again. 
 These constantly recurring stoppages allowed 
 the ditch-dogs, who had a less impeded path, to 
 get ahead; and often it was impossible to tell 
 where the hedge-dogs were, so thick was the 
 screen of foliage. Often, when Viper was working 
 the hedge in most approved fashion, we would 
 hear a sudden " Yap ! yap ! " a hundred yards 
 or so ahead. Then there would be a general 
 and demoralised rush of "guns" and dogs, on 
 either side of the hedge, to the cry. We always 
 had one gun at least on each side. The dogs 
 outside the hedge would reach the scene of 
 action first, where the "yap, yapping" was 
 pushing the rabbit along through the scrub. 
 These outside dogs would begin yapping too, 
 rushing on ahead again to get a fair start after 
 the rabbit when it should break covert. Then
 
 i82 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 we would try to recall them, with shouting of 
 their names in every tone of blandishment or 
 objurgation. Generally we had to threaten them 
 by the gesture of throwing an imaginary stone 
 before they would return in reluctant obedience. 
 Often the rabbit would choose this moment to 
 break out, and in the general disorder the first 
 barrel was usually futile. Before we could fire 
 a second the dogs, no longer under any sem- 
 blance of restraint, would be rushing perilously 
 into the line of fire, and as likely as not the 
 rabbit would make a bolt of it across the field, 
 with the whole pack in full cry after him, spite 
 of shouts and whistles and every conceivable 
 persuasion. Viper, long before this, would have 
 come down from his hedge-running to join in 
 the pursuit. Eventually the dogs would come 
 back, one after the other, rather sheepishly, 
 with tongues hanging out and panting sides, to 
 receive admonitions which would be quite in- 
 effectual when a fresh exciting occasion pre- 
 sented itself. 
 
 It was not always thus. Sometimes a single 
 shot, or oftener a volley, would roll the bunny 
 over before the faces of the racing pack. Then 
 it was a question of saving his carcase from the 
 excited fury of the body-snatchers, each of whom 
 retired, after much scolding, with at least a 
 mouthful of fluffy fur to champ upon and taste.
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 183 
 
 A more utterly demoralising school for dogs it 
 is impossible to think of. 
 
 Or, again, it might be that the rabbit, in his 
 confusion, would bolt back along the hedge, 
 right into the mouths, as it seemed, of the dogs 
 who were conscientiously hunting it. It was 
 quite marvellous how these back-bolting rabbits 
 escaped. Sometimes it seemed as if they ran 
 absolutely between the dogs' legs, and yet got 
 off unhurt. Then the cry would continue back, 
 up the part of the hedge which we had already 
 hunted, sometimes going at such merry speed in 
 the depths of the hedgerow that no running 
 could keep up with it, and the rabbit would 
 break covert a hundred yards off, and go joyfully 
 across the field without a shot fired at him. 
 Now and again it happened, however, that the 
 dogs were too many or too agile for him, and 
 the yapping note, changing suddenly to a snarl- 
 ing "worry," would proclaim that he had been 
 "chopped" in covert. 
 
 A very frequent alternative was the diving 
 of the rabbit down one of the many holes. 
 Generally this manoeuvre was not at once 
 detected. The dogs in the hedge would go 
 yapping on, not noticing in their eagerness that 
 they had overrun the scent, and those outside 
 would accompany them, dancing up on their 
 hind legs for a better view of the chase and the
 
 1 84 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 quarry. Then the notes would die away. The 
 dogs would begin fussing about, silently con- 
 sciously at fault. At length one would be seen 
 scratching and digging at one of the holes, with 
 whines in the intervals of his labour. Immedi- 
 ately all the others would flock to him and strive 
 to push their noses in, before his, into the hole, 
 receiving blinding showers of earth in the face 
 from his shovelling paws. 
 
 " Gone to hole ! " " Which hole is it, then ? " 
 "That there where the old Rover's marking." 
 
 So "the old Rover" would be drawn out, 
 with ignominy, by the great stump of his 
 spaniel's tail, and all the dogs would be called 
 back, and held by the attendants to admit "old 
 Belzy," Causey's polecat ferret. Causey always 
 was engaged, all the neighbourhood round, for a 
 day of this description. " Old Belzy," released 
 from the bag in which he had, so far, enjoyed the 
 sport, looked doubtfully around before he pro- 
 ceeded to explore the hole at whose mouth he 
 had been released. The hole was brought to his 
 notice more pointedly when he was taken up by 
 his middle and thrust, head foremost, down it. 
 He resented the indignity by drawing back and 
 again standing doubtfully. 
 
 " There bean't no rabbit there/' Causey would 
 say. 
 
 "I know the rabbit be there, 'cos the old
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 185 
 
 Rover marked," the keeper, Rover's master, 
 would answer in high dudgeon. 
 
 Belzy seemed to have heard him. He gave 
 himself a shake, just to get himself ready for 
 business, then dived into the hole with avidity. 
 " Maybe he'm there after all," his master would 
 mutter. 
 
 Presently, after a trying interval of silence, 
 there came a hurried rumbling in the bowels of 
 the bank. The dogs jumped in the arms of 
 those that held them. "Look up!" Causey 
 would say in a hoarse whisper. Then there was 
 a final scurry, a swish through the thicket ; the 
 dogs made a more determined jump. "Ee'th 
 bolted ! Let go the dogs ! " 
 
 So the dogs were loosed, and rushed, with 
 cries of eagerness, into the hedge, while Belzy, 
 his duties finished, was consigned again to the 
 dark obscurity of his bag. 
 
 Belzy was the biggest ferret it has ever been 
 our lot to see, and the best. Sometimes, when 
 there was a suspicion that a nest of young 
 rabbits was in the hole, or when a rabbit had 
 been wounded so badly that it was unlikely to 
 bolt again, Belzy was let in with a string 
 attached to the collar round his neck ; and often, 
 when the rabbit has refused to bolt, we have 
 known Causey tug on the string with force that 
 one would have thought must have broken the
 
 1 86 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 little beast's neck. But, far from that, it did not 
 even have so much effect as to make him loose 
 his hold of the rabbit, and we have seen ferret 
 and rabbit literally dragged out together, so that 
 one could seize the rabbit by the ears and put an 
 end to his sufferings even while Belzy was still 
 hanging like a bulldog to him. At other times 
 the collar around his neck was ornamented by a 
 bell, which tinkled cheerfully as he moved to and 
 fro in the burrow, and told us his whereabouts. 
 We were a little doubtful whether Belzy derived 
 his name from this appendage to his collar it 
 was the derivation which we always favoured 
 when we spoke of him to Authority or 
 whether, as amongst ourselves it was some- 
 times whispered, it was an irreverently shortened 
 form of the name of one of high position in the 
 councils of evil spirits. On the whole, however, 
 Belzy was an amiable ferret, and only under 
 severe provocation gave any grounds for the 
 suggested diabolical origin of his name. Now 
 and again, it is true, he would decline to come 
 out of the hole, in spite of all seductive allure- 
 ments, such as the dangling of a dead rabbit at 
 the mouth of the burrow; but he was never 
 known to misbehave in this way without some 
 such excellent reason as a nest of tender young 
 rabbits in the subterranean depths. On these 
 occasions it became necessary for Causey, much
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 187 
 
 complaining, to remain behind, digging away 
 with his spud at the orifice of the hole, and 
 gradually enlarging it more and more until he 
 had buried himself in mother-earth, and could 
 reach down to the place of Belzy's succulent 
 feast. 
 
 While he was thus engaged the rest would 
 go forward with the rabbiting, and presently he 
 would overtake us with Belzy safely restored to 
 his bag, and himself and all pertaining to him 
 the colour of the red earth of the country. 
 
 Surely a ferret's existence is the most perfect 
 example of a life of disappointments ! He 
 spends the inactive part of it in a hutch, which 
 is all well and good ; but when he comes out to 
 take the field he is carried, with none too gentle 
 care, in a dark and dirty bag. Then he is let 
 out, to go down into the darkness of the rabbit- 
 hole, only, nine times out often, to see the provok- 
 ing rabbit skip off out of the hole before he can 
 get even a nip at him ; and when he follows the 
 bunny out into the upper air he is immediately 
 snatched up, ungently, by his middle, and thrust 
 back again into the bag. In truth, it is nothing 
 short of a marvel that ferrets are even as good- 
 tempered as they are, rather than a wonder that 
 some of them are the sourest cynics. 
 
 All our rabbiting ground was on hillsides 
 sloping down to the precipitous cliffs, so that
 
 i88 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 our recollections of it alternate between a throng 
 of shouting men and yapping dogs going along 
 either side of one of the great fences, and a rabbit 
 with ears erect going full speed over the dry 
 3^ellow grass of the upland toward the cliff, with 
 the blue sea far below as his background. When 
 once the rabbits had reached the cliffs they were 
 safe from us. They knew all the runs and tracks 
 on the sides of the precipices ; but the dogs and 
 ferrets knew them not, and we dared not allow 
 them to risk their precious lives. 
 
 But besides the wide overgrown fences there 
 was covert for the rabbits in the gorse-beds 
 which sometimes darkly dotted the hillsides, and 
 sometimes crowned them in wonderful glory 
 with ubiquitous golden bloom. The gorse was 
 very beautiful, but very prickly. After these 
 rabbit-hunts we would have occupation for days 
 in picking the prickles out of our epidermis. 
 And if it was bad for us, certainly it was no better 
 for the dogs. Viper was a fox-terrier, and though 
 his coat was a little rougher than that of some, 
 it was very poor protection against the gorse- 
 needles. The poor little fellow's nose and eyes 
 used to be very red and sore when the day was 
 over ; and, for all his weariness, he could scarcely 
 rest in any position long, but must move uneasily, 
 with whines, even in his very sleep. And when 
 he forgot his sufferings, the excitements of the
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 189 
 
 day would still be with him, even in his deepest 
 slumbers, so that he would "Zouf! zouf!"and 
 twitch his limbs in hot pursuit of a dream-rabbit. 
 His dreams were like our dreams, apparently, in 
 that he never seemed to arrive in them. He was 
 always pursuing, never capturing; his dream- 
 hunting was like the life-hunting of Belzy. 
 
 We are not now able to aver that Viper was 
 pure-bred, though there was a time when we 
 would have resented most strongly an aspersion 
 on his pedigree. Certainly, you could pick him 
 up by his stump of a tail, and he would give 
 no sign of pain ; and this test we believed to be 
 infallible. Wider experience has taught distrust 
 of it. He had a breadth of forehead which seemed 
 to us to denote intellect, but others have thought 
 it to reveal a strain of the bulldog. His intellect, 
 however, was not to be denied, nor was his 
 heart ; and his one ear that cocked, while the 
 other dropped, added to his expression of intel- 
 ligence and humour. His sense of humour was 
 very keen, though too often it ran riot along the 
 lines of practical joking, which was unworthy of 
 him. Beneath the ear that cocked he had a black 
 patch over the eye, and this was the only mark- 
 ing on his white coat. He was a very keen 
 sportsman, and the sense of fear was utterly 
 unknown to him. 
 
 If he had a fault, it was too great impetuosity.
 
 IQO WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Other dogs, with skins and coats no tougher than 
 his, would suffer far less in the gorse-bushes. 
 One, that used to hunt with us constantly, was 
 as cunning as a serpent in avoiding the prickles. 
 He was a warrior of the name of Turk one- 
 eyed, for the other had suffered in an engagement 
 with an otter a fox-terrier, like Viper, though 
 of a wirier coat. The coat gave him little pro- 
 tection, but his cunning supplied the place of 
 armour. Among the dogs who habitually came 
 with us was a big, coarse spaniel with a dense 
 coat that no thorn could pierce; and often, as 
 we stood silent and motionless at the corner of 
 a furze-brake (for no rabbit will venture near 
 you unless you are both silent and motionless), 
 we used to see Turk come, in hot pursuit, to a 
 dense thicket of the furze. He would try one 
 or two runs into the thicket, but find them too 
 small for him, and draw back. He would wait a 
 moment, knowing that the slower-going spaniel 
 was on his track. The spaniel would come up, 
 burst with a crash into the thickest of the brake, 
 making a wide avenue, through which Turk 
 would easily follow after him without a scratch. 
 Yet Turk was brave enough, too, when occasion 
 demanded it, as witness his damaged eye and 
 many other honourable scars, only he knew too 
 much of the realities of life to go to meet un- 
 necessary trouble. His prudent head governed
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 191 
 
 his emotions. Viper was emotional first, rational 
 afterwards. 
 
 Rabbits were not the only visitors of the great 
 furze-brakes, though they may have been its 
 chief regular inhabitants ; but many times part- 
 ridges have gone whizzing up from them, and 
 escaped scatheless, as a rule, the shots fired after 
 them with little regard of close seasons or game 
 licences. There are some temptations, as Aris- 
 totle says, which are beyond the power of human 
 nature to resist, and among these, if the human 
 in question be a boy, may perhaps be reckoned 
 the very occasional partridge whirring up un- 
 expectedly out ot a furze-brake. Once, and the 
 month was August, a great cock-pheasant rose 
 rocketing gloriously from the gorse, and as he 
 was levelling himself for his flight to another 
 covert, a lucky shot brought him down like the 
 rocket's stick. Nor were we ashamed of it. As 
 the French novelists say of love, c'etatt plus fort 
 que moi t and deem that they have amply apolo- 
 gized for every shortcoming of their heroine, so 
 it was with us, and the pheasant was picked up 
 and borne along, with little said. Only, at the 
 end of the furze-brake the old keeper too old 
 for furze-brakes, and practically too old for " keep- 
 ing," had there been anything to keep said, 
 cocking his ears, " Hullo, what be that there ? " 
 and Causey, who was carrying the pheasant,
 
 192 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 replied readily and unabashed, "Oh ! the dogues 
 caught 'ee in the vurze." And so they had, only 
 an ounce of shot from a gun had made the capture 
 easy for them. It was said that some one had 
 once seen a woodcock get up from one of these 
 furze-brakes, but we held a sceptical attitude 
 towards this woodcock. 
 
 Further inland were plantations of big trees, 
 beneath which we hunted the rabbits ; there 
 there was always a chance, too, of a shot at a 
 passing wood-pigeon. There were squirrels, 
 also, among these trees, which we were en- 
 couraged to shoot because of the damage they 
 do in nibbling the sapling timber. Few people 
 know how excellent a squirrel is to eat. " The 
 gipsies eat them," we were told, as if this should 
 be enough to make us decline them henceforward. 
 But in truth it had rather the opposite effect, for 
 what life is so alluring to the imagination of 
 Boyhood as a gipsy's ? When once, however, 
 we had persuaded the cook to roast a squirrel 
 for us, it looked so nice on table that we even 
 persuaded Authority to try a slice; and even 
 Authority, steeped as it always is in prejudice, 
 was forced to admit that it was " not so bad." 
 Afterwards we began to regret that we had 
 wrung this cordial admission from Authority, 
 for Authority became so eager for "just a little 
 bit to taste," that it was with difficulty that
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 193 
 
 Boyhood managed to keep enough (which meant 
 a good deal in the days of growth) for itself. We 
 were also told that gipsies ate hedgehogs, roast- 
 ing them in clay; and this was food which we 
 always aspired to taste, though we never 
 achieved it, for the cook declined to have any- 
 thing to do with such " nasty prickly things, that 
 eat blackbeetles," and our ambitions did not 
 urge us strongly enough to make us light an al 
 fresco fire and cook the hedgehog after the 
 gipsies' own manner. 
 
 There was no lack of hedgehogs. We often 
 found them in the fence of our orchard at home, 
 and sometimes came upon them in the gloaming, 
 taking their walks abroad after insects and slugs. 
 But those that we found away from covert were 
 generally young ones. We used often to bring 
 them into the house, where they lived on the 
 multitudes of blackbeetles which abounded in 
 the kitchen premises, gratefully eking out exist- 
 ence on bread and milk. Generally they met 
 their end by taking such a surfeit of blackbeetles 
 as proved fatal. They used to become very tame, 
 and some of them seemed to know us quite well. 
 
 We had one very sad day indeed on the yellow 
 gorse-clad hills facing the sea the day on which 
 Viper fell over the cliff edge and right down to 
 the rocks beneath. It was his impetuosity that 
 brought him to it. He was an obedient dog 
 
 o
 
 194 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 ordinarily ; but on this occasion, in swift pursuit 
 of a rabbit, he heeded neither command nor 
 entreaty. The rabbit whipped over the cliff 
 edge and was into its hole as safely as a sand- 
 martin could have flown there; but poor old 
 Viper went at too great a speed to stop himself, 
 and fell lumbering over. There he lay, far below, 
 a silent, motionless flake of white on the black 
 rock. The cliff was not at its highest at this 
 point, or we might have spared ourselves the vain 
 pains of going down to look at him. There was 
 a pathway just a little farther westward, which 
 on such an occasion one could run down almost 
 at full speed, and it did not take long to reach 
 the dog. He made no attempt to move, only 
 looked up with loving eyes as we came to him. 
 His limbs did not seem to be broken, but he 
 whined when we touched his side. Probably he 
 had a broken rib or two. " Pore thing ! he'll 
 die, I know 'ee'll die ! " was the form of consola- 
 tion which old Causey oifered. But we carried 
 him home in an ambulance made out of a coat ; 
 and all the while he lay quite still, without a 
 whine, only looking up, and trying to repay us 
 with a grateful smile when we spoke cheeringly 
 to him. When we came to the house one of us 
 rode straight off for the " vet." 
 
 Viper lay on the straw in the stables. When 
 the dog-doctor arrived the others were just
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 195 
 
 coming from the shooting. " Pore thing ! " said 
 Causey, looking compassionately at him. " There 
 he be, dead ! Pore thing, I know'd 'ee'd die." 
 
 But Viper was not dead, nor had any intention 
 of dying, only this was Causey's way. Once he 
 had said a thing would happen it must happen, 
 according to his way of thinking, and in point 
 of fact did happen, according to his belief. So, 
 having said that Viper would die, the saying, in 
 his view, was equivalent to the dog's death ; and 
 afterwards, whenever he saw Viper, who hence- 
 forward was not quite the dog he had been 
 before prematurely aged, and feeble in action, 
 but all the dearer to us he would say, " Pore 
 thing ! there 'ee be might equal so well be dead, 
 he might. Pore thing ! I know'd 'ee'd die." Such 
 are the consolations of the omniscient. 
 
