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diff --git a/16121.txt b/16121.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9f57648 --- /dev/null +++ b/16121.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6040 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts +and Men, by Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men + Brothers of Pity; Father Hedgehog and His Neighbours; Toots and Boots; The Hens of Hencastle; Flaps; A Week Spent in a Glass Pond; Among the Merrows; Tiny's Tricks and Toby's Tricks; The Owl in the Ivy Bush + + +Author: Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing + + + +Release Date: June 23, 2005 [eBook #16121] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BROTHERS OF PITY AND OTHER TALES +OF BEASTS AND MEN*** + + +E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Janet Blenkinship, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 16121-h.htm or 16121-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/1/2/16121/16121-h/16121-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/1/2/16121/16121-h.zip) + + + + + +BROTHERS OF PITY +AND OTHER TALES OF BEASTS AND MEN + +by + +JULIANA HORATIA EWING + +London: +Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, +Northumberland Avenue, W.C. +Brighton: 129, North Street. +New York: E. & J.B. Young & Co. +[Published under the direction of the General Literature Committee.] + + + + + + + +DEDICATED + +TO MY DEAR SISTER + +HORATIA KATHARINE FRANCES GATTY. + +J.H.E. + + + + +PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. + + +These tales have appeared, during some years past, in _Aunt Judy's +Magazine for Young People_. + +"Father Hedgehog and his Neighbours," and "Toots and Boots," were both +suggested by Fedor Flinzer's clever pictures; but "Toots" was also "a +real person." In his latter days he was an honorary member of the Royal +Engineers' Mess at Aldershot, and, on occasion, dined at table. + +"The Hens of Hencastle" is not mine. It is a free translation from the +German of Victor Bluethgen, by Major Yeatman-Biggs, R.A., to whom I am +indebted for permission to include it in my volume, as a necessary +prelude to "Flaps." The story took my fancy greatly, but the ending +seemed to me imperfect and unsatisfactory, especially in reference to so +charming a character as the old watch dog, and I wrote "Flaps" as a +sequel. + +The frontispiece was designed specially for this volume, by Mr. Charles +Whymper, and the _Fratello della Misericordia_ (from a photograph kindly +sent me by a friend) is by the same artist. + +J.H.E. + + + + +PREFACE TO NEW EDITION. + + +The foregoing Preface was written by Mrs. Ewing for the first edition of +_Brothers of Pity, and Other Tales_. The book contains five stories, +illustrated by the pictures of which my sister speaks; and it is still +sold by the S.P.C.K. "Toots and Boots" was so minutely adapted to +Flinzer's pictures, that the tale suffers in being parted from them. +Still, it is to be hoped that readers of the un-illustrated version will +not have as much difficulty as Toots in solving the mystery of the +Mouse's escape! I have added four more tales of "Beasts and Men" to the +present edition, as they have not been included in any previous +collections of my sister's stories. "A Week Spent in a Glass Pond" +appeared first in _Aunt Judy's Magazine_, October 1876, and was +afterwards published separately with coloured illustrations. The habits +of the water beasts are described with the strictest fidelity to nature, +even the delicate differences in character between the Great and the Big +Black water beetles are most accurately drawn. + +"Among the Merrows" has not been republished since it came out in _Aunt +Judy's Magazine_, November 1872. At that time the Crystal Palace +Aquarium was a novelty, and the Zoological Station at Naples not fully +formed--but, though the paper is behind the times in statistics, it is +worth retaining for other reasons. + +"Tiny's Tricks and Toby's Tricks" as a specimen of versification might +perhaps have been included in the volume of _Verses for Children_, but +it seemed best to keep it with the "Owl Hoots," as these papers were the +last that Mrs. Ewing wrote. The first appeared in _The Child's Pictorial +Magazine_ a few days before her death, and the "Hoots" soon afterwards. +The illustrations to both were drawn by Mr. Gordon Browne at my sister's +special request, and they are now reproduced with gratitude for his +labour of love. + +HORATIA K. F. EDEN. + +October 1895. + + + + +CONTENTS + + BROTHERS OF PITY + + FATHER HEDGEHOG AND HIS NEIGHBOURS + + TOOTS AND BOOTS + + THE HENS OF HENCASTLE + + FLAPS + + A WEEK SPENT IN A GLASS POND + + AMONG THE MERROWS + + TINY'S TRICKS AND TOBY'S TRICKS + + THE OWL IN THE IVY BUSH + + + + + + +BROTHERS OF PITY. + + "Who dug his grave?" + + * * * * * + + "Who made his shroud?" + "I," said the Beetle, + "With my thread and needle, + I made his shroud."