 After this poor Viper was never able to take 
 an active part in hunting. We would take him 
 out, and he would sit beside us at the corner of 
 a furze-brake, trembling with excitement, but 
 never trying to go into the covert nor to work a 
 hedge. It was a joy to him to be allowed to 
 mouth a recently killed rabbit, and he could 
 still do a little in the way of mole-catching and 
 hedge-hog-finding. No poor human cripple ever 
 realised more thoroughly his own disabilities. 
 Still, he enjoyed his life, and remained the best 
 of comrades.
 
 196 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Down among the rocks of the foreshore, 
 below the cliffs over which poor Viper fell, 
 the receding tide used to leave, among all the 
 smaller pools, one that was considerably larger 
 than any other. The water therein was quite 
 out of our depth, as we have proved, and out 
 of the depth even of a grown man. It was so 
 much larger than the surrounding pools that it 
 was quite well known to us by the name of the 
 Mermaids' Pool. We never saw mermaids in it, 
 but it often happened that as we came to it we 
 would see large fish dash away from its surface 
 and disappear into the forest of various seaweed 
 that fringed its sides and depths. We paddled 
 and we dived in the pool, but never succeeded 
 in capturing the fish. The utmost that we ever 
 achieved was to feel a slippery elusive shape 
 glide out of our fingers as we thrust them into 
 the beautiful green and pink and brown weed. 
 Even these inquiries we prosecuted with mis- 
 givings, and were mightily cautious how we 
 trod, for once we had brought up from the 
 depths of this pool a spiny-backed crab, a horrid 
 red thing like an enormous spider, with thorny 
 spikes all over his back by no means a pleasant 
 thing to tread on with the bare feet. Providence 
 had not given him very powerful nippers, deem- 
 ing, no doubt, that the spiny armour was sufficient 
 protection in itself. But besides an occasional
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 197 
 
 monster of this kind, multitudes of the common 
 green crabs had their homes at the roots of the 
 waving seaweeds, and each of them was able to 
 welcome intrusive fingers with a pretty sharp 
 nip. Lobsters were not to fear here, so far in 
 from the low-water mark. 
 
 Boys do not think much about fairyland ; but 
 if ever it had occurred to us to form any con- 
 ception of such a place, we could nowhere have 
 found it so nearly realised as in this wonderful 
 pool, into which the sunlight sank, to be reflected 
 back in finely blended hues of green and 
 azure and purple an opalescent mystery with 
 the delicate waving tresses of the many-tinted 
 seaweed sending out quivering feelers, like those 
 of the anemones, into it. It had its darkly mys- 
 terious depths and its brightest, sunlit surfaces, 
 and no one could say what forms of life did not 
 hide within it. The anemones grew larger and 
 more beautiful in form and colour here than in 
 any other pool; and as to those fish, though 
 we could catch but a glimpse of them as they 
 dashed away from the surface and down into 
 the depths at our approach, we were certain 
 that they were something finer and altogether 
 different from the big-headed little dog-fishes 
 which we caught by groping for them under the 
 stones in the lesser pools. These others we 
 called "dog-fishes" in our parlance, but likely
 
 198 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 enough they were quite a different species from 
 the true dog-fish sharks in little with whom 
 we made acquaintance at other times and by 
 other means. 
 
 But, whatever the big-headed little fishes in 
 the other pools were, we were quite sure that 
 the fish which dived away into the recesses 
 of the Mermaids' Pool were something quite 
 different and much larger. We cast about for 
 a way by which we might approach these un- 
 known fish, so as to get a good sight of them 
 before they had a sight of us ; for we had little 
 doubt that if we could come near enough unseen 
 we might find them basking or playing on the 
 surface of the pool. 
 
 Between the pool and the cliffs the rocks lay 
 in a tolerably level field, affording no covert to 
 speak of, but on the seaward side a ridge of 
 higher rocks ran out like a spine into the sea. 
 It was on one of the outjutting vertebrae of this 
 spine that the cormorants loved to sit, and we 
 conceived the notion of creeping out in the hope 
 of stalking the cormorants, and coming back 
 hidden by the backbone of rock from the fish in 
 the pool. The cormorants flew off into the 
 water before we came within many gunshots of 
 them, and went diving and swimming farther 
 and farther out to sea. It remained then to turn 
 back cautiously and approach the pool. When
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 199 
 
 at length we peered over the tall rock down into 
 the pool beneath we saw a strange sight. For 
 there indeed were fish, several of them of large 
 size and light colour, but, far from basking quietly 
 on the surface, they were darting continuously 
 this way and that from one corner of the pool 
 to another, evidently seeking for some way of 
 escape. No doubt this was the reason of their 
 agitated movements : they had been left by the 
 outflowing tide, and were in a panic-hurry to 
 find a way of regaining the sea. Now and again 
 one would remain still a moment, giving us a 
 good look at him. We saw at once they were 
 fish we were not familiar with. 
 
 "Have a shot at them," Bob suggested in a 
 whisper, for I was carrying the gun. 
 
 "What's the good?" I said. "No one ever 
 shoots fish." 
 
 " Well, it can't do any harm," he answered, 
 quite unanswerably. 
 
 So I fired at a corner of the pool where two 
 or three were for the moment congregated, 
 rather than at any individual fish. There was 
 the splash of shot in the water; chips of the 
 rock flew back in a little gritty dust over us. 
 Then, as the smoke cleared, we were ever so 
 astonished to see three motionless white shapes 
 floating in the corner into which we had 
 fired. They were fish lying belly upwards, so
 
 200 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 successful had the shot been. It took very little 
 while to pull off shoes and socks, roll up 
 trousers above the knee, and climb down on 
 the ledges of the pool's side to seize two of the 
 silvery fish. But when I reached out a hand to 
 grasp the third, he gave a wriggle as my fingers 
 touched him, and in a moment had vanished, 
 like a passing streak of light, into the obscurities 
 of the pool's depths. 
 
 But we had two fish in hand, which was 
 infinitely more than we had reason to expect, 
 and we set to admiring the soft pearliness of 
 their backs and the silvery whiteness of their 
 under-parts. The bigger was not much less than 
 a pound, and the smaller only a little lighter. 
 Curiously enough, we could find no shot-holes, 
 and have often wondered whether these fish, 
 which turned out to be grey mullet, had been 
 really struck by the shot at all. One is rather 
 inclined to think that they must have been 
 merely stunned by the shock of the report and 
 of the shot striking the water close above them, 
 and that they would soon have recovered, had 
 we left them, and dived off as blithely as the 
 third. 
 
 This was the only occasion on which we had 
 any success in fish-shooting. We often visited 
 the pool again, approaching it in like stealthy 
 manner ; but either there were no fish there, or
 
 RABBITS AND SOME GREY MULLET 201 
 
 they had perceived us approach, so that the 
 Mermaids' Pool gave us no further sport. After 
 all, it was a good three miles from home, and 
 that was a long way to go on the bare chance of 
 a shot at a mullet.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 SOME FOXES AND EIGHTY-TWO RATS 
 
 OUR first lessons in riding were taken on (and 
 off) the back of a donkey. He was a creature of 
 changeable but, on the whole, amiable disposi- 
 tion. When his temper gave way before the 
 trials to which we subjected it, we took many 
 lessons in that gentle art of falling off which is 
 so useful a supplement to the science of riding 
 as more generally understood. We can make 
 this avowal without any sense of shame now, for 
 it happened once, on a day for ever memorable, 
 that our donkey kicked off our riding-master 
 himself in all his glory of boots and breeches. 
 Joe, the coachman's boy, declared all our theory 
 of donkey-riding to be incorrect : and it is 
 significant that, though the donkey could kick 
 off the riding-master, boots and breeches and 
 all, it entirely failed to shake Joe from his seat by 
 any of its antics. But then Joe's method was 
 entirely different from that of the riding-master's; 
 it was, indeed, so simple as scarcely to deserve
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 203 
 
 the name of method, being contained in the single 
 precept that you should sit as near the tail of 
 the animal as possible. That was the sum total 
 of his theory of donkey-riding, and it worked to 
 perfection in practice. My uncle, who was in 
 the Navy, explained the mechanics of Joe's style 
 of riding nautically : " It's as plain as a pike- 
 staff," said he, "that when you've got all the 
 weight in the stern, the craft isn't likely to go 
 down by the head." It was at all events true as 
 a statement of fact, however it may have been as 
 an explanation of the principles, that the donkey 
 did not "go down by the head " so frequently when 
 Joe was riding him as when we were mounted 
 " amidships." And this going down by the 
 head always had the same result ; we went off 
 over the head. 
 
 For a long while we were not allowed to ride 
 with stirrups, and whether or no this was a wise 
 provision is hard to say. It has its advantages 
 and its disadvantages. But it is very certain 
 that Authority was justified of its wisdom in 
 making us ride often without bridle. The mouth 
 of our donkey was as the nether millstone, and 
 had we been allowed to drag on it at will our 
 hands would inevitably have been ruined irre- 
 trievably. As it was, we learned to gallop along 
 secure of our seat, so long as " the craft did not 
 go down by the head," while we guided the
 
 204 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 donkey by means of a stick more or less ungently 
 applied to one side or other of his head and 
 neck. The first principle of good riding, we 
 were taught, was that the seat was to be kept 
 by the hips, knees, and balance only. 
 
 I learned the value of these precepts, which 
 seemed at the time so much vanity and vexation, 
 when I was promoted to the high distinction of 
 riding a pony. Jumping Jenny was the inspirit- 
 ing name of this creature, and the good little 
 lady in no way belied her designation. She was 
 Exmoor bred, and an ideal boy's pony for a heavy 
 banked country. Timber or water she could 
 jump at need; but her two special points were 
 the nimbleness with which she could climb up 
 and down a great Devonshire bank, and her 
 unfailing eye for a bog. She had not been 
 brought up on Exmoor for nothing. She knew 
 the look of a bog far better than we knew it, and 
 a team of elephants would scarcely have pulled 
 her into it; certainly no boy would ever induce 
 her to put foot into one. 
 
 She was as generous also as she was prudent. 
 Though no consideration would make her set 
 hoof on a real undoubted bog, she yet would 
 face mere boggy ground in the most gallant 
 fashion. Only once did she ever refuse a fence, 
 and I carry in my mind still the time and place 
 of that refusal and the overwhelming shock of
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 205 
 
 astonishment it caused me. We had sent on our 
 horses on the previous day, for the meet was 
 some twenty miles from home. I was driven 
 out in the morning in a dogcart by Authority, 
 who was to ride a new horse that day, fresh to 
 the country. The first covert drawn was a big 
 furze brake, a sure find for foxes and woodcock, 
 of which delectable birds we counted no less 
 than fifteen come out at the corner where we 
 stood awaiting the first whimper. From this 
 covert there were several lines that the fox might 
 take, all comparatively good except one. If he 
 took that line we should find it, we had been 
 told, very boggy, but the odds were some five to 
 one against it. Nevertheless that, and none of 
 the other four, was the line that perverse fox 
 elected to take ; and we found it, as we had been 
 told, very boggy. Authority had the best of us 
 all, for his horse, new to the big banks, refused 
 the very first of them, and half a precious hour 
 was passed in getting him over it ; it was, by the 
 way, one of our most stringent rules that if an 
 animal once refused a fence he was to be put at 
 it till he was over somehow, or till darkness 
 closed the contest. In the intervals of his argu- 
 ments with the new horse, Authority took a 
 glimpse at Boyhood and Jumping Jenny growing 
 constantly more distant over a succession of 
 banks, and noticed, as I was told afterwards, an
 
 206 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 undue elevation in the heels of Jenny after each 
 ascent. In truth these banks were just a little 
 higher than those to which we and Jenny were 
 commonly accustomed, and upset me a little in 
 consequence. We pecked severely over several, 
 but the ground was soft (a deal too soft !) and we 
 were always up and on again, Jenny with a nose 
 growing rapidly dirtier. Off the fifth bank the 
 landing was terrible ; Jenny was in up to the 
 hocks, and the soft mud sucked lovingly as she 
 drew each leg out of it. Some of the field were 
 making play on firmer ground to the right. On 
 the left was a big grey mare jammed tight in a 
 ditch, while her late rider lay on his back in the 
 soft bed of an indisputable bog. Poor Jenny 
 was herself scarcely better than a fixture now, 
 but there was no going back. The hounds 
 were in front, and Devonshire fields are small. 
 Together we struggled on, Boyhood sometimes 
 afoot, sometimes for a pace or two, in the saddle ; 
 Jenny was a mass of mud right up to the girths, 
 and Boyhood equally muddy to an equal height. 
 Still we plunged away until at length we 
 floundered on to more solid ground close by the 
 further bank of the field. There was now 
 breathing-space to count up the losses. These 
 consisted of a broken curb-chain, the result of a 
 particularly severe peck on Jenny's part, and a 
 lost stirrup-leather. The latter loss was serious ;
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 207 
 
 but it was hopeless to attempt any search for 
 them in that hardly-passed Slough of Despond ; 
 I was only too thankful to be out of it at such 
 slight cost. Then I put Jenny at the low bank, 
 beyond which was a beautifully hard high-road ; 
 anything hard looked beautiful after our late 
 experience. To my utter amazement she would 
 not even offer to rise to it, but just stood stock 
 still when she came to it. Three several times 
 I put her at it, with spur and whip and adjura- 
 tion, before I arrived at an understanding of 
 this most extraordinary thing; and then I felt 
 thoroughly ashamed of myself. Of course, poor 
 Jenny was so done by her efforts in dragging 
 herself through that dreadful slough that she was 
 literally incapable of rising to the fence, and I 
 had beaten her and spurred her on that account ! 
 When I realised the position, I went near to 
 shedding tears, of shame for myself and sorrow 
 for Jenny ; but in five minutes she had recovered 
 her wind, and went over that bank like a cat 
 
 The hounds were by this time goodness knew 
 where ; and, with the exception of goodness, the 
 only being who knew anything at all about their 
 doings during a great part of that run was 
 Authority who, after succeeding in getting his 
 horse over the bank, jumped him backwards and 
 forwards several times before thinking about 
 the hounds at all, and then began to look about
 
 208 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 him from the vantage post of the high-road. 
 The road here runs along the watershed, giving 
 a view into the lower ground on either side ; 
 and on his right he saw the hounds running hard 
 with no one within some fields of them, and at 
 intervals over the country a horse and rider 
 fighting for life in a bog. He trotted along the 
 high-road, watching the hunting hounds, and 
 eventually, putting himself under the guidance 
 of one of the road-riding brigade, cut off the 
 pack, which by that time the huntsman had 
 overtaken, by a cross lane. 
 
 Meanwhile Boyhood and Jumping Jenny, 
 coming out on the high-road, met another very 
 sorry fox-hunter, whose experiences had been 
 similar, riding along it. Together we jogged in 
 what we thought the most likely direction, and 
 by good luck soon fell in with the hounds and 
 the field, the former having lost their fox and the 
 latter being in an advanced stage of demoraliza- 
 tion. It seemed unlikely that more would be 
 done that day, so we set off for a long ride home 
 with Authority. Boyhood, after a twenty-two 
 mile ride with only one stirrup on a dead-tired 
 pony, was glad enough when the white bars of 
 the turnpike gates (for there were pikes in 
 those days) appeared through the gathering 
 dusk to announce that it was nearly at home 
 again.
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 209 
 
 This was on the whole a somewhat dismal 
 experience ; but for a while at all events I had a 
 greater delight in that hunting than in any other 
 experience that life has ever held for me. It 
 was, of course, the poorest kind of fun imaginable 
 from the Meltonian's point of view ; but it 
 required nevertheless a certain amount of riding, 
 and a certain degree of nerve in galloping up 
 and down some very queer places. It was a 
 country in which it was impossible to take your 
 own line, being so intersected with what were 
 locally called " bottoms," steep glens with a 
 stream running through them, that it was almost 
 necessary to follow the guidance of some one 
 familiar with it. One of the most remarkable 
 features about it all was the way in which great 
 heavy fellows would follow the hounds on little 
 Exmoor ponies no bigger than my Jenny. When 
 they came to a bank they would jump off, send 
 their pony over with a smack on the quarters, 
 clamber up after, often by the aid of the pony's 
 tail, then mount again, for the ponies would wait 
 for them on the other side, and so on. This was 
 a style of hunting which gave you fine oppor- 
 tunities of seeing the hounds at their work, 
 though it is to be confessed that this was a very 
 minor consideration to Boyhood, who loved first 
 and foremost the death of the fox, and secondly, 
 plenty of jumping. It was not within Boyhood's 
 
 P
 
 210 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 philosophy that there could be any pleasure in 
 galloping over enormous grass fields ; he liked 
 much better the Devonshire plan where the 
 fields were small and the fences plentiful. Now 
 and again we did get a mighty gallop over great 
 unfenced spaces, but then there was a compen- 
 sating quality of delight that made up to one for 
 the loss of the jumping. Then one raced away 
 over the moorland towards the blue sea, with 
 the sniff of the salt breeze all the time in his 
 nostrils. They were always stout foxes, too, 
 those that we found on the borders of the moor- 
 land and that took us straight away towards 
 their well-known hold in the great seaward 
 cliffs. There was one of these old fellows that 
 we all knew as well as a kelt knew a Jock Scott. 
 We knew him by his brush, of a curious dusty 
 grey, and probably he knew us and all the field 
 and the hounds no less well. We found him 
 always in the same covert; he stole out of it 
 always at the same corner, gave just the same 
 defiant wave of his brush as he settled into his 
 stride, and went the same line, fence for fence 
 and gap for gap, every year. After a mile or so 
 we came upon the open downs, golden with 
 gorse-bushes in perpetual flower; but the old 
 fox cared not a whit for the covert of the gorse- 
 bushes, always holding on his line until he came 
 to the cliff, where a hound or two generally fell
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 211 
 
 a sacrifice on the beach below, unless the pack 
 could be whipped off in time. At length, one 
 year when I was beginning to be quite a big 
 boy, the old fox, sensibly greyer and dustier in 
 the brush than last year, was viewed a mile and 
 a half from his point and pulled down in the 
 open within half a mile of it. His brush was one 
 of my proudest trophies ; no interfering Diana 
 happened to be in at the death that day to rob 
 Boyhood of its best-deserved spoils ; for though 
 we had several other brushes and a mask or two, 
 none had been the adornment of quite so gallant 
 and famous a fox as this one. 
 
 No doubt there were black letter as well as 
 the red letter days. It happened to me once and 
 again to be pounded; to come across a post and 
 rails, though such obstacles were rare in our 
 country, which Jumping Jenny, with the best 
 heart in the world, could not negotiate. Then 
 we had to go sadly round by a gap or a gateway, 
 and by the time we had our heads straight again 
 the hounds might be clean gone from sight and 
 hearing. But this happened seldom, for Devon- 
 shire is the special happy hunting-ground of a 
 boy on a small pony. Rider and steed of this 
 quality are there equal to any others, and often 
 it was a positive advantage to be able to creep 
 through a small place in a hedge or bottom. 
 We had hunted several times before it ever
 
 212 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 happened to us to come face to face with an 
 obstacle in the nature of timber, and on this 
 first occasion Jumping Jenny was more equal 
 to the situation than her rider. Jenny landed 
 deftly enough over the fence; but Boyhood 
 found itself strangely dislodged from the saddle 
 and perched on Jenny's neck in a manner at 
 once undignified and uncomfortable. A hasty 
 scramble back into the saddle was followed by 
 a quick glance round to see whether the un- 
 fortunate adventure had been observed. A 
 sardonic smile on the face of Authority was 
 the only comment; but it was comment sufficient 
 to make Boyhood swear in his heart that before 
 next taking the field it would be as a finished 
 timber-jumper. In pursuance of this resolve I 
 asked that a line of hurdles should be set up for 
 practice on the lawn before the house. But here 
 Authority's acquiescence was qualified by a 
 stringent condition : the hurdles might be put 
 up and I might practise over them at will ; but 
 it was to be clearly understood that if Jenny 
 refused them, as might happen in cold blood, I 
 was to keep on putting her at those hurdles so 
 long as the daylight lasted. I agreed, perforce, 
 to this condition, and started, with some qualms, 
 on the emprise. Boyhood was a trifle more 
 cunning than Authority had expected. Authority, 
 with the sardonic smile on his face, watched
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 213 
 
 Boyhood riding down from the stables in the 
 expectation that Jumping Jenny would be called 
 on, then and there, to show that her title was 
 merited. I was not quite so green as that. My 
 favourite reading, in this phase of my career, 
 was the glorious and immortal history of Mr. 
 John Jorrocks, M.F.H. My hero of romance 
 was Mr. James Pigg, and my very phrases were 
 borrowed from this inspired book. Each fox I 
 viewed was "the biggest fox whatever was 
 seen " ; my verdict on each night, as I looked 
 out upon it from the window, was " hellish dark 
 and smells of cheese." From so sapient a work 
 it is impossible but that I should have picked up 
 a certain share of cunning in matters pertaining 
 to the horse, the hound, and the chase. There- 
 fore, instead of bringing Jenny right down on 
 the line of hurdles at the outgoing, I took her a 
 little round about the lawn and into the next 
 field first ; and then, bringing her back towards 
 the hurdles, with her head towards the stables, 
 set her going at them in a canter, and over she 
 hopped like a bird. Boyhood was disconcerted : 
 the seat in the saddle was insecure for a moment, 
 no doubt; but it had been drilled to sit well 
 back, and after two or three trials I enjoyed 
 going over a hurdle a great deal better than 
 sitting in an armchair. After this no fence that 
 I met in the hunting-field could puzzle me
 
 2i 4 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 except, of course, those that beat Jenny by 
 their quantity rather than quality. 
 
 The quaintest incident that memory retains 
 of those hunting days was the finish of a potter- 
 ing run in a heavily wooded country where no 
 fox would face the open. We had hunted him 
 up and down the rides for the greater part of a 
 day, and finally, with the scent at its hottest, we 
 seemed to have lost the fox in the neighbourhood 
 of a little cottage, with a pigstye tacked on to it. 
 The hounds were giving tongue round the pig- 
 stye, while its occupants protested with no less 
 noise. The hubbub was tremendous, and the 
 tumult increased tenfold when the second whip 
 climbed the stye palings and began to search the 
 tenement for the missing fox. There was no 
 sign of him. Still the hounds kept giving tongue 
 around the dwelling as if the fox were there. 
 The whip, after drawing the pigstye blank, 
 knocked at the cottage door and, receiving no 
 answer, entered. The sole inmate was a bed- 
 ridden old woman who protested with vehem- 
 ence equal to the pigs' against this invasion of 
 her privacy ; adding that no fox could possibly 
 have come in, for the door had not been opened 
 since her grandson had gone out to work in the 
 morning. The man in pink was about to retire 
 with apologies, when a bold hound burst in 
 through the door, with a terrible burst of
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 215 
 
 melody. He stopped to ask no questions of the 
 poor old lady, but went under the bed like a 
 tiger. More hounds dashed in ; there was a 
 scuffle and a worry under the bed, shrieks from 
 the poor old woman that lay on it, furious 
 death-notes of the hounds and in a second or 
 two all was over. It took a deal of silver and 
 consolation to make the lady realise that the 
 hounds had not killed her as well as the fox. 
 She still protested solemnly that the fox could 
 not have entered the cottage because the door 
 had been shut all the time ; but it was obvious 
 enough, from the sootiness of the old fellow's 
 coat, that his way in had been, not through the 
 the door, but down the chimney. The old lady 
 suffered no harm ; indeed, the shock and the 
 hubbub did her a world of good. Her grandson 
 reported afterwards that he had never known 
 her so well and lively for years as she was for 
 a few days after this excitement. 
 
 Another day comes back to me, the brightest 
 of all the triumphs shared by Jenny and Boy- 
 hood. We were waiting, while hounds were 
 drawing a big covert, on the far side from that 
 where most of the field were watching. There 
 was a fox at home, for the hounds threw their 
 tongues bravely and continuously, and yet, while 
 the greater volume of sound grew distant, it 
 seemed that nearer at hand an echo of it still
 
 216 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 sounded in the covert. Therefore we stayed, 
 while every nerve of Jenny's little body quivered 
 in her excitement. Nearer and nearer came this 
 lesser chorus until, almost beneath our noses, a 
 fine red fox slunk stealthily out and away over 
 the stubble before us. I waited, as I had been 
 well warned to do, until he was a hundred yards 
 out in the open, before crying tally-ho with all 
 the force of my young lungs. At the same 
 moment there burst from the covert two hounds, 
 no more, hot on the scent. Larger experience 
 might have taught me that these could be but 
 two stragglers from the pack, that the rest were 
 away out on the far side of the covert after 
 another fox : larger experience might have 
 taught me that my duty was to whip off these 
 two errant ones and send them back to the body 
 of the pack; but Boyhood does not always know, 
 or heed, its duty, and if Jenny knew better, she 
 told me nothing. Such a run we had ! Across 
 that stubble, out over the grass field beyond, 
 and on to a plough, only ourselves, Jenny and I, 
 and those two hounds and there they viewed 
 the fox. They raced, and the fox, being fresh, 
 raced too. How long he might have kept away 
 from them one cannot say, for at the far end of 
 that plough a stark obstacle confronted him. In 
 that country they build the walls of their fruit- 
 gardens of a clayish concrete, with a straw
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 217 
 
 thatch on top to keep the rain out. Fruit-trees 
 grow better on these than on any other walls, 
 and it was one of these that our fox had before 
 him across the plough. He went at it bravely, 
 but the take-off was none too good. Still he 
 clung a moment, with teeth and pads, on the 
 thatching ; then the treacherous straw gave way, 
 and he slid scrambling down the wall. Again 
 he went at it, but in a hurried, hustled fashion, 
 for now the two hounds were hard on him. 
 Again he clung a moment to the thatch, then 
 down again he slid almost into the hounds' 
 mouths. There was a snarl, a worry, and all 
 was over. Boyhood, alone, with a single couple 
 of hounds had killed a fox. With enormous 
 labour, and much rating of hounds, we managed 
 to perform the obsequies with a pocket-knife, 
 and trotted off in fine feather with the trophies, 
 after the two hounds had munched the carcase. 
 The errant couple followed, sterns proudly erect, 
 and when, later in the day, I succeeded in falling 
 in with the rest of the field, neither the Master 
 nor other Authority had the heart to say a word 
 to spoil Boyhood's sense of triumph. 
 
 It was by the happiest of happy chances that 
 I came in at the end of one of these hunting days 
 for the following story, though for the moment I 
 did not know my luck. From a meet at Coombe 
 End Gate on Galsworthy Moor we had run a
 
 2i8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 very boggy line, then lost the fox, and at dusk I 
 found myself with two shoes gone, fifteen miles 
 from home, close by the West Country Inn and 
 a blacksmith's shop. That was a bit of luck in 
 itself, if I could have realised it. So I gave my 
 horse to the blacksmith to be shod, and while he 
 was about it went into the bar parlour. There 
 were several there that I knew : among others 
 our old friend Tom Causey. 
 
 He was drinking beer at frequent intervals 
 from a great quart pot, when I came into the 
 inn, and sucking more frequently still from a 
 black clay pipe which seemed to want a lot 
 of drawing and bubbled like a bird piping as 
 he sucked at it, but in all the intervals he was 
 nodding in a doze, for he was well tired. He 
 had followed the 'hunt afoot, and though he 
 knew every inch of the country and the short 
 cuts and gaps, and where the fox would be 
 heading for and so forth, still it had been heavy 
 going, and Causey was a big, heavy man. He 
 was more than half asleep, or else would have 
 been taking part in the talk which was going 
 forward, for it was all about his special subject 
 rats. I expect it was just his coming which 
 had given it this turn of course, after the fox, 
 the hounds, the horses and the rest had been 
 talked over. The question had turned on the 
 greatest number of rats ever known to be killed
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 219 
 
 by any dog at any one particular time, and there 
 was a good deal of big talking and telling of 
 stories which no one liked to call untrue because 
 he meant to tell a bigger as soon as that one 
 was finished, and had no desire to create a cold 
 atmosphere of incredulity. I t have sometimes 
 thought that Causey had heard more of the talk 
 than he had pretended to, the physical atmo- 
 sphere being thick, steamy and somnolent with 
 damp clothes drying and hot men cooling, for 
 as soon as ever some one appealed to him 
 directly as to what he knew about rats and dogs 
 and the relation of one to the other, he seemed 
 alive to the situation in a moment, and set out 
 without a stop, ias if he meant to make all the 
 rest of the tales that had been told feel weak and 
 faint and ashamed of themselves. 
 
 "Be it rats then, as you'm a-tellin' about?" 
 he asked, and crammed his great greasy wide- 
 awake hat on his head, which had been bare, as 
 if he was preparing for instant action. " I'll tell 
 'ee then. The mostest number as ever I did 
 know vor wan dogue vor swallee down at wan 
 time was eighty-teu." 
 
 It must never be forgotten that Tom Causey 
 was a genius. If it ever had been doubted it 
 would have been assured by the way he 
 mentioned this fairly large figure with all the 
 air of a man apologising that he could say no
 
 220 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 more. Still, the effect in the bar parlour was to 
 produce what the papers call " sensation." 
 
 Ezekiel Leach, the earth-stopper, passed his 
 hand over his brow as if he doubted whether 
 his intellect were clouded or he had heard 
 aright. 
 
 "'Eow many was it as yeu zaid, Tom?" he 
 asked. 
 
 Causey went to the bottom of the quart pot 
 before he answered, and then he said, as he 
 drew the back ,of his hand across his mouth, 
 " Eighty-teu. 'Twas zo near as makes no matter 
 as 'e 'adn't a-swalleed up the eighty-third, but 
 there! eighty-teu it was. Yeu know as I 
 wouldn't tell 'ee a lie." 
 
 " Ees fai', Tom, us knows that zure enough," 
 the earth-stopper said, terribly solemn on the 
 side of his face towards Causey, but winking 
 like a gargoyle on the side of which the general 
 company had the benefit. 
 
 "What kind of dogue was 'e then, Tom?" 
 asked another. 
 
 " Ees, do 'ee tell up about it, Tom," one or 
 two more chorused. 
 
 So then Causey, proud in knowing he was a 
 born narrator, though modest like all great men, 
 obliged the company. 
 
 " Well then, if you'm minded vor hear, I'll 
 tell 'ee just 'ow it was. 'Twas wan day as I was
 
 SOME FOXES AND RATS 221 
 
 a-comin' down Raleigh 'ill : they was pullin 
 adown of a rick, just beside the road, and there 
 was a genTman standin' by wi' a pleesure dogue. 
 And just as I was comin' along, a rat nipped out 
 of the rick and nipped across the road. Well, 
 the dogue snip 'ee up. Two or dree minutes 
 more, out there nipped another, and the dogue 
 snip 'ee up ; and 'e'd 'ardly swallowed of 'un 
 down 'vore out there nips a third, and the dogue 
 snip 'ee up. And zo they went on, the rats 
 nippyin' out and the dogue snippyin' of 'em up, 
 till 'e'd swalleed up eighty-teu; and just as 'e 
 was a-goin' vor swallee up the eighty-third" 
 (here Causey paused, as if overcome with a 
 hiccough or other temporary impediment in his 
 speech, but I think it was really to fulfil the 
 narrator's born instinct to keep his audience in 
 suspense for the real thrill of the tale), "just as 
 he was a-goin' vor swallee up the eighty-third, 
 zomethin' took 'ee zick, and 'ee drawed up all 
 the eighty-teu rats and they all rinned back into 
 the rick." 
 
 He finished off the denouement with a rattle, 
 after the pause, and there was dead silence for 
 a while in the steamy parlour of the West 
 Country Inn. 
 
 Then Ezekiel Leach said gently, "Did 'ee 
 ever 'ear tell the name of the gen'l'man wi' the 
 pleesure dogue, Tom ?"
 
 222 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 " I don't mind, Zekel, as ever I did," Causey 
 said, glaring hard at him. 
 
 "I think as I should 'ave been minded vor 
 enquire," the earth-stopper persisted in mild 
 defiance of the glare. 
 
 But that was the limit which that good 
 company reached in the way of hinting at a 
 doubt of the tale, for Causey was a very burly 
 man and not always gentle. At all events, he 
 had given me something to think about, to help 
 pass the time as I rode back fifteen miles in the 
 dark, on the tired horse, and twice the horse 
 was startled, as he was just going off into a doze, 
 by finding me lean forward on his neck, not 
 able to hold myself upright in the saddle for 
 laughter.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 
 
 I REMEMBER well how we used to revel in the 
 most glorious bathes off that ridge of pebbles 
 which protected our foreshore from the Atlantic 
 rollers. We chose the evenings, as a rule, for our 
 bathing, because by that time we were well tired 
 out, whether with cricketing or birds-nesting, 
 and a cool bath in the brine was the best possible 
 refreshment Moreover the seaward outlook at 
 that hour was the most delightful, with the sun 
 sinking low over Lundy Island in the distance 
 and sending to us a golden pathway of his 
 reflected light across the waves. We loved best 
 of all to bathe at the highest of the tide, for then 
 the breakers rolled right up to the ridge of 
 pebbles. One could almost dive off and be in 
 deep water at once ; whereas at other times one 
 had to run out over many hundred yards, it 
 might be, of level golden sand, and wade out a 
 hundred or two more before one could trust 
 oneself to swim without risk of rasping some
 
 224 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 valuable epidermis upon the shingle. It was 
 jolly diving to meet the incoming wave, and 
 letting the breaking foam dash over you as you 
 swam beneath it, to emerge triumphantly beyond 
 it and swim on to meet the next. But there was 
 no peaceful pleasure until one had gone out 
 beyond the furthest breaking line and met the 
 waves, which nearer shore curled over like the 
 white manes of horses, while they were yet 
 nothing more than the placid swell of ocean. 
 
 Authority had warned us of fearful ground- 
 currents, apt to suck the young swimmer sea- 
 ward, but we never encountered these currents 
 in any strength ; and indeed on the days when 
 the billows came in with any furious force it was 
 work enough to fight one's way out and stand up 
 at all against half a dozen of their assaults : one 
 had no breath or energy left for swimming out 
 beyond their lines. On these days, too, the sea 
 beyond would be flecked, as far as the eye could 
 see, into white horses, each of which would catch 
 the swimmer an uncomfortable buffet on the 
 head, filling his eyes, his ears, and maybe his 
 mouth too, if he attempted an untimely breath, 
 with salt foam. 
 
 The quiet days were the most delightful, 
 when the sun, as it sank, gilded only the top of 
 each successive swell with its glory, so that 
 what had a while before the likeness of a golden
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 225 
 
 pathway, seemed now no more than a ladder of 
 golden rungs which we contemplated reverently 
 with pious memories of Jacob's dream. The 
 delight and marvel of this pathway and this 
 ladder was that, no matter where we swam, it 
 seemed ever to reach down straight towards us, 
 as if designed for us alone. It was a sad disillu- 
 sion when some one explained the matter to us 
 as a simple example of the laws of reflection. 
 
 But that same sea which would sometimes be 
 so tempting and comparatively peaceful, in time 
 of storm could be furiously and cruelly grand. 
 At those times the roaring of the great pebbles 
 that it ground and churned and dashed against 
 each other was deafening. It could be heard 
 with ease in the neighbouring country town 
 three miles away, for the sea beat on our coast 
 with all the fury of the open Atlantic. Now and 
 again an unfortunate vessel would be driven 
 ashore and broken up in a wonderfully short 
 space on that stony ridge. But this, which to us 
 boys was rather a pleasing excitement than an 
 occasion of grief, happened seldom, for the sailors 
 knew and dreaded the coast. The usual issue of 
 a severe storm was that when it was over we 
 would find great stems of monkey-tail seaweed, 
 as we called it, on the shore, together with 
 numbers of dead birds, white below and dark 
 above, which we termed little auks. Really they 
 
 Q
 
 226 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 were nothing of such rarity, but merely razor- 
 bills mers as the sailors of the coast called them 
 which had been driven in by the waves and 
 winds and either dashed to death on the shore 
 or drowned in the tumult of broken waters. 
 
 Numbers of them, innumerable multitudes, 
 nested, as we knew, on the cliffs of that Lundy 
 Island which we could see, except when the 
 distance was hazy, out in the Bristol Channel. 
 We knew it, for more than once it had been our 
 good fortune to be taken there in a trawling 
 fisher-smack owned by a great friend of ours in 
 the port which lay a mile or so up the tidal river. 
 For a port there was, though the coast was so 
 dreaded by the sailors; but it was a port that 
 was only accessible at nearly high tide, for the 
 mouth of the river was blocked by a sandbar 
 over which vessels even of very small draught 
 could pass only when the tide was fairly full. 
 
 These expeditions were a great joy to us, 
 and yet there was a measure of disappointment 
 about the first part of the voyage. True, there 
 was always a certain excitement in watching the 
 ship thread her way among the other coasters 
 and smacks that would be taking advantage of 
 the same tide to help them out, passing some, 
 being overhauled by others, for which the skipper 
 always had some plausible excuse at hand. It 
 was interesting, too, to see the features of the
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 227 
 
 coast unfolding themselves successively as we 
 stood farther and farther away from the land; 
 features that were perfectly familiar, but which 
 now acquired the interest of novelty from appear- 
 ing at a different point of view. They all looked 
 so small from the sea ; but then we reflected how 
 small a ship looked from the shore, and yet how 
 large it really was ; one could almost stand up- 
 right, being a boy, in the cabin. But that which 
 disappointed us in the earlier miles of the voyage 
 was the absence of any considerable amount of 
 bird-life. An occasional wandering seagull came 
 and looked at us, then passed on, finding us un- 
 interesting. An occasional flight of shearwaters 
 scudded past us over the waves and into their 
 troughs ; but there was nothing to give us any 
 continuous interest. We always wanted the 
 fishing-lines to be put out overboard, just on 
 chance ; and we would not believe it when told 
 that there was no chance, that we were sailing 
 too fast. Where there was sea there must be 
 fish, and where there were fish, if you put out a 
 hook with a bait there was a chance of catching 
 them ; that was our young argument, and it was 
 as sound as many others that are applied to 
 fishing, which is perhaps saying little enough 
 for its wisdom. But after the island of Lundy had 
 begun to look relatively near at hand, and the 
 mainland dim and distant, instead of conversely,
 
 228 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 that is to say, when we were more than half 
 way across, then the sea began to be dotted 
 with birds swimming in pairs, a big bird and a 
 little one together, a mother razor-bill and its 
 baby. They would not fly up at our approach, 
 but contented themselves with diving as the 
 smack came near them, to rise again at a great 
 distance on one side or the other. As we neared 
 the island these pairs became more frequent. 
 Among them appeared a few guillemots, and 
 after a while an immense number of puffins, 
 those quaint creatures that the natives of those 
 parts called distinctively Lundy parrots. Over- 
 head the gannets would be winging their way 
 with powerful strokes of their great wings, 
 poising themselves, now and again, before 
 diving down at tremendous speed into the water, 
 dropping with closed wings into its surface like 
 a dead weight, and sending up a fountain of 
 spray such as comes from a blowing whale. 
 After a moment or two they would rise again, 
 with a fish in their bills, and soar up into the 
 air as they swallowed the prey to be ready for 
 another deadly swoop on a fresh victim. 
 
 The sight of the razor-bills, with their little 
 ones on the water, would fill us with terrible 
 anxiety lest all the sea-birds should have left 
 their nests ; for the high summer-tide, when the 
 weather was most to be relied on, was the time
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 229 
 
 that Authority smiled on (though even then 
 rather grudgingly) for these expeditions. Our 
 friend, the skipper, however, assured us that 
 the wild fowl were later in their date of nesting 
 than the small birds with which we were familiar; 
 and that though some of the mers, with their 
 young ones, were already afloat, we should find 
 plenty more on the cliffs of the island. 
 
 He might well say plenty. The smack came 
 to anchor about a hundred yards from the beach 
 on the eastern side, and we went ashore in the 
 dinghy, landing on a very slippery little jetty 
 of big stones, and scrambling over them to the 
 more secure land. Then followed a winding 
 ascent, past the proprietor's house, to the upper 
 level of the island ; for all the island had steep 
 cliffs, least steep of all at the point of our ascent 
 and landing; but, once these precipices were 
 scaled, the top was a fairly level plateau some 
 three miles in length and a mile or so across. 
 It was inhabited only by the people of the 
 light-house, and by the family and dependents 
 of the owner. It was seldom that we saw a 
 soul, after we had once passed up the combe in 
 which were the farmhouses and the store, or 
 any sign of cultivation, or of domestic animals 
 save a few sheep. But rabbits abounded, darting 
 up out of every little bush and tussock and 
 making for their holes in the cliff-sides. And
 
 230 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 everywhere, and ever louder as we went along 
 to the north of the island, the air was full of a 
 continuous, unceasing sound of the cries of the 
 sea-birds. Where we had landed there had 
 been few of them. We had, by that time, passed 
 the ranks of the swimming razor-bills, guille- 
 mots, and puffins : the gannets could not dive 
 with safety in the shallow water ; and the only 
 signs of bird-life were a few gulls hovering 
 around us. 
 
 And yet, to our anxious enquiries after the 
 birds, the skipper had told us there would be 
 plenty. It was impossible to doubt him, as we 
 heard the perpetual chorus, and yet we saw 
 little except a plover or two flinging himself 
 about over our heads, as we went along, and 
 uttering his plaintive wild cry. The island was 
 very unsympathetic to us, for, save in the 
 sheltered combe where a stout elder bush 
 flourished, there was nothing in the nature of 
 a tree on the whole area; and the bare plateau 
 did not appeal to our boyish need for secrecy 
 and concealment. 
 
 Yet we kept on. And now, looking out 
 beyond the northward limit of the island, we 
 became aware of what appeared like a brown 
 cloud, obscuring the bright levels of the sea. 
 As we approached, it appeared that this cloud 
 was composed of minute moving particles ; and,
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 231 
 
 drawing nearer still, it was seen that what had 
 looked like a cloud was in reality a marvellously 
 dense throng of sea-birds coming and going 
 from their nests in the cliff-side to the sea and 
 back again. The brownish aspect of the cloud 
 had been given by the dark colouring of their 
 upper parts, which alone were visible from 
 above. But among and through them the 
 great white gannets went sailing and swooping 
 majestically, throwing a fresh note of colour 
 into the mass here and there. It was marvellous 
 when we came near enough to be able to take 
 in the details of the scene, that the birds could 
 pass each other without collision, swiftly as they 
 flew in such countless numbers. Yet if that 
 were marvellous, how much more wonderful 
 was it to see a bird shoot up and perch on a 
 ledge of rock which appeared to us, looking 
 from above, already so densely crowded, that 
 there could not be room for a man to put his 
 finger into the midst without edging one of the 
 outside sitters off the ledge into the sea. And 
 this, indeed, over and over again happened ; for 
 though the poet of our childhood had taught 
 us that " birds in their little nests agree " it 
 scarcely appeared as if his studies in ornithology 
 could have extended to this remote island, so 
 strangely did its inhabitants contradict his 
 pleasant statement by the manner in which they
 
 2 3 2 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 fought and hustled for their footing on these 
 ledges and terraces of rock. 
 
 Of a truth there were, as the skipper had 
 said, plenty. From every rabbit-hole that 
 seemed within feasible reach of our climbing 
 the puffins were coming and going, and for their 
 eggs we reached down the longest arm we 
 could stretch, yet not without trembling and 
 much clamour at the mouth of the hole, to scare 
 the mother-bird away, for we had a profound 
 respect for that most useful weapon of offence 
 the beak of the Lundy parrot. And, after all, 
 our quest of the sea-birds' eggs came to very 
 little, for there were, no doubt, on the island 
 boys, quite as keen bird-nesters as we and much 
 better climbers, to whom the eggs were of value 
 as articles of diet. All the nests within reach 
 had probably been already harried, and the vast 
 majority were on the precipitous cliffs, inacces- 
 sible to any creature that had not wings, or, 
 failing them, a rope by which he might be 
 lowered from above. 
 
 But if we did little in the way of adding to 
 our collection of eggs, it was a sufficing joy to 
 lie there on our stomachs, with heads over the 
 edge of the cliffs, and look down on this mazy 
 throng of winged things coming and going or 
 sitting very straight up, as is their manner, on 
 the terraces. And among the throng of sea-
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 233 
 
 birds we saw, sailing out proudly from the cliffs, 
 creatures that we had never seen before, pere- 
 grine falcons to wit, for Lundy is a favourite 
 and unfailing source for the supply of these birds 
 to falconers all over the kingdom. 
 
 The while that we lay and watched, the 
 chorus of shrill voices was about us, deafening 
 with its clamour and unceasing ; increasing only 
 to louder energy when we sent down a stone to 
 clatter among the densely packed terraces and 
 startle out a yet thicker cloud of bird-life. It 
 was a wonderful sight, and we would make our 
 way back to the landing-place feeling that, 
 though we returned practically empty-handed, 
 we had not lived in vain. 
 
 In the neighbourhood of the landing-place 
 we found means of making up for our scant 
 success in nest-hunting, for there would be boys 
 of the island, informed no doubt by our friend 
 the skipper of our tastes, with eggs to sell us of 
 all the birds that nested on the island ; and, 
 though our finances were at perpetual low ebb, 
 a shilling, by judicious bargaining, would go a 
 very long way in purchasing quite as many 
 specimens as we were at all likely to be able to 
 carry home unbroken. 
 
 A very interesting question had to be asked 
 as soon as we reached the smack, were we likely 
 to get home on the next tide, or should we have
 
 234 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 to be out all night? There was no doubt about 
 the answer we desired. The cabin was dark 
 and foul and very musty ; there was nothing of 
 which it did not smell. The deck, on the other 
 hand, was well enough, on a fine night, save for 
 one circumstance, that one of the several jobs 
 for which the smack had come to Lundy Island 
 was to carry back a cargo of the crabs and 
 lobsters whose fishery is a standing industry of 
 the place. These creatures were all alive, under 
 no particular control, and roamed the deck 
 irritably, seeking whom they might devour. 
 Nevertheless it needs not to say that this 
 diversity of discomfort was infinitely more 
 attractive to our fancy than the cleanliness and 
 snugness of our inglorious beds. But whether 
 we were destined to enjoy a night of this charm- 
 ing nature on the open sea depended on a 
 complexity of circumstances. For one thing, it 
 depended much on the length of time we had 
 taken on the passage over, as well as on the 
 probable duration of the return journey ; that is 
 to say, it depended on the caprice of the wind. 
 And next it depended on the hour at which the 
 return mail was ready, for it was primarily as a 
 carrier of mails and provisions that the smack 
 paid its fortnightly visits to the island. The island 
 might, indeed, be provisioned for longer than a 
 fortnight at a time, but once in two weeks did
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 235 
 
 not seem excessive for receiving news of the 
 outer world. Finally there was a circumstance 
 which no doubt had some weight, but which was 
 not communicated to us, and that was the esti- 
 mate formed by the skipper of his chances of a 
 good catch with his trawl. In theory his busi- 
 ness was to go to and fro the island with all 
 speed, bearing the mail ; but, with a good steady 
 trawling-breeze, it seemed nothing short of 
 wicked to go piling on sail over all the nice 
 trawling-ground which lay a little to the main- 
 land side of the island. It was so easy to explain 
 to the proprietor a fortnight after, when he 
 discovered that his letters had come to hand a 
 post late, that the wind had fallen light in the 
 night and it had been impossible to make the 
 estuary of the river until the tide had so far 
 ebbed that there was practically no water on the 
 bar. Very often the explanation would have all 
 the merit of truth; and after all it could not 
 matter very much to the bulk of the English 
 nation whether it got its news of Lundy Island 
 a post earlier or a post later. Surely it was 
 infinitely more important that we should not 
 forego the chance of making a nice catch of fish. 
 The first part of the voyage, after leaving 
 Lundy, was apt to be peculiarly exciting, for 
 then we would often sail right through the 
 troubled waters of Lundy Race. This was not
 
 236 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 in any way different from other reaches of 
 troubled water, caused by the meeting of con- 
 flicting currents, that go by the same name all 
 round the coast ; but it was the only race we 
 knew, and we always looked forward to its 
 encounter with a tremulous excitement. The 
 smack went larking and bounding through the 
 water which swept the deck with each successive 
 wave, arousing the crabs and lobsters to a state 
 of extreme liveliness. If the waves were break- 
 ing with any force, we were consigned to the 
 obscurity of the cabin, whence we crept up the 
 companion way till our heads were on a level 
 with the perambulant crustaceans, and we could 
 see the mysterious scene the ship ploughing 
 her way over the dark sea, the dim figures of 
 the men moving here and there as the skipper 
 shouted his commands, and an occasional white 
 splash of a wave on the deck which gleamed as a 
 ray from the port or starboard light fell on it. 
 It was a scene that made us think of Grettir the 
 Strong and all the heroes of the Sagas that 
 people had told us about ; we fancied ourselves 
 hardy Norsemen and brave Vikings, and felt all 
 the braver so soon as the smack had made her 
 way out of the breakers of the race into calmer 
 water. It was curious that the smoother the 
 water fell the more confident we were that the 
 heart of the storm was our true native element.
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 237 
 
 As soon as our trawl-net was put down we 
 became increasingly doubtful of it. 
 
 Of course the ever-moving sea has a wonder- 
 ful variety in its movements, and different move- 
 ments affect different people in different ways. 
 Some especially dislike the roll ; to others the 
 pitch is peculiarly fatal ; some endure with 
 fortitude the motion of a following sea, but 
 succumb to the tossing of waves that meet them; 
 with others the sensations are reversed. But 
 none of these, which are as it were motions 
 natural to the great fluid body of ocean, compare 
 at all with the discomfort of the uneven motion 
 given to the ship when it is dragging its trawl- 
 net behind. All others are more or less regular, 
 rhythmical motions ; but this is a horrid discord. 
 We tried our best to be brave ; we strove hard 
 to think of Grettir the Strong, of whom it is 
 never recorded that he was sea-sick, and further 
 endeavoured to sustain our fainting courage by 
 anticipating the delight of seeing the trawl 
 hauled up. So the dark hours sped on, with 
 fortunes that it is not well to chronicle too 
 minutely, and maybe before the morning the 
 trawl would have been hauled up several times. 
 
 The delight of seeing it come aboard was 
 glorious. Its possible contents on each occasion 
 were really infinite ; we could conceive of 
 nothing that it might not hold. In point of fact
 
 238 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 it never did bring up a sea-serpent, but it 
 brought creatures that were quite as marvellous 
 to us ; devil-fish, whose very name (their aspect 
 apart) suggested fearfully attractive attributes ; 
 octopuses, that lay with many tentacles and a 
 kind of menacing helplessness upon the deck; 
 dog-fish, that were sharks in miniature, with 
 many rows of teeth ; queer-shaped thornybacks 
 or skates ; and many other curious and uncouth 
 fishes. Besides these and their congeners, in 
 which we took an especial interest, there was all 
 the tribe of more edible fishes ; soles of various 
 kinds and plaice, John dories, brill and turbot, 
 flapping their great flatnesses on the boards of 
 the deck. It formed an entrancing scene under 
 the fitful gleam of the ship's lantern, which 
 scarcely bettered the soft summer moonlight. 
 
 And then, towards morning, we would have 
 " upped trawl," put the dinghy, which had been 
 taken on board while the net was down, out to 
 tow behind again, and be bearing into the line 
 of breakers that marked the bar at the river's 
 mouth. But about this time it would generally 
 happen, hardy Vikings though we were, that all 
 the excitement we had gone through would 
 prove too much for us, and we would go off 
 to sleep amidst the thousand and one mingled 
 odours of the cabin. In our dreams we would 
 hear the wash of the waves against the vessel,
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 239 
 
 accompanying the shrill chorus of a multitude 
 of gulls attracted by the rich repast that the 
 sailors kept throwing overboard for them as 
 they cleaned the fish. The gulls waited on the 
 vessel in a clamouring throng. Now and again 
 they would swoop, with a united rush, at a 
 fragment of waste fish hurtling through the air. 
 Sometimes one or other would seize and swallow 
 it before ever it came to the water's surface ; or 
 again it would fall on the water and at once a 
 fierce tug of war would begin for its possession. 
 Sometimes one would seem to prove his title to 
 a certain morsel, and he would be left far behind, 
 sitting on the waves, discussing it, while the rest 
 of our satellites pursued us as before, with cease- 
 less clamour. And after a while this laggard, 
 having disposed of his portion, would rise heavily 
 off the sea and come labouring after us. 
 
 All the sounds of this comedy of hunger and 
 the struggle for existence would come to our 
 dozing ears in the stuffy little cabin, forming the 
 substance of our dreams; and the next noise to 
 arouse us would be the rattling of the anchor- 
 chain, when we would stretch ourselves and 
 open sleepy eyes, and go blinking up the com- 
 panion-way to find that we were back in port, 
 and that there was nothing more for us to do 
 than to trudge away along a mile or two of dusty 
 road to our home.
 
 240 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 But the joy of that expedition was not yet 
 altogether over. While we were actually en- 
 gaged in it there had been discomforting sensa- 
 tions that would intrude themselves, no matter 
 how we tried to ignore them; but in the delightful 
 retrospect all these completely vanished ; nothing 
 but the joys remained, and there was an added 
 joy in the triumph of detailing all our adventures 
 to Authority at home; and Authority, prosaic 
 though it was, had yet some sparks of enthusiasm 
 left which might be kindled into genuine fire by 
 the recital of deeds of sea-faring so heroic and 
 so remote from its own experiences. 
 
 And really we had some adventures worthy 
 of record. On a certain morning, as the smack 
 went stealing out over the bar, helped rather by 
 the tide beneath her than by the breeze which 
 scarcely filled her sails, we passed a strange coil 
 upon the water. It was one of those slumbrous 
 summer mornings on which everything is bathed 
 in the heat-mist that rises from the sea, and the 
 few smacks and coasters that had come out with 
 us became indistinct at a few hundred yards' 
 distance. Therefore we could make out this coil 
 on the water only vaguely. But, as we slipped 
 quietly along, the skipper said, " I'm just going 
 off in the dinghy to see what I can make of that 
 there." 
 
 "That there," as we well understood, referred
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 241 
 
 to the strange appearance; but what we did 
 not understand, nor did the skipper, was the 
 nature of that coil. We observed, however, that 
 he took off with him, in the dinghy, the gaff with 
 which we used to hook up into the boat the big 
 whiting pollack that we sometimes caught in the 
 tideways, with a bait of a bright spinner trailed 
 behind the boat. The gaff excited our interest 
 to a yet keener pitch ; it looked as if business 
 were intended. The smack was headed up into 
 the light breeze, and we all watched the skipper's 
 doings as he shoved off in the dinghy. Quietly 
 and slowly he paddled his way to where we 
 could still dimly see the dark coil on the water. 
 He rowed gently, as if with the notion of not 
 disturbing the object of his quest. At length he 
 came to it, and leaning slowly over the boat's 
 side, struck the gaff with a sudden jerk into the 
 coil, which instantly, from an inert, motionless 
 thing, was transformed into a writhing, wriggling 
 creature of intense vivacity. It was a conger. 
 Presumably it had been asleep in the sun, on 
 the water's surface. Now, with the sudden 
 sting of the gaff in its side, it was aroused into 
 the fiercest and most aggressive life, lashing 
 this way and that in the little boat while the 
 skipper skipped about in a manner delightfully 
 suggestive of his title, aiming a shower of blows 
 the while with the gaff at the shining coils that 
 
 R
 
 242 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 constantly eluded his assault. The skipper's 
 measures were by no means confined to the 
 offensive, for everywhere that the creature's 
 head appeared, now under this thwart, now over 
 that, in its furious wrigglings, it showed a 
 great mouth menacing him with clashing jaws. 
 Presently, however, he got some decisive blows 
 home upon the creature's head; its writhings 
 grew feebler, and soon the battle was over and 
 the victory rested with our friend. He sculled 
 back in triumph, with the body of the foe as the 
 trophy of the fight. It is needless to say how 
 tumultuously we greeted his return, congratu- 
 lating him on his skill, and sharing his triumph 
 over the body of the vanquished. Truly it was 
 a remarkable achievement, thus to have gaffed 
 into the boat the person of a free and unscathed 
 conger. To catch a conger asleep is an oppor- 
 tunity that does not occur to many in a life- 
 time. 
 
 Towards evening a breeze sprang up and we 
 got home on the evening tide. On the way we 
 fell in with a boat that had been dredging, 
 illegally as we believed, for oysters, and of them 
 we bought fifty-two (being the whole of the 
 catch), each about the size of a soup-plate, for a 
 shilling. We thought we had done a fine stroke 
 of housekeeping finance, rating the value of the 
 oyster according to its size. When we reached
 
 LUNDY ISLAND 243 
 
 home Authority looked with distrust upon our 
 shell fish, disdainfully pronouncing them cooking- 
 oysters, and thus showing yet again its per- 
 sistent disposition to belittle our best achieve- 
 ments.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 
 
 AT about this point in the story came news of a 
 tragedy occurring in India to those parents of 
 Bob Burscough who were engaged in the 
 mysterious work of shaking the pagoda tree. 
 I do not think that Bob himself had any clear 
 idea about the details, for he certainly told me 
 all that, as a boy, he did know. My hunting had 
 put us apart a little, because he had nothing to 
 ride except our donkey on which he had taken 
 his first lessons, with me, in falling off. But in 
 everything except the riding we were as much 
 one as ever, and saw each other every day in the 
 holidays. For all that, I have even now the 
 vaguest idea of the details of that tragedy in 
 the East, which made a big difference in Bob's 
 life, and, incidentally, a little temporary difference 
 in my own. It is enough, at all events, to know 
 that Mr. and Mrs. Burscough, Bob's father and 
 mother, died suddenly and tragically, leaving the 
 Colonel as Bob's guardian. It also seemed, when
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 245 
 
 there was time to look into the financial side, 
 that much golden fruit had been the result of 
 the pagoda-tree shaking, and that Bob would be 
 a rich man when he came of age. In the mean- 
 time a good share of the income of the money 
 was left to Colonel Burscough with a very free 
 hand in his disposal of it to the best advantage 
 in Bob's education and recreation. 
 
 It was a prospect that held promise, and we 
 discussed it in many aspects, mutually debating 
 largely what, and what first of all, it behoved 
 Bob to buy. He showed a generous pleasure in 
 talking of the many things he intended an in- 
 tention amply fulfilled to give me. Yet, over 
 all, was a sentiment which did us credit, that it 
 was not altogether right that we should thus 
 speak of the golden future, when it was all owed 
 to that tragedy of which we knew but dimly and 
 spoke under our breaths. Bob had been at 
 home so long that his parents were really hardly 
 any more than names to him. It could not 
 affect us like the loss of Viper or any of our 
 pets, but still there was an awesome sentiment 
 about it all. 
 
 After the business details were more or less 
 cleared up, the first thing the Colonel did, acting 
 readily enough I expect on Bob's instigation, 
 was to hire a sailing yacht and since, when you 
 have a sailing boat, the next essential seems to
 
 246 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 be a place to sail to, he rented a shooting, 
 where was said to be fine anchorage for a yacht, 
 in the island of Skye. Colonel Burscough had 
 shot over the same ground the two previous 
 years, but had then stayed at a roadside inn. 
 Now, however, he had succeeded in getting his 
 landlord to set in order a disused house upon 
 the property, and was thus able to offer 
 hospitality to a moderately large party. 
 
 We went up from Glasgow in the yacht, and 
 arrived upon the third or fourth day at Portree, 
 where we met the Burscoughs' servants crossing 
 by steamer from Strome Ferry. It was most 
 amusing to see the undisguised contempt of 
 this essentially Sassenach crew for their Gaelic 
 surroundings. We watched them trail up the 
 steep street, hung about with band-boxes and 
 bundles like a Cheap Jack's waggon, and having 
 seen them comfortably installed for the night in 
 the hotel, went back to the yacht and turned 
 in, in preparation for an early start. We 
 weighed anchor with the sun to cruise round 
 and meet the servants at Runish, where the 
 shooting was, in the evening. 
 
 The Colonel's out-of-door factotum, a Celt of 
 hardy aspect and peaty flavour, we found 
 awaiting us on the little stone jetty of the loch, 
 as we rowed ashore after bringing the yacht to 
 her moorings. He clasped his Scotch bonnet
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 247 
 
 with both hands upon the pit of the stomach in 
 an attitude eloquent of self-depreciation and 
 respect for his superiors. There was no shadow 
 of a doubt of the warmth of our welcome from 
 this faithful dependent. 
 
 We landed a few hundred yards from the 
 house, which stood at the head of the loch. A 
 burn, where the little brown trout jostled each 
 other, and the sea-trout came up, for change of 
 air, in autumn, ran past the kitchen door. The 
 bridge of the mail-coach road spanned the burn 
 just beside the house. Up on the hillsides were 
 the little " black houses " of the crofters of the 
 township of Runish low stone huts, peat- 
 thatched, dark, peat-smoky ; half of each tenanted 
 by the human family, half by the cattle beasts 
 which they owned. Near Colonel Burscough's 
 house were the kennels, for the pointers and 
 setters, and behind the kennels the mill where 
 the crofters got their meal ground on payment of 
 a certain measure corresponding to the old 
 " gowpen," or handful, of the Eastern counties 
 out of each sack. 
 
 In the course of our first dinner the cook 
 came bursting into the room with eyes aflame. 
 
 "Oh lor, Sir!" said she. "Oh lor, Sir! 
 This 'ouse is full of rats ! " 
 
 Now Eliza probably knew "full of rats" to 
 be merely a way of speaking ; nevertheless, very
 
 248 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 brief examination of the premises revealed the 
 presence of rats, visible, and in the flesh, in 
 numbers such as it had never entered into the 
 imagination of any of us to conceive before. 
 With military promptitude Colonel Burscough 
 recognised the gravity of the situation and 
 initiated his plan of campaign. 
 
 "Mc'Bain," he said (Mc'Bain was the name of 
 the Celtic factotum), "go out and borrow a cat 
 from the crofters. Borrow two. Borrow 
 twenty." 
 
 About the end of dinner word came that 
 Mc'Bain wished to speak to our host. We all 
 went into the kitchen. Mc'Bain was there, with 
 a pleased smile on his face and grasping in his 
 hand the neck of a large sack which writhed 
 felinely. He thrust in his other hand and drew 
 forth a cat, observing, in the "English as she 
 is spoke " by those whose native tongue is 
 Gaelic " See, where iss one ! " 
 
 He repeated the performance, and the obser- 
 vation, seven times, not noticing, apparently, 
 that each grimalkin traced an ensanguined rail- 
 way track down the back of his hand. As he 
 deposited the seventh cat on the floor, he said, 
 " It iss all ; " and stood, with the same well- 
 pleased smile on his face, and the blood running 
 off him, watching the seven brethren as they 
 suspiciously examined their surroundings.
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 249 
 
 That night those cats must have had a fore- 
 taste, as from a feline Pisgah, of the happy 
 hunting-grounds. We got but little sleep. The 
 noise was like nothing less than a troop of 
 cavalry at full gallop within all the wainscotings. 
 In the morning the cats, considerably bulkier 
 than overnight, stole plethorically away to their 
 respective "black homes," and Mc'Bain was sent 
 on the shooting-pony to Portree for strychnine. 
 The following night the noise was less it was 
 as though infantry had relieved the cavalry. On 
 the succeeding night there was silence, as of the 
 grave. Then, for a week, we were in terror, 
 expecting an intolerable stench. But it did not 
 come : the burn ran too near : the poisoned rats 
 had doubtless betaken themselves thither to 
 quench their thirst. We were free ! 
 
 Of the whole episode what most struck us 
 was the readiness with which the crofters lent 
 their cats to us, the alien Sassenachs, in our 
 distress. 
 
 Another point relative to the cats that drew 
 our attention, was that the hairs had all been 
 cut away from within their ears; and this we 
 learned was done to prevent them from going 
 out at night in pursuit of game, for the dew 
 getting into their unprotected ears makes them 
 prefer the comforts of the "black house." Such, 
 at least, is the crofter's theory. On many matters
 
 250 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 their information is original. Mc'Bain told us 
 that a man of his acquaintance had killed a mad 
 dog; but in the struggle some of the dog's blood 
 had got upon his leg, "and four weeks later 
 she" (referring to the man) "was on the roof of 
 her house without any clothes, and her wife wass 
 cut up in four quarters in the house." Such 
 was Mc'Bain's tersely graphic description of the 
 effects of what is probably a rather exceptional 
 instance of hydrophobic poisoning through the 
 skin. 
 
 He told us another curious fact in Natural 
 History which is well worth knowing. "Eff 
 you wass stabbed by a snake, and the snake 
 wass getting to the watter first, then you would 
 most likely die," he said. "But ef you wass 
 getting to the watter first, then the snake would 
 die : and there wass a boy at Broadfoot she 
 wass stabbed by a snake ; and she wass run to 
 the watter, and the snake was run to the watter 
 alongside; and she wass jump into the watter 
 first, and the snake burst before her eyes." 
 
 The Skyemen are very like children. They 
 can attach themselves with an unreasoning de- 
 votion which is almost canine to a kind master, 
 and the poverty which has in so many instances 
 driven the proprietor out of the Highlands is 
 therefore peculiarly to be regretted. It is, in a 
 great measure, the very qualities which render
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 251 
 
 the Highlander so valuable under the control ot 
 military discipline, or personal affection, that 
 make him as unfitted as a dog or a child for 
 steering his own path through the intricacies 
 and temptations of political agitation. 
 
 Grouse-shooting is a theme whose glories 
 have been done to death with pen and pencil; 
 yet there is a more than ordinary charm in its 
 surroundings in the Western Highlands and 
 Islands, where loch, sky, sea and mountain work 
 together to show you Nature's splendours. 
 From the higher moor the crofters' black houses 
 look more like little peat-stacks than dwellings. 
 The little squares of their arable crofts, of eight 
 acres each, are dark with potato or light with a 
 thin crop of short oats. Here and there a patch 
 in which oats were sown shows nothing but a 
 blaze of gaudy, useless golden flowers. The 
 soil is poor, and the climate, especially by reason 
 of the terrific wind storms, almost intolerable to 
 the agriculturalist. There are sheep grazing 
 about upon the hillsides, and what the Scotch 
 call " cattle beasts," notably a black bull which 
 kept one of our party up to his neck in a burn, 
 where he was fishing for brown trout, for a 
 whole summer's afternoon. 
 
 Each crofter has twelve sheep and two cattle 
 beasts, whose pasturage is included in his rent 
 of i per acre i.e. 8 in all and for this he
 
 252 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 gets also the services of the landlord's factor as 
 manager of the joint-stock sheep farm under the 
 check of two auditors, locally termed " members," 
 appointed by the crofters out of their own body. 
 We were given to understand that Mc'Bain was 
 a man of consideration among the crofters, but, 
 as yet, scarcely old enough he was about fifty 
 to be a member. No doubt age is held in 
 greater veneration in proportion to the primi- 
 tiveness of the society. 
 
 Almost the first day of the grouse-shooting 
 Mc'Bain fell into dire disgrace. It was his duty 
 to lead the pony that carried the game and the 
 lunch. He left the pony for a moment, while he 
 went round the bend of a hill to fetch a wounded 
 bird, and on his return the pony was gone ! His 
 consternation could not have been greater had 
 he lost his wife. He set about looking for the 
 pony under tufts of grass and down drains 
 which would not have sheltered a field-mouse, 
 and it was not till late in the day that he at 
 length reappeared, limping horribly, but tri- 
 umphantly leading the pony, "which," he ex- 
 plained, " wass that evil she wass tread on my 
 fingers." He meant his "toes." En revanche, as 
 it were, he spoke of the "sleeves" of a shirt 
 or a coat as the "legs." Also, the page of 
 grammar which treats of gender must, I think, 
 have been sealed to him, for whereas he called
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 253 
 
 most things " she," he invariably referred to his 
 wife as " he." 
 
 We made no heavy bags on these days after 
 the grouse, nevertheless we loved them as only 
 boys can. Twenty-five brace to four guns was 
 about our average. As in all the islands, the 
 birds lay like stones. They can be shot over 
 dogs all through the season. Perhaps it is the 
 climate that makes Celt and grouse alike sloth- 
 ful. The crofters used to hold day-long informal 
 mass meetings of the unemployed outside the 
 merchant's shop the merchant being not of 
 the class dear to our childhood, who traded in 
 pearls and Eastern carpets between Bussorah 
 and Bagdad, but the Highland counterpart of 
 the proprietor of the English village "shop," 
 selling most things, from a Gaelic newspaper 
 and bootlaces to fish-hooks and the Oban Times. 
 Runish, at this season of the year, indeed, was 
 peopled exclusively, almost, by the unemployed ; 
 for the young and hearty were away for their 
 eight weeks at the East Coast herring fishing, 
 whence, with luck, they would return with some 
 20 in their pockets, the greater portion whereof 
 would be swamped by their outstanding debt to 
 "the merchant," and the margin remain as a 
 very slender provision for the exigencies of the 
 coming winter. To be in debt to the merchant 
 is a recognised and respectable form of liability
 
 254 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 among the crofters, but they had rather starve 
 than borrow of each other. Colonel Burscough 
 had a story that a winter or two back a man 
 had obtained some turnips on credit from a 
 friend to feed, as he said, his cow. A week later 
 it was found that these turnips had been the 
 sole support of himself and his family during 
 all those days. That there is, at times, great 
 misery among the crofting population is beyond 
 question. 
 
 The first year that Colonel Burscough was 
 there, when the potato disease was very bad 
 amongst them, he had given the crofters of 
 Runish a large number of seedling potatoes. 
 They accepted these gratefully ; but endeavour- 
 ing, in their Highland pride, to make him some 
 return, they inundated us with gifts of butter, of 
 milk, and of eggs, all of them pervaded by the 
 eternal flavour of the black-house peat. The first 
 time that our clothes returned from the wash, it 
 seemed as if the people, suspecting us of some 
 infectious plague, must have fumigated our gar- 
 ments. Everything that enters into the black 
 house is impregnated by the flavour of the peat- 
 smoke. In a general way this is not unnatural, 
 seeing that chimneys are rather the exception, 
 and in most houses the smoke has to find a way 
 for itself through the thatch, or stop inside ; but 
 how the peat taste gets inside a hen's egg beats
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 255 
 
 old King George and the apple-dumpling. More 
 satisfactory presents than these black-house 
 flavoured luxuries were the fresh herrings which, 
 as the season advanced, they used to bring us. 
 This was only, however, when "there wass 
 word that there wass herring in the loch ; " for 
 the Skyemen have no properly decked boats 
 wherewith to follow the herring into the open 
 Minch. Possibly Government might do some- 
 thing for them, as in some of the outer islands 
 the proprietors have done, by giving them help 
 in this direction. 
 
 Colonel Burscough, as autocrat of the break- 
 fast table, had passed a rule which, though it 
 savour of an apparent greediness, can be com- 
 mended to all similarly situated viz. that 
 whatsoever special dainty, bird, beast, fish, or 
 vegetable were shot, caught, found, etc., should 
 be eaten by the shooter, catcher, finder thereof. 
 When, under other auspices, one sees a Jack 
 Snipe bandied about a round table of knights, 
 each too chivalrous to deprive another of the 
 delicacy, this rule finds its justification ; and 
 even the joy to the palate of a golden plover is 
 dearly purchased at price of the envy, hatred, 
 and malice of a whole shooting-party. 
 
 Indeed, we fared by no means badly. It is 
 true we had to eat our way steadily through 
 a sheep, with a monotony that served us for an
 
 256 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 almanack ; by the joint that appeared on table 
 we knew how many days through a sheep we 
 had gone. On the first day came the haggis, 
 which tasted high then, and we steadily worked 
 on till all was consumed. But our variety lay 
 in grouse, in plover, in snipe, in fish of all 
 kinds, from brown trout and sea-trout, with an 
 occasional salmon, to sea-fish proper, lobsters, 
 and shell-fish of all sorts. Oyster-catcher soup 
 was a discovery, and an excellent one better 
 than hare. The sea-fish we caught mostly in a 
 trammel-net set in the tideway, and left all night; 
 the sea-trout in a long seine-net set at dusk 
 across a burn's mouth, into which net the trout 
 were then frightened by splashing from up the 
 burn towards the net. The moving lanterns, the 
 gleaming fish, the silvery drippings from the 
 net, and the dark moving forms and boats against 
 the still background of dark water, made this a 
 picturesque scene. Unsportsmanlike maybe ; 
 but we had no option in absence of a "spate" to 
 enable the sea-trout to get up the burns, where 
 we could catch them with fly. 
 
 But we had fine fun out at sea with the lythe 
 great big fish running up to twenty pounds, 
 andifull of play. We fished for them with a spin- 
 ning bait and an india-rubber eel trailing behind 
 the boat, which we kept rowing in the tideway. 
 The rod was two-jointed, very strong with
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 257 
 
 whalebone top. When the lythe strikes, he 
 bores downwards, and if he once gets among the 
 weeds at the bottom, he stays there, and so do 
 your spinner and your temper. When quite 
 fresh, the lythe is excellent eating; but if you 
 are on a small yacht, and your chef is an old 
 man-of-war hand, as was our case, you had 
 better not go and see how the cooking is done. 
 I saw it once. Jack that was the cook's name 
 was watching some simmering soup, and peel- 
 ing potatoes with his jack-knife. When one 
 potato was completely peeled, he found that the 
 part he had last held was black from his fingers 
 and thumb. So he peeled off the grime ; mean- 
 while the other side of the potato became rich 
 brown, and in its turn claimed the attention of 
 his knife. By sundry repetitions of this process 
 the potato was reduced to about the size of 
 a gooseberry, and acquired a uniform yellow 
 griminess. He looked at what remained of the 
 vegetable with a heavy sense of the eternal 
 indestructibility of grime, and throwing it into 
 the pan, commenced treating another on similar 
 principles. Then, noticing that the fire in the 
 little stove wanted poking, he poked it with his 
 forefinger. The soup needing stirring, he 
 stirred it with the same forefinger. I went 
 on deck, and, being a boy, was soon hard at 
 work on the dinner that I had thus seen in
 
 258 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 preparation, but it needs to be a boy to enjoy 
 these things. 
 
 There is no part of the world for yachting 
 that can touch the West Coast of Scotland 
 provided, which is exceptional, you get tolerable 
 weather. Where will you find such variety of 
 scenery, as the outlines of the mountains and 
 islands unravel themselves ; as the swift changes 
 of sky and drift upon the hills, or the colour of 
 the water, warn you of the squall that is on you 
 and past you so quickly out of these mountain 
 gorges ? At one place the land looms above you 
 in great up-sweeping sheets of grassy down. 
 At another a grotesque, beetling cliff over- 
 shadows you; or again the columnar basalt 
 which scarcely looks as if Nature's careless hand 
 had made it. Now and again, you will pass the 
 ruins of a castle built upon the very edge of a 
 promontory, looking away over the Minch, with 
 but a narrow causeway from the mainland lead- 
 ing up to it; and scarcely the most prosaic of us 
 but would conjure up some vision of yellow- 
 haired Vikings plying wild war around the base 
 of the cliff, while, from above, the chief and his 
 retainers rained down their missiles far enough 
 from the reality, perhaps, but none the less allur- 
 ing to the fancy. Then you will go past a colony 
 of puffins, which come out in denser masses than 
 a swarm of bees ; or you will get among a shoal
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 259 
 
 of herring, with myriads of sea-birds of all sorts 
 preying upon them, and so loaded with fish that 
 they can only lift themselves an inch or so from 
 the water, to flip along out of the boat's way. 
 And then some one will see a whale blowing out 
 in the Minch, and you all look emulously to be 
 the first to sight his next appearance. One day, 
 going by a shoal of herring, we came so near a 
 gannet asleep on the water, with his head under 
 his wing, that we almost caught him ; and 
 McBain told us that once, at night, a gannet 
 had got itself entangled in the nets of his boat, 
 and frightened him with his great, white, flap- 
 ping wings, for he thought it was the ghost of 
 his father but what the distinctive features were 
 by which he thought to identify the ghostly 
 individuality, he either would not, or could not, 
 confide to us. 
 
 Some of their fancies are strange. Fairies, 
 they will tell you, frequent streams of running 
 water. Bob Burscough, having sorely rent the 
 seat of his trousers, the journeyman of the 
 township a sort of general utility man, who 
 mends your drains or your cisterns or, as before 
 indicated, your trousers was summoned to 
 repair them. The job being still unfinished at 
 dusk, and his home across a branch of the burn, 
 he declined to stay and finish it for fear of the 
 fairies, except on one condition : that a little
 
 260 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 child should be sent home with him. The child 
 was to come back by itself. They said that the 
 fairies would not molest a child, or any one who 
 is with a child. It is a pretty fancy. The 
 journeyman, under the child's protection, got 
 home quite safe. 
 
 It did not fall to our lot to witness a crofter's 
 funeral, but we were informed that the ceremonial 
 had some singular features. The corpse is borne 
 to the place of burial in a cart, on which is also 
 carried a cask of whisky. The mourners form a 
 procession before the cart, with the chief mourner 
 in front bearing a whisky bottle, from which 
 drinks are offered to all whom the procession 
 encounters. The bottle is replenished from the 
 cask, and it is said to be counted a great affront 
 to refuse the proffered dram. At none of their 
 religious ceremonies are instruments of music of 
 any kind permitted. Bob did indeed assert that 
 they admitted the Jew's harp, believing it to be 
 the instrument with which David scared away 
 the evil spirit that vexed Saul. If this view be 
 correct, there is some justification for the mon 
 arch's hasty use of the javelin ; but Bob was a 
 boy of original imagination. One of our party, 
 on his first sight of a Highlander in full dress, 
 was simple enough to ask Bob to point out to 
 him the Highlander's pibroch he pronounced it 
 " pie-brooch " and Master Robert promptly told
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 261 
 
 him that it was the clasp which held together the 
 skirts of the kilt, of his own accord volunteering 
 the further information that when the clasp was 
 replaced by a pin the latter was then called a 
 "hoolichan." 
 
 The people are responsive to the charm of 
 music. We got a piper from Portree, and Eliza 
 gave a crofter's ball, in return for much black- 
 house hospitality in the shape of tea and syllabub- 
 fights. The day before the ball we took the piper 
 out in the yacht, and as he tucked the bag under 
 his arm, like Alice in Wonderland with her fla- 
 mingo croquet-mallet, and sent the weird strain 
 skirling across the waters of the loch, and up 
 the glens and hillsides, we saw the people ever 
 so far away coming out before their houses and 
 shuffling and jigging in the steps of the reel. 
 The ball was a succes Jou. The gun-room was 
 the ball-room. It was not lofty. Indeed, one 
 tall crofter, in the energy of the dance, perpetually 
 hit his head against the ceiling, bringing down 
 little avalanches of the plaster for which he 
 subsequently apologised most courteously yet 
 never allowing the mishap to interfere with the 
 vigour of his dancing. 
 
 Reels, reels, reels, nothing but reels all night, 
 with an occasional interval for a Gaelic song of 
 most monotonous melody, and, as we were told, 
 though we did not understand a syllable, of most
 
 262 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 monotonous words. Jack, also, sang Jack, our 
 chef from the yacht and such a voice, too ! It 
 nearly brought the house down literally, as it 
 quite did metaphorically. We could never induce 
 him to sing on board the yacht he used to say 
 he had lost his voice (it would assuredly have 
 incommoded the man who chanced to find it !), 
 but the skipper told us the real reason of his 
 reluctance. His last effort had been in the par- 
 lour at home, and he had then sung till his 
 grandmother's nose bled she was a very old 
 woman and it was a most dangerous thing, and 
 Jack had then and there registered a vow never 
 to sing again. This vow he had broken under 
 the genial influence of Eliza's party and whisky ; 
 and the atmosphere of the gun-room, where peat 
 flavour and whisky were proving but inadequate 
 substitutes for oxygen, was noticeably cleared 
 by it. They kept up the dance until four in the 
 morning, and went away delighted, and very few 
 of them tipsy. 
 
 Yet they are an austere people. The profane 
 Saxon who is tempted by the inviting look of 
 sky and water to fish for the dainty sea-trout on 
 the Sabbath, will be made to feel the ill-will 
 which any such disregard of their conscientious 
 scruples will entail. The merchant was the most 
 austere of all. A weather-bound ship came into 
 the loch, one Sunday during our stay, with a
 
 THE HIGHLANDS AND THE ISLANDS 263 
 
 cr?w of nine men. They had been lying-to, short 
 of provisions, in the Minch, and had not tasted 
 food for thirty-eight hours. They came to the 
 merchant and asked for bread they offered him 
 money, they besought him, they threatened him ; 
 bit not a bite would he give those starving men 
 because he was a religious man and it was the 
 Lord's day ! A neighbouring proprietor, hearing 
 of their case, sent them a sheep; otherwise no 
 one knows what might have happened to the 
 merchant. 
 
 And no one can spend an autumn in Skye 
 without bearing away with him a most lasting 
 impression skin-deep only of two insect pests. 
 First, about the time that the primitive sickles 
 are cutting the late hay harvest and driving the 
 ever craking corn-crake out of his favourite 
 haunt about this season appear, in hosts, the 
 horse-flies, whose local name is " clegg." A dark 
 coat, which they probably affect rather on account 
 of its greater warmth than for any aesthetic 
 reasons, is almost immediately covered by them ; 
 and when they bite they mean business, and draw 
 blood. They infest the country for a fortnight 
 and then vanish, and after an interval of two or 
 three days are succeeded by a creature to which, 
 in spite of its smaller bulk, the " clegg " is not a 
 circumstance. This is no other than the midge, 
 the common midge ; but it is hardly possible
 
 264 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 for any one who has had experience merely of 
 the English midge to form an idea of what he 
 can be in the Western Highlands. No stronger 
 proof of their power can be given than that vce 
 have known a keen fisherman leave a rising 
 salmon to get anywhere away from them. They 
 are perhaps a little worse round the burns like 
 the fairies than elsewhere, but they are pretty 
 ubiquitous. They get into your eyes, your ears, 
 your nose ; you breathe midge, you eat midge, 
 and midge eats you ; a myriad of them eat you 
 at the same moment. Happily, " little Master 
 Midge," as Bob used to call him, is no mariner. 
 On the water you are free from him. So, on the 
 water we spent most of his brief but despotic 
 reign.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 A VERY CURIOUS ACCOUNT OF THE ISLAND OF 
 ST. KILDA 
 
 A GREAT many people have been to Skye, despite 
 the hardships of the journey, for the English are 
 an adventurous race, but Skye is but half-way 
 nay, but a fraction of the way to a much less 
 familiar and more remote island the island of 
 St. Kilda. 
 
 I ought, perhaps, to have mentioned before 
 that the party the more or less permanent 
 party, so to say, besides guests coming from 
 time to time for a day or two in Skye included 
 an old friend of Colonel Burscough's, a certain 
 Professor Flegg. Mr. Flegg was a man of 
 prodigious learning. In what particular line 
 his learning lay I was always afraid to ask, 
 but I fancy that it was almost universal in 
 all lines. Not only so, but he was incomparably 
 the most modest, courteous, and self-depreciating 
 man I have ever met. One of the principal 
 pleasures which Bob expected from our autumn
 
 266 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 in Skye was the observation of the Professor, 
 whom he profanely termed " old Flegg." 
 
 " You'll see," he said, " old Flegg '11 be rigged 
 out in a high hat and a paper collar and a kilt ; 
 you see if he isn't." 
 
 In this alluring prospect we were dis- 
 appointed. "Old Flegg" wore much the same 
 clothes rusty black as it is to be supposed that 
 he wore in London, with the addition of a " fore 
 and aft" cap, which did not at all look as if it 
 belonged to him. We had considerable enter- 
 tainment, however, in instructing Mr. Flegg in 
 the use of the gun. 
 
 " I have observed, my dear sir," he said, with 
 his deferential courtesy, " I have observed that 
 firearms are safest when carried at the port." 
 
 Putting this conclusion into practice, he used 
 to stride over the moor with his " firearm " held 
 perpendicularly, with both hands in front of 
 him, recalling to mind the hare in Struwelpeter 
 who has stolen the huntsman's gun. What 
 made him a less desirable companion on the 
 moor was that Bob had insidiously advised him 
 to "Swing your gun when you fire, Professor, 
 so as to make the shot scatter more " ; which 
 advice, zealously followed by the Professor, 
 "scattered" not only the shot, but the whole 
 shooting party. 
 
 For all and sundry such counsels the
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 267 
 
 Professor always expressed his courteous grati- 
 tudesurely the most simple-minded of learned 
 men! 
 
 Now, the Professor, in common with the 
 rest of us, experienced a yearning desire to 
 know something of that lonely little island of 
 St. Kilda, away out, all by itself, weathering the 
 Atlantic storms, far beyond those outer Hebrides 
 whose outlines we could well distinguish, across 
 the Minch, from the northern corner of Skye. 
 Professor Flegg had suffered cruelly in crossing 
 even that small nearly land-locked offshoot of 
 the Minch betwixt Skye and the mainland; for 
 of the Flegg that arrived at Strome Ferry but 
 Flegg x (an unknown but large quantity) 
 reached Portree. A fortiori, to what power 
 would not that unknown x be raised in crossing 
 that stretch of open Atlantic which lay betwixt 
 us and St. Kilda! Professor Flegg concluded, 
 therefore, to satisfy by proxy his scientific 
 interest in the remote island. 
 
 We talked much beforehand of our intention 
 of visiting it, and were greatly confirmed in our 
 purpose by the incredulity shown by Colonel 
 Burscough about the chances of our ever 
 getting there. As the steamer was adver- 
 tised to start for St. Kilda at an unseasonably 
 early hour in the morning, Bob and I set 
 off after dinner, and drove into Portree the
 
 268 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 evening before. Arriving at the chief hostelry 
 at about n p.m., we fought our way through a 
 dense atmosphere of peat and tobacco smoke, 
 to be informed by the host that a large meeting 
 of the Landlord Abolition Society, or some such 
 philanthropic evangel, was being held in the 
 town. The crofters had mustered in great 
 force, as was apparent from the all-pervading 
 atmosphere of peat-smoke by which they are 
 ubiquitously attended. All the beds in the 
 hotel were taken, and crofters were slumbering, 
 several deep, both on and below the billiard- 
 table. Menaces, bribes, and entreaties succeeded 
 in securing for our use two chairs apiece, on 
 which we betook ourselves to such rest as we 
 might snatch, after bidding the waiter, on pain 
 of death, wake us in time in the morning to 
 catch the steamer for St. Kilda. 
 
 What with the discomfort of the couch and 
 the Gaelic snores of the circumjacent crofters 
 I was but in my first beauty sleep when the 
 waiter lightly touched me on the shoulder. 
 
 "The boat will be awa' in half an hour," 
 said he. 
 
 " Indeed," I said, and glanced at Bob, who 
 slept profoundly. " Hush ! " I whispered to the 
 waiter. " Is it a fine morning?" 
 
 " Na'," said he, " it's a gae stormy morn." 
 
 "Then go away again," I whispered; "and,
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 269 
 
 whatever you do, don't wake us till the boat's 
 clean away." 
 
 For a quarter of an hour I was uneasy 
 terribly anxious lest Bob should awake in time 
 for us to catch the steamer. At length I heard 
 her whistle, and sank peacefully to rest as if I 
 were on a bed of eiderdown. 
 
 " I say hi ! " It was Bob's voice that awoke 
 me about an hour later. "I say, what time 
 is it?" 
 
 "About eight, I think," I said, looking at 
 my watch. 
 
 "Eight!" he said. "But the steamer goes 
 I mean went at seven ! " 
 
 " So I believe," I said. 
 
 "Oh lor! and that confounded waiter never 
 woke us ! " 
 
 " That confounded waiter " had a very severe 
 time of it with Mr. Robert Burscough a few 
 minutes later. The waiter asserted that he had 
 awakened me at half-past six, and that I had 
 then told him to go away and not come back till 
 the boat had gone. 
 
 "You see," I said to Bob, "it must be that 
 wretched trick I have of talking in my sleep." 
 
 At all events the steamer was gone. There 
 was not much good waiting for the next, for it 
 did not go for six weeks. 
 
 "The question is," as Bob said, "what are
 
 2;o WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 we to do? We cannot possibly go back and 
 let on we've never been. We'd better cruise 
 about for three days somewhere, and then go 
 back and tell them that we've been there." 
 
 We decided we would go a walking tour. 
 Its distance was to be determined at the pleasure 
 of the one who should first call a halt ; the pace 
 of walking by the pace of him who walked the 
 slower. This understanding is as indispensable 
 to the success of a pedestrian tour as of a cavalry 
 charge. 
 
 "Tell you what we might do," Robert Burs- 
 cough suggested; "get leave from the Sheriff 
 to fish the Skcebost. We can borrow rods here 
 and send them back from Sligachan to-morrow." 
 
 The Skcebost, the pride of Skye, recalls 
 forcibly, by the colour and velocity of its waters, 
 the Regent's Park Canal. It meanders sluggishly 
 through low-lying moorland. It runs deep 
 between its banks, and only in a storm of wind 
 and rain are its waters sufficiently troubled for 
 the artificial fly to delude the eye of the hungry 
 salmon. These conditions were excellently ful- 
 filled on the present occasion, but few fish were 
 in the river, and we caught but one a nine- 
 pound grilse. 
 
 The grilse we presented to the innkeeper's 
 wife at Sligachan, which we reached about 
 nightfall, thoroughly soaked to the skin. We
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 271 
 
 went to bed while our clothes were dried and 
 our salmon cooked ; then got up to eat him, and 
 then to bed again to sleep him off. 
 
 A quaint little place is that Sligachan, be- 
 neath the overwhelming Cuchullins. It is your 
 duty to go up one of the Cuchullins every day 
 that you are at Sligachan, but we left our duty 
 undone. We took it very easy. We strolled 
 along the not too uneven tenor of our way, 
 encountering in each corrie a fresh bevy of 
 tourists. Each tourist carried a long crook- 
 handled stick, to show he was a Scotchman, but 
 dropped his "h's," which he had left behind in 
 London. There was great excitement among 
 one party of them. One of its members was 
 gazing through a telescope at a stag which he 
 saw on the mountain-side. When his eye was 
 satisfied with seeing, he handed his glass to 
 another of his party, who gave a prolonged 
 " whew-ew-ew ! " to indicate his appreciation 
 of the noble animal, and handed the telescope 
 to another. When they had all looked and 
 " whew-ew-ew-ed," they politely invited Bob 
 and myself to look also. We looked and 
 " whew-ew-ew-ed " ; then gave the telescope 
 back to the tourists, thanked them, and went 
 our way. 
 
 After this it seemed, as the novelists say, as 
 if an indefinable something had come between
 
 272 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 us. We were not to each other what we had 
 been. I determined that I would make a clean 
 breast of it. 
 
 "Bob," I said, "did you see that stag?" 
 "Well," said he, "did you?" 
 "Well, I really was not certain whether I 
 made it out quite clearly or not. There was 
 something, you know, that perhaps might have 
 been a stag." 
 
 "Yes; that was just my feeling too," he said. 
 " It might have been a stag, you know." 
 
 "Oh yes," I said, "it might have been a stag, 
 but I do not think I can honestly say that I saw 
 one." 
 
 " Well, I don't think I should like to swear to 
 it either," he said. 
 
 " It is a great pity," I said ; " I should like to 
 have seen one." 
 
 We afterwards heard that there are no deer 
 on that part of the Cuchullins. 
 
 After this explanation we proceeded in much 
 harmony to call at the house of a friend, with 
 whom we spent the greater part of the day in 
 sea-otter hunting. We were in luck to fall in 
 for this fun, which can only be followed at low 
 tides. These Skye sea-otters are not the sea- 
 otter from which the finest fur is taken, but are 
 mere river-otters come down to the sea-side for 
 change of air. They live in cairns by the sea-
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 273 
 
 side, from which they can be ousted by a plucky 
 terrier; but in most states of tide the bolt-hole 
 is so near the sea that they are out and under 
 water before you can get a shot at them. We 
 visited one or two cairns in vain, much to the 
 disappointment of the three terriers, each of 
 which was an exact facsimile of the other two. 
 We cruised about from cairn to cairn in a little 
 yacht, with the three small doggies in the dinghy 
 towing behind. Failing their otter-bait, they 
 fell on each other tooth and nail, for exercise, 
 and continued the contest regardless of rebuke 
 until their master drew the dinghy alongside, 
 and, seizing the nearest doggie by the tail, 
 hauled him on board the yacht, with the others, 
 who had a fast hold with their teeth, depending 
 from him like a string of sausages. 
 
 At the third cairn we were more successful. 
 A fine worrying in the heart of the cairn of 
 stones was succeeded by a rush and scramble, 
 and out bolted an old otter, followed by one 
 half-grown. With a bang ! bang ! our host had 
 bagged them both, whilst songs of thanksgiving 
 went up from the mouths of all the fishes who 
 beheld it. 
 
 By afternoon of the next day we reckoned it 
 time we should return from St. Kilda. The 
 evening was mainly occupied with preparing an 
 account of the voyage and the island. This was 
 
 T
 
 274 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 the easier that we knew almost nothing at all 
 about it. Our scope was practically unlimited. 
 We thought it likely, however, that we knew as 
 much as Colonel Burscough or Professor Flegg, 
 so that any departure from the truth was likely 
 to be undetected. Bob assured me that he knew 
 there were native cavalry upon the island, be- 
 cause he had lately read in Truth of a gentleman 
 holding a commission in the "St. Kilda Horse.'* 
 
 "They're something like the Maltese Fen- 
 cibles, or the Cape Mounted Rifles, you know," 
 he said. But this did not seem much on which 
 to base an exhaustive account of the island and 
 its general society. 
 
 "It seems to me," I said, "as if I remembered 
 hearing that they live almost entirely on one 
 animal, like the Esquimaux on the reindeer, or 
 the North American Indians on the buffalo. I 
 wish I could remember the name of the animal, 
 but, of course, it's some sort of seal. It couldn't 
 be anything else. I expect we shall have to call 
 it 'a peculiar species of seal.'" 
 
 I was very sorry that I could not remember 
 the proper name of the creature. I puzzled over 
 it all the evening, out could not get it. Just, 
 however, as I was lighting my candle to go to 
 bed the idea seemed to flash out with the match. 
 
 " I've got it," I said triumphantly. " Foumart 
 that's it. I am pleased to have remembered.
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 275 
 
 That'll make the whole thing all right. It won't 
 be so very far from the truth now." 
 
 "Never mind. So much the better," said 
 Bob. He was disappointed I could see that 
 though he strove to make the best of it. It was 
 hard to be forced from the alluring paths of 
 fiction into the hard and stern reality of fact. 
 "I'm glad you've remembered the name," he 
 forced himself to say. "Don't forget it again 
 before morning. Good night ! " 
 
 We got our account into proper order the 
 next morning, and, timing things well, reached 
 home about five o'clock in the afternoon. A 
 light rain was falling, and down by the mouth 
 of the burn, not far from the house, we beheld a 
 familiar object. It was Professor Flegg. He 
 was sitting on a little stool. He was completely 
 enveloped, save for his head, in a voluminous 
 mackintosh. Over his head he held a large 
 umbrella. He was seated on the brink of the 
 stream, above which stuck out, motionless, his 
 fishing-rod, while through his powerful spec- 
 tacles he closely watched his cork which 
 wobbled on the water. 
 
 " I say, old Flegg clot-fishing ! " Bob whis- 
 pered to me in huge delight. 
 
 A "clot" is a very unpleasant confusion of 
 worms and worsted. An eel, endeavouring to 
 disengage a worm, entangles his fangs in the
 
 2/6 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 worsted. The fisherman gently raises him to 
 the top of the water, then gives a violent whip 
 back of the rod over his head, and Master Eel, 
 loosing his toothhold a second too late, finds 
 himself flying a considerable distance up country, 
 where on dry land Mr. Man has him at a dis- 
 advantage. 
 
 As we came upon Mr. Flegg thus assiduously 
 employed, it was evident that an eel was wickedly 
 coquetting with him. Momentary agitation every 
 now and then affected his float, agitation which 
 manifested itself throughout all Flegg even to 
 the ribs of the umbrella. At length Mr. Flegg 
 prepared for decisive action. He allowed the 
 umbrella to fall backwards. He raised the rod 
 very gently, then whipped it up over his head 
 with such energy that he threw himself backward 
 off the little stool, while the eel, after flying 
 through the air like a pterodactyl, descended 
 very nearly in Bob's eye. 
 
 I left Bob to secure and decapitate the eel, 
 while I proceeded to try and separate Mr. Flegg 
 from his umbrella. He had lost his spectacles, 
 without which he could see no more than his 
 spectacles could without him. 
 
 " Indeed, my dear sir, I am deeply indebted 
 to you," he said, as I replaced them on his nose. 
 " Has our friend Robert succeeded in securing 
 our quarry?"
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 277 
 
 The latter came up at the moment with the 
 wriggling but decapitated body of the eel. Mr. 
 Flegg was intensely pleased and excited. He 
 did not care at all that he had ruined his 
 umbrella, which was compound- and complex- 
 fractured and dislocated in all directions. He 
 had caught six eels, and now he insisted upon 
 carrying them home himself. It was but a 
 hundred yards, but six eels are bad to carry. 
 Mr. Flegg would get all but one firmly wedged 
 between his fingers, and then, in putting in the 
 last, the first would wriggle loose, and then one 
 in the middle would come out and demoralize 
 the whole arrangement. It was just like " pigs 
 in clover." 
 
 "Their vitality, my dear sir, is truly pro- 
 digious," Mr. Flegg justly said. " I have, to-day, 
 my dear sir, been severely bitten by one from 
 which I had already severed the head." 
 
 " Oh ! now really, Mr. Flegg," Bob ejaculated, 
 " that is trying us a bit too high. How in the 
 world could it bite when it had no head to bite 
 with ? " 
 
 " It was with the jaws of the severed head 
 that it bit me, my dear sir," Mr. Flegg answered 
 with grave courtesy. " Naturally it was not the 
 headless body." 
 
 " I beg your pardon," said Bob. " I did not 
 understand."
 
 2;8 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Acting on a prearranged plan, we determined 
 to give the family but a very general description 
 of St. Kilda until we arrived at the reading of 
 our written narrative. We reported that we 
 had had a pleasant time, and heard and seen 
 much that was new and strange, and had jotted 
 down, for the edification of the home-stayers, an 
 account of the strange life, habits, and circum- 
 stances of the St. Kilda islanders, which Bob 
 promised to read to the company after dinner. 
 
 " It was, indeed, considerate of you, my dear 
 sir," said Mr. Flegg, as Bob unrolled his manu- 
 script, " to have been at the pains of committing 
 to writing your doubtless deeply interesting and 
 instructive experiences." 
 
 " Not at all, Mr. Flegg ; it was a pleasure, I 
 assure you," Bob said pleasantly. " I will pass 
 over," he went on, " an account I have sketched 
 in, principally for my own satisfaction, of the 
 incidents of the voyage or, perhaps, you would 
 like to hear it?" 
 
 No one expressed any fervent desire to do 
 so, so Bob, a little disappointed, said, "Very 
 well ; if you don't care for that, I will at once go 
 on to the description of St. Kilda." 
 
 "'As you draw near the island,'" he began 
 his reading, "'your ears are assailed by a loud 
 and constantly increasing moaning or bellowing 
 a weird and dreadful sound, mingling, as it
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 279 
 
 does, with the roar of the waves which dash 
 ceaselessly upon the precipitous shore. The 
 terrifying noise proceeds from a beast named 
 ' foumart ' by the inhabitants of the island, who 
 are entirely dependent on this creature for their 
 food, for the wigwams they live in, and indeed 
 for their very existence. The ' foumart ' would 
 appear to be a cross between the right whale 
 and the seal, being amphibious in its habits, and 
 having its dwelling in the caves by the sea-side. 
 It feeds entirely upon fish, in the catching of 
 which it displays an almost incredible swiftness, 
 and it is by taking advantage of this peculiarity 
 that the islanders are enabled to capture it.' " 
 
 " Pardon me, my dear sir, but one moment," 
 Mr. Flegg interrupted. " I am indeed at a loss 
 to understand how it can be by taking advantage 
 of its incredible swiftness " 
 
 "Almost incredible" Bob softly corrected. 
 
 Mr. Flegg acknowledged the correction by 
 an inclination of his head, and repeated his 
 remark in a much amended form : " I do not 
 fully understand, my dear sir, how its un- 
 doubtedly marvellous swiftness can at all aid 
 the islanders in effecting its capture." 
 
 "No, no, Mr. Flegg; it's not that. It's the 
 peculiarity of its feeding on fish that doe 5 that," 
 Bob explained. 
 
 "Why, hang it all, boy," said Colonel
 
 280 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Burscough, "there's nothing so very peculiar in 
 that. Why, I eat fish myself sometimes. We all 
 eat fish. You did not go all the way to St. Kilda 
 to find an animal that ate fish ! " 
 
 "Oh no, indeed, uncle; certainly not. Per- 
 haps I had better go on," said Bob hastily ; and 
 as no one moved an amendment he continued 
 the reading of his manuscript: 
 
 " ' They ' that's the islanders ' having by 
 some means peculiar to themselves (for they 
 have no apparatus which we should deem at all 
 suitable for such a purpose) contrived to capture 
 a great number of fish, thrust into their bodies ' 
 (the fishes' bodies, you know) ' large fishhooks, 
 and setting them floating upon the water at the 
 end of long, stout fishing-lines, watch eagerly 
 until they are pounced upon and swallowed by 
 the voracious foumart ' " 
 
 " Pardon me for one instant if I again 
 interrupt you, my dear sir," said Mr. Flegg ; " but 
 I think that even you yourself, despite the 
 privilege you have had of exploring the island, 
 must regard it as a singular fact that a people 
 completely destitute of such apparatus as we 
 should deem suitable for the capture of fish, 
 should yet find no apparent difficulty whatever 
 in the procuring of such articles as fishhooks 
 and long fishing-lines ! " 
 
 " Eh ? Yes. Rum thing that, isn't it ? " said
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 281 
 
 Bob, much perplexed. " Did you ask the Master 
 of the Horse about that ? " he said, referring 
 to me. 
 
 " They are a most peculiar people, Mr. Flegg," 
 I said ; " most peculiar. No ; I forgot to put 
 that point to the Master of the Horse. I wish I 
 had thought of it, but I did not." 
 
 " And who the mischief is the Master of the 
 Horse?" Colonel Burscough asked. 
 
 " Oh, don't you know, Uncle ? " said Bob 
 with gentle surprise. " He's commander of the 
 cavalry of the St. Kilda Horse, as they are 
 called. He had a long talk with him," he added, 
 indicating me. 
 
 " A very interesting companion," I observed. 
 
 " Indeed ! " said Colonel Burscough. " Go 
 on, Robert." 
 
 " ' voracious foumart,' " said Bob, picking 
 
 up the thread of his parable. "'No sooner has 
 the dainty fish, with the cruel barbed hook 
 imbedded in it, disappeared down the maw 
 of the foumart, than the islanders, who have 
 been lying in wait, seize the other or shoreward 
 end of the line, fasten it to a horse or, if 
 necessary, a pair, or even, on occasion, a team 
 which they have kept in readiness for the 
 purpose, and drive up country, dragging the 
 loudly-bellowing foumart at the end of the 
 rope behind them. The islanders then fall upon
 
 282 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 the beast with sharpened stones, loud cries, and 
 pieces of bottle-glass which have been left by 
 previous excursionists to the island, and in an 
 almost incredibly short space of time the 
 foumart is skinned, his flesh laid aside for eating, 
 and his fat carefully preserved for melting down 
 into oil for lamps made out of his own skull. 
 
 " ' The myriad uses to which these people 
 put this single animal are almost inconceivable. 
 It is to the islanders of St. Kilda what the 
 buffalo is to the North American Indian, the 
 reindeer to the Esquimaux. With its skins they 
 wall their wigwams and make their clothes 
 which, in form, are a modification of the High- 
 land kilt. Its teeth they use for necklaces, 
 earrings, and other ornamental purposes. Its 
 flesh is their sole means of subsistence '" 
 
 " Can it be, my dear sir, that they eat none 
 of the fish which, as you have stated in your 
 most interesting and instructive description, 
 they capture in such numbers as bait for the 
 allurement of the voracious foumart ? " asked 
 Mr. Flegg. 
 
 "You asked the Master of the Horse that 
 question, I think," said Bob, referring again to 
 me, " and he said ' no fish.' " 
 
 " ' No fish,' said .the Master of the Horse," I 
 replied. 
 
 "'With regard to the social habits of the
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 283 
 
 islanders,'" Bob resumed, "'we were unable, I 
 regret to say, to learn any details. So far as we 
 could gather, however, cannibalism is almost 
 unknown among them, except under stress of 
 the greatest pressure ; and even in those circum- 
 stances it is only the very old or the very young 
 those, in fact, who are unfit for work, that is 
 for foumart hunting who fall victims. Other 
 details, many of them, doubtless, of absorbing 
 interest, we were unable to gather, owing to 
 the great difficulty of conversing with a savage 
 people, ignorant of every language but their 
 own ' " 
 
 " Pardon my once more interrupting you, my 
 dear sir," said Mr. Flegg, " but I had understood 
 that our friend here had conversed at no incon- 
 siderable length with the Master of the Horse, 
 who indeed proved, I believe I am correct 
 in stating, a most interesting companion ! " 
 
 " Gestures, Mr. Flegg purely by gestures," 
 I explained. 
 
 " Must have been a blamed interesting com- 
 panion," the Colonel observed dryly. 
 
 " I have frequently read and heard it stated, 
 my dear sir," said Mr. Flegg, addressing Colonel 
 Burscough, " that amongst savage peoples the 
 faculty of conversing by means of gestures has 
 reached a degree of development quite incon- 
 ceivable to us who have had few occasions for
 
 284 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 the interchange of our ideas through such a 
 medium." 
 
 "You're quite right, Mr. Flegg," I said. " It's 
 simply inconceivable." 
 
 "'When we turn/" Bob resumed, "'to the 
 geological aspect of St. Kilda, we find every- 
 where a uniform character of carboniferous 
 limestone and basaltic trap. Igneous formations 
 of every kind ' " 
 
 "Oh! hang it all, boy," broke in the Colonel 
 impatiently, "skip all that, for goodness' sake. 
 Go on to the next heading." 
 
 "Very well, uncle," Bob answered sub- 
 missively ; and, after turning to a new page and 
 hunting about it for a little while, went on : 
 "'The flora of this interesting but most bleak- 
 looking island is of the most meagre description. 
 Tufts of stunted, wind-swept grass ' " 
 
 " Oh ! hang it all, my dear boy, I don't want 
 to hurt your feelings," said the Colonel, " but 
 upon my word, we don't want to hear all that. 
 Haven't you got any more about the people to 
 tell us?" 
 
 " Well, I am afraid, do you know, uncle," said 
 Bob slowly, as he turned over the pages, " I am 
 afraid there's nothing more that would interest 
 you very much. You see," he said, as he laid 
 the manuscript reverently on the table, "it's 
 very hard to learn much about the people of a
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 285 
 
 new country when you can't speak their language. 
 I think I've given you all the information we 
 managed to pick up." 
 
 " May I express to you my thanks, my dear 
 sir," said Mr. Flegg, courteously, " for the very 
 interesting information which you have been 
 kind enough to collate for us. Will you permit 
 me the great privilege of re-perusing your 
 manuscript at my leisure ? I am convinced that 
 it will contain much of interest to myself, as a 
 man of science, in that portion which you have 
 left unread ; for from that which you have been 
 good enough to read to us I have derived not 
 only much entertainment, but much information 
 which to me was new." 
 
 " It would be new to most people, I fancy, 
 Mr. Flegg," I said. "There are few who have 
 had the privilege to visit St. Kilda. Bob and I 
 may reckon ourselves uncommonly fortunate." 
 
 "Indeed, my dear sir, you may," said Mr. 
 Flegg, as he took up his candlestick and pre- 
 pared to carry off Bob's manuscript with him 
 to bed. 
 
 " Do you think of publishing it, Bob ? " 
 Colonel Burscough asked, as we proceeded to 
 follow Mr. Flegg's example. 
 
 " Well, I had not thought of it," he answered. 
 "You see, I do not quite know what sort of 
 periodical would care to put it in."
 
 286 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 " You might try Knowledge" I suggested. 
 
 "Yes, I think you'd better," said Colonel 
 Burscough, dryly. "Or, perhaps you'd better 
 first try Truth" 
 
 " Uncle twigs it's all gammon," Bob whispered 
 to me as we went upstairs, " but we boshed old 
 Flegg to rights." 
 
 The next morning, before breakfast, Bob 
 noticed a fresh book on the sitting-room table. 
 It was " Maunder' s Treasury of Natural His- 
 tory." One of the leaves was dog's-eared down, 
 and it opened readily at that place. Running his 
 eye idly down the page, Bob's attention was 
 caught by the following heading : 
 
 " Fulmar (Procellaria glacialis). A palmiped 
 bird, belonging to the Petrel family." 
 
 He read the article through, and then he 
 called me from the breakfast-room. 
 
 " Look here," he said, taking me to the table 
 where the book lay open, and pointing to the 
 article under heading " Fulmar." 
 
 The concluding sentences ran thus : " Pen- 
 nant, speaking of those" (that is, those fulmars) 
 " which inhabit the Isle of St. Kilda, says : ' No 
 bird is of such use to the islanders as this : the 
 fulmar supplies them with oil for their lamps, 
 down for their beds, a delicac}' for their tables, a 
 balm for their wounds, and a medicine for their 
 distempers.' The female is said to lay one white
 
 THE ISLAND OF ST. KILDA 287 
 
 and very brittle egg, which she hatches about the 
 middle of June." 
 
 There was a very curious pause as we looked 
 at each other after reading the article. 
 
 " Blame me," observed Bob, " if it wasn't a 
 bird ! We'd got the name pretty right, too, all 
 but a letter or two ; but how the dickens were 
 we going to know it was a bird ? " 
 
 I was silent 
 
 "It seems to me," he went on plaintively, "a 
 kind of breach of confidence of the fulmar, its 
 being a bird." 
 
 " They say its egg's brittle," I said vaguely, 
 not seeking to excuse it, but because no other 
 remark occurred to me. 
 
 Bob took no notice of the observation, but 
 turned back to the flyleaf of the book, where he 
 found the name of Mr. Flegg. He pointed to the 
 name with his forefinger, and then he said, " Did 
 you ever read a poem of Bret Harte's 'The 
 Heathen Chinee ' ? " 
 
 "Yes, I have. Why?" I said, thinking the 
 question rather irrelevant. 
 
 " Why, it strikes me that Bret Harte studied 
 Ah Sin from Mr. Flegg;" and he shut up the 
 book with a bang, and we went, with much 
 impaired appetites, to breakfast. 
 
 The next day the book was gone. Mr. Flegg 
 had probably taken it to his bedroom. Nor did
 
 288 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 he ever again allude to the island of St. Kilda 
 and to that creation of a splendid fancy, the 
 foumart, save to thank Bob, with his usual 
 courtesy, when he returned the manuscript.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 LOST AND FOUND 
 
 IT was a lovely morning that I sallied forth by 
 myself to fish one or more of the small burns 
 that ran across the moor. It was in consequence 
 of the extra number of guests now at the lodge 
 that Bob and I had to take a turn, now and then 
 at some other amusement than the shooting, 
 which could only make sport for a limited num- 
 ber of guns. It is possible that in preoccupation 
 of my mind with the fish which rose greedily 
 I took too little notice of my route as I went 
 along, but, however that may be, it is certain 
 that when I began to think of leaving off and 
 making my way back to the lodge, I had only a 
 very general and vague idea of the direction in 
 which it lay. 
 
 I do not mean to say that as soon as I turned 
 my back on the river I believed that I had lost 
 myself, but merely that I had begun to be con- 
 scious of that cold chill and kind of arrest of the 
 heart's action that one seems to feel at the first 
 
 u
 
 290 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 moment of realisation, or fancied realisation, that 
 all one's landmarks are gone. I had been far 
 out on the moor, fishing a little burn that was 
 famous. The day had been beautiful, but for its 
 midges, and the game little fish, hungry for fly 
 in the stream that was just clearing from the 
 spate, came freely and fought gallantly. I had a 
 basketful. I delayed longer than I should have 
 done beside the water, till the swallows and 
 martins had come down, flying close over the 
 stream's surface, and as I turned away, after 
 putting up my rod, the swallows had gone some- 
 where to their roosting, and their place as insect- 
 hawks had been taken by the bats. When the 
 bats come out, fish, as a rule, cease to rise at 
 least, I have found it so, though some speak of 
 great catches with the Coachman or the White 
 Moth. For my own part, when it gets too dark 
 for the fish to see the Blue Dun, I think it is time 
 to be going home. If the fish could see the Blue 
 Dun when I left off that night, it was certainly 
 more than I could do, and even as I turned 
 homeward I felt that I ought to have been on my 
 way sooner. 
 
 I believed, however, that I knew my road 
 perfectly. At home, in an armchair, by lamp- 
 light, I would have declared that I knew it 
 blindfold ; a few days previously it had seemed 
 very familiar country, and I thought that I
 
 LOST AND FOUND 291 
 
 remembered all its features. It was only as the 
 dusk gave out and the real dark set in, that 
 I began to appreciate how like each other 
 the dim outlines were of those features that I 
 supposed I knew so well. It was not so much 
 that I did not seem able to see the features by 
 which I had proposed to steer, but that there 
 appeared to be so many of them; the same 
 seemed to be repeated so very often, although I 
 knew that really there ought to be no more than 
 one of its particular kind. Until one has actually 
 tried it, I do not think it possible to imagine 
 how helpless he feels in the dark on the open 
 moorland, even moorland that is known fairly 
 intimately. Neither can one realise without the 
 actual experience how full of hidden pitfalls and 
 occasions of trips and stumbles and falls the 
 moorland is when it becomes so dark that he 
 cannot see where he puts his feet. The actual 
 falling is a very demoralising process, so that 
 after the shock you lose nerve and confidence, 
 and begin to be more doubtful than ever of your 
 steering indications. It was not till after my 
 third serious fall that I began to be really a little 
 dazed, and to find myself wondering what the 
 experience would be like of spending the night 
 under the heather, like Rob Roy or some other 
 Highland cateran only, unfortunately, I had not 
 so much as a plaid. Of course, what we are
 
 292 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 always told is that you are bound to be all right, 
 that you are bound to arrive "somewhere," if 
 you will but follow down the course of a burn. 
 This is quite good advice so far as it goes, but 
 the trouble of it is that sometimes it goes a good 
 deal too far. For one thing, your burn, granting 
 that you are able to " follow it down," as you are 
 told to do, is more likely than not to land you in 
 the low country very many a weary mile from 
 the place where you would be ; and, in the 
 second place, this " following down " is not 
 always so easy in practice as it sounds. You 
 will come, here and there, upon deep ravines 
 worn by subsidiary burns, running at right 
 angles into the main one which you are follow- 
 ing; and that means that you have to follow 
 them up until you can find a place to cross them, 
 and then follow them down on the other side to 
 their junction with the bigger stream, before you 
 can take up again your main line. And by the 
 time you have done that more than once or 
 twice, a good deal of the night has worn itself 
 away, and you have traversed a good many 
 miles, and are ready to drop down and sleep in 
 the heather of very weariness. 
 
 Just as I began to put all these points to 
 myself, a fern-owl, nightjar, or whatever you 
 please to call it, began its "jarring," and if any 
 one can tell from what point of the compass this
 
 LOST AND FOUND 293 
 
 purring, mysterious noise arises, he must be a 
 wizard. Presently the bird came, almost brush- 
 ing my face, when I thought I had heard him 
 "jarring" a long way off, and from the opposite 
 direction to that in which I had seemed to hear 
 him. It is an eerie, uncanny sound, and I 
 followed the bird's flight the yard or two I could 
 see it as it went past ; and as I turned my head 
 to do so, I may fairly confess now that my heart 
 stood stock still a moment, and I suffered the 
 sensation of icy cold drops of water trickling 
 down my spine. It was fear, if anything ever 
 was. And this is what caused it. Upon the left, 
 on the crest of the hill, outlined against the sky, 
 stood the high form of a gallows a weird sight 
 enough by itself on the lonely moorland. But 
 this was a gallows-tree very far indeed from 
 being by itself. It was excellently well attended. 
 Beneath it, in fiendish inhuman glee, danced a 
 form that was hardly human, danced and pranced 
 and anticked and reared in some unholy devil's 
 pranks. The form really was not wholly human. 
 In the darkness I thought at first that, of course, 
 my eyesight was playing me some trick, that 
 this was, beyond doubt, a human form, a human 
 dancer, really ; and then, on second looks, I 
 doubted. It positively did not look quite human. 
 The thought dashed through my mind of the 
 warlocks, the fairies, the kelpies ; and all this I
 
 294 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 discarded as ancient superstition. In a moment 
 I knew I say " I knew," for the conviction came 
 upon me as of a certain fact that this was an 
 appearance on the astral plane that I was behold- 
 ing ; it was the gallows-tree on which some poor 
 wretched miscreant had been hanged, and here 
 he was, made visible to my enlightened eyes. 
 Like a flash, too, there went through my mind 
 the words of that famous chorus of Burns to 
 " M'Pherson's Farewell" 
 
 " Sae rantingly, sae wantonly, 
 
 Sae dauntingly gaed he ; 
 He played a spring, and danc'd it round, 
 Below the gallows-tree." 
 
 As I said the words to myself there came plainly 
 to my ears the fiddle's skirl, and I believed it to 
 be that bold freebooter's self. 
 
 And the next minute there rose a din of shrill 
 laughter. It was awful. If it had not been 
 plainly absurd to run from such a dancer as that 
 and over the moor, and in the dark ! I should 
 have run. As it was, I stood stock still and 
 tried to cry out. But I could not cry. My 
 mouth r was kiln dry, and no sound came. I 
 even ventured a little nearer the uncouth thing 
 then for a better look. The sight began to 
 appear even more inhuman and unholy, for the 
 thing had a horned head. Before I had drawn 
 near enough to have a really distinct view I came
 
 LOST AND FOUND 295 
 
 on the fiddler. He saw me a great deal plainer 
 than I could see him, for he was one of the 
 Petulengros, as we called them blacksmith 
 gipsies, and had often been at the lodge and 
 all the gipsies can see much better at night than 
 we can. He called me by name, surprised to 
 see me at that hour on the moor; and when I 
 heard my name I seemed brought into touch 
 with humanity once again. 
 
 What had happened was that the local 
 authorities, since I had been there, had put up 
 a signpost my gallows-tree at the moorland 
 cross-roads, and Jasper Petulengro, so named 
 by us, had tethered his goat to it. His playing 
 on the fiddle always seemed to send the goat 
 quite mad, and he made money by showing off 
 the performance at gatherings, such as these 
 at Inverness and Portree "Sae rantingly, sae 
 wantonly, sae dauntingly gaed he." I was not 
 many yards off my straight way home. But they 
 ought not to put up signposts on lonely places 
 of the moor without notice given, and gipsies 
 ought not to tie their goats to them at night, 
 and make them dance to the fiddle.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 ULTIMA THULE 
 
 THERE is something especially attractive to the 
 fancy about those ultimate islands of our United 
 Kingdom, the Orkneys and the Shetlands. 
 When it seemed to us that we of the Burs- 
 cough yacht's company had " done," from the 
 point of view of landscape hunters and anglers, 
 all that beautiful West Coast of Scotland, with 
 its lochs and islands, we began to look further 
 on the map, and the northern islands inevitably 
 appealed to us. Coasting up, therefore, and 
 putting in for a night at Loch Inver, the next 
 day we got a good soldier's wind from the west, 
 that took us at a spanking rate up the western 
 side and followed us astern, with all sail set, 
 after we had rounded that terrifically-named 
 headland of Cape Wrath. The day had served 
 us well, but the glass was ominous of rough 
 weather, and shortly we turned into the south- 
 ward-running shelter of Loch Erribol. In the 
 morning the storm came, and held us there 
 three days, in the course of which we contrived 
 to catch a few fish of various kinds and humble
 
 ULTIMA THULE 297 
 
 size by setting a trammel net in a sheltered 
 tideway. On the fourth day the storm had spent 
 itself to a dead calm, no more helpful for our 
 sailing. At a distance from the yacht we spied 
 a great lot of birds gathered on the glassy 
 surface and, rowing out, found that the majority 
 of them were shearwaters. We had been pru- 
 dent in taking rods and tackle, guessing that the 
 birds had collected for purposes of dining, and 
 succeeded in catching a number of small gur- 
 nard, that seemed amiably willing to accept 
 almost any trolling bait we offered them. The 
 birds were extraordinarily tame, shearing over 
 the water, after their manner, quite close beside 
 the boat, so closely, indeed, that three of them 
 at one time or other entangled themselves in 
 our lines and were hauled aboard. We released 
 them and let them go, but one was ungrateful 
 enough to deal the Professor such a dig with its 
 bill, as he was in the merciful act of freeing it 
 from the line about its wing, that the learned 
 blood flowed generously. The following morn- 
 ing the breeze served kindly again, and we went 
 on our way along the northern coast, with the 
 great hills southward making a magnificent but 
 darkly-frowning panorama, the aspect that they 
 presented to us lying all in shadow of the sun 
 behind them. We passed Tongue with its kyles, 
 and in the course of that day made as far as
 
 298 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 Thurso, and there lay for the night, running 
 over the Pentland Firth to the Orkneys on the 
 morrow. These mountains of Sutherlandshire, 
 with the sun at their backs, as we had seen them 
 all that day, are not a kindly preparation of the 
 eye for scenery on any scale of less magnifi- 
 cence. The aspect of the Orkney Islands, on 
 the other hand, is not altogether magnificent. 
 There is that fine and singular obelisk, "The 
 Old Man of Hoy," at their south-westerly angle, 
 that is an exception to the rule, and the cliff of 
 the mainland beside him is immense. He is a 
 striking and a grand old man enough; but for 
 the most part the scenery of the Orkneys is 
 not on the grand scale. The islands lie rather 
 low, and after the mountain scape of Suther- 
 land nothing less than Alpine could seem quite 
 satisfactory. There cannot, of course, fail to be 
 a beauty of a more peaceful kind in sailing 
 between the islands, until one comes to anchor 
 in the bay of the little cathedral town of Kirk- 
 wall. The cathedral is most curious, with an 
 immense number of round brick pillars within, 
 built, I believe, about the latter end of the Saga 
 time, when they were bringing "the white 
 Christ " to Norway, Iceland, and all the old 
 strongholds of Odin. Of course, these islands 
 of Orkney, and Shetland too, were always being 
 harried by the Vikings. In the Orkneys we did
 
 ULTIMA THULE 299 
 
 not have much fortune with the fishing, but 
 probably this was rather by reason of the luck 
 being against us than of any lack of fish in the 
 waters that girdle those islands, for why should 
 they not be fishy ? 
 
 Fishing from the yacht's deck one day in the 
 harbour of Kirkwall, Bob Burscough pulled up 
 a huge cod, that looked so long, so lean, and so 
 sickly that he took our appetite away from us. 
 We did not care to eat him, and threw him, with 
 a great splash, into the water again, to give him 
 a chance of becoming a better fish. We paid 
 our due devotions in the Kirkwall Cathedral, 
 we played a round of golf on the Kirkwall golf 
 course for there is a golf course, though only 
 of what the St. Andrews man scornfully calls 
 the " inland " kind and then, with the dawning 
 of a glorious day, sailed off between the islands 
 northward again for Shetland. 
 
 Perhaps few of us who have not been there 
 realise how far north the Shetland Islands really 
 are, how far to the north of the Orkneys, 
 being, in fact, if anything a little nearer Norway 
 than the Scottish main, and in some ways with 
 a closer affinity to Norway than to Scotland. 
 The dialect seems more Norse than Scottish, 
 the prows of the boats curve up in a Norwegian 
 way. These islands, again, lie low, but some- 
 how, perhaps because we had longer left the
 
 300 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 majestic glories of the Sutherlandshire moun- 
 tains, we felt more appreciation for the Shetland 
 scenery than we had been able to give to that 
 of the Orkneys, though in truth it is not dis- 
 similar. A group of Shetland ponies, curiously 
 watching the yacht sail past, was a quaint sight 
 from the boat's deck. We had great luck, too, 
 in entering Lerwick harbour just as the herring 
 fleet was coming in after a successful catch a 
 busy and very interesting sight. One of the 
 yacht's crew was a native Shetlander, who took 
 us ashore with him to call on a relative whom 
 we found charmingly engaged with her spin- 
 ning-wheel, working up the wool of the famous 
 Shetland sheep. Elsewhere we saw a great 
 cauldron of dye cooking, but this, I fancy, was 
 rather for the dyeing of some of the tweeds 
 than of the wools, which we understood to be 
 left their natural colours, the white, the grey, 
 and the brown. But of these mysteries we 
 speak subject to much correction. With more 
 confidence we can talk about the sea-trout fish- 
 ing in the lochs the sea lochs, which in those 
 islands are called "voes." The sea-trout rise 
 to fly there, in the shallow sea water, more 
 freely than any of us had ever known them do 
 elsewhere. They rose very freely when they 
 were inclined to rise, and yet they were extra- 
 ordinarily capricious. We could not find that
 
 ULTIMA THULE 301 
 
 the state of the tide had much to do with 
 it, neither the weather so far as we could 
 appreciate the conditions of weather ; but, what- 
 ever the reason, the fact was very patent, some- 
 times painfully patent, that after biting eagerly 
 (though, of course, with the exasperating ten- 
 dency to hook themselves very lightly and 
 break away afterwards of all sea-trout) for an 
 hour or so they would then suddenly go right 
 off the feed, and would not be persuaded to look 
 at any kind of lure again. It was an exasper- 
 ating business. But, by way of compensation, 
 there was always the hope that if the fish were 
 not biting one hour or one minute they might 
 be the next, and when they were on the rise the 
 fun was glorious. It is an added satisfaction to 
 catch a fish that is such dainty eating. 
 
 The sea-trout fishing in the salt water is 
 certainly the best fun that the Shetlands have 
 to give the angler, though there is other fishing 
 for the various kinds of trout, both in the lochs 
 and in the rivers, besides the sea-fishing as more 
 generally understood. But of all these the best, 
 in the humble opinion of our ship's company, 
 was the salt-water sea-trouting. 
 
 Of our return journey southward again I do 
 not propose to say much, for the weather broke, 
 and it was not that harmonious affair that it had 
 been as we came northward. In Kirkwall we
 
 302 WHEN LIFE WAS NEW 
 
 were storm-stayed the better part of a fortnight. 
 For three days the Aberdeen steamer did not 
 come. When she at length put in we boarded 
 her and consulted the captain as to the weather 
 in the Pentland Firth. 
 
 "Is yon your boatie?" the man of brass 
 buttons asked, speaking thus disrespectfully of 
 our trim-built ship. We said it was. 
 
 "Then," said he, "the sea outside's like a 
 wall, and if it's for pleesure ye're going, don't go." 
 
 That was enough for us. We took berth 
 southward on that Aberdeen boat, and, through 
 seas like a wall, as he had truly told us, in com- 
 paratively few hours found our way to the 
 granite city. 
 
 And therewith came to an end, as it seems 
 in the retrospect, the days of boyhood, for the 
 squalid severity of attempting to earn a liveli- 
 hood compelled me to London on the morrow, 
 while Bob Burscough himself, friend of my 
 boyhood, returned with all that merry company 
 to Skye. We have foregathered since in many 
 and varied scenes, but it was on the cold and 
 unsympathetic platform of Aberdeen station that 
 we exchanged the last words in that association 
 of villainy which had held us in very agreeable 
 bonds for many of the earliest and best years 
 of life. 
 
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