--_Death of Cock Robin_. + + +It must be much easier to play at things when there are more of you than +when there is only one. + +There is only one of me, and Nurse does not care about playing at +things. Sometimes I try to persuade her; but if she is in a good temper +she says she has got a bone in her leg, and if she isn't she says that +when little boys can't amuse themselves it's a sure and certain sign +they've got "the worrits," and the sooner they are put to bed with a +Gregory's powder "the better for themselves and every one else." + +Godfather Gilpin can play delightfully when he has time, and he believes +in fancy things, only he is so very busy with his books. But even when +he is reading he will let you put him in the game. He doesn't mind +pretending to be a fancy person if he hasn't to do anything, and if I do +speak to him he always remembers who he is. That is why I like playing +in his study better than in the nursery. And Nurse always says "He's +safe enough, with the old gentleman," so I'm allowed to go there as much +as I like. + +Godfather Gilpin lets me play with the books, because I always take care +of them. Besides, there is nothing else to play with, except the +window-curtains, for the chairs are always full. So I sit on the floor, +and sometimes I build with the books (particularly Stonehenge), and +sometimes I make people of them, and call them by the names on their +backs, and the ones in other languages we call foreigners, and Godfather +Gilpin tells me what countries they belong to. And sometimes I lie on my +face and read (for I could read when I was four years old), and +Godfather Gilpin tells me the hard words. The only rule he makes is, +that I must get all the books out of one shelf, so that they are easily +put away again. I may have any shelf I like, but I must not mix the +shelves up. + +I always took care of the books, and never had any accident with any of +them till the day I dropped Jeremy Taylor's _Sermons_. It made me very +miserable, because I knew that Godfather Gilpin could never trust me so +much again. + +However, if it had not happened, I should not have known anything about +the Brothers of Pity; so, perhaps (as Mrs. James, Godfather Gilpin's +house-keeper, says), "All's for the best," and "It's an ill wind that +blows nobody good." + +It happened on a Sunday, I remember, and it was the day after the day on +which I had had the shelf in which all the books were alike. They were +all foreigners--Italians--and all their names were _Goldoni_, and there +were forty-seven of them, and they were all in white and gold. I could +not read any of them, but there were lots of pictures, only I did not +know what the stories were about. So next day, when Godfather Gilpin +gave me leave to play a Sunday game with the books, I thought I would +have English ones, and big ones, for a change, for the _Goldonis_ were +rather small. + +We played at church, and I was the parson, and Godfather Gilpin was the +old gentleman who sits in the big pew with the knocker, and goes to +sleep (because he wanted to go to sleep), and the books were the +congregation. They were all big, but some of them were fat, and some of +them were thin, like real people--not like the _Goldonis_, which were +all alike. + +I was arranging them in their places and looking at their names, when I +saw that one of them was called Taylor's _Sermons_, and I thought I +would keep that one out and preach a real sermon out of it when I had +read prayers. Of course I had to do the responses as well as "Dearly +beloved brethren" and those things, and I had to sing the hymns too, for +the books could not do anything, and Godfather Gilpin was asleep. + +When I had finished the service I stood behind a chair that was full of +newspapers, for a pulpit, and I lifted up Taylor's _Sermons_, and rested +it against the chair, and began to look to see what I would preach. It +was an old book, bound in brown leather, and ornamented with gold, with +a picture of a man in a black gown and a round black cap and a white +collar in the beginning; and there was a list of all the sermons with +their names and the texts. I read it through, to see which sounded the +most interesting, and I didn't care much for any of them. However, the +last but one was called "A Funeral Sermon, preached at the Obsequies of +the Right Honourable the Countess of Carbery;" and I wondered what +obsequies were, and who the Countess of Carbery was, and I thought I +would preach that sermon and try to find out. + +There was a very long text, and it was not a very easy one. It was: +"For we must needs die, and are as water spilt on the ground, which +cannot be gathered up again: neither doth GOD respect any +person: yet doth He devise means that His banished be not expelled from +Him." + +The sermon wasn't any easier than the text, and half the _s_'s were like +_f_'s which made it rather hard to preach, and there was Latin mixed up +with it, which I had to skip. I had preached two pages when I got into +the middle of a long sentence, of which part was this: "Every trifling +accident discomposes us; and as the face of waters wafting in a storm so +wrinkles itself, that it makes upon its forehead furrows deep and hollow +like a grave: so do our great and little cares and trifles first make +the wrinkles of old age, and then they dig a grave for us." + +I knew the meaning of the words "wrinkles," and "old age." Godfather +Gilpin's forehead had unusually deep furrows, and, almost against my +will, I turned so quickly to look if his wrinkles were at all like the +graves in the churchyard, that Taylor's _Sermons_, in its heavy binding, +slipped from the pulpit and fell to the ground. + +And Godfather Gilpin woke up, and (quite forgetting that he was really +the old gentleman in the pew with the knocker) said, "Dear me, dear me! +is that Jeremy Taylor that you are knocking about like a football? My +dear child, I can't lend you my books to play with if you drop them on +to the floor." + +I took it up in my arms and carried it sorrowfully to Godfather Gilpin. +He was very kind, and said it was not hurt, and I might go on playing +with the others; but I could see him stroking its brown leather and gold +back, as if it had been bruised and wanted comforting, and I was far too +sorry about it to go on preaching, even if I had had anything to preach. + +I picked up the smallest book I could see in the congregation, and sat +down and pretended to read. There were pictures in it, but I turned over +a great many, one after the other, before I could see any of them, my +eyes were so full of tears of mortification and regret. The first +picture I saw when my tears had dried up enough to let me see was a very +curious one indeed. It was a picture of two men carrying what looked +like another man covered with a blue quilt, on a sort of bier. But the +funny part about it was the dress of the men. They were wrapped up in +black cloaks, and had masks over their faces, and underneath the picture +was written, "_Fratelli della Misericordia_"--"Brothers of Pity." + +I do not know whether the accident to Jeremy Taylor had made Godfather +Gilpin too anxious about his books to sleep, but I found that he was +keeping awake, and after a bit he said to me, "What are you staring so +hard and so quietly at, little Mouse?" + +I looked at the back of the book, and it was called _Religious Orders_; +so I said, "It's called _Religious Orders_, but the picture I'm looking +at has got two men dressed in black, with their faces covered all but +their eyes, and they are carrying another man with something blue over +him." + +"_Fratelli della Misericordia_," said Godfather Gilpin. + +"Who are they, and what are they doing?" I asked. "And why are their +faces covered?" + +"They belong to a body of men," was Godfather Gilpin's reply, "who bind +themselves to be ready in their turn to do certain offices of mercy, +pity, and compassion to the sick, the dying, and the dead. The +brotherhood is six hundred years old, and still exists. The men who +belong to it receive no pay, and they equally reject the reward of +public praise, for they work with covered faces, and are not known even +to each other. Rich men and poor men, noble men and working men, men of +letters and the ignorant, all belong to it, and each takes his turn when +it comes round to nurse the sick, carry the dying to hospital, and bury +the dead.' + +"Is that a dead man under the blue coverlet?" I asked with awe. + +"I suppose so," said Godfather Gilpin. + +"But why don't his friends go to the funeral?" I inquired. + +"He has no friends to follow him," said my godfather. "That is why he is +being buried by the Brothers of Pity." + +Long after Godfather Gilpin had told me all that he could tell me of the +_Fratelli della Misericordia_--long after I had put the congregation +(including the _Religious Orders_ and Taylor's _Sermons_) back into the +shelf to which they belonged--the masked faces and solemn garb of the +men in the picture haunted me. + +I have changed my mind a great many times, since I can remember, about +what I will be when I am grown up. Sometimes I have thought I should +like to be an officer and die in battle; sometimes I settled to be a +clergyman and preach splendid sermons to enormous congregations; once I +quite decided to be a head fireman and wear a brass helmet, and be +whirled down lighted streets at night, every one making way for me, on +errands of life and death. + +But the history of the Brothers of Pity put me out of conceit with all +other heroes. It seemed better than anything I had ever thought of--to +do good works unseen of men, without hope of reward, and to those who +could make no return. For it rang in my ears that Godfather Gilpin had +said, "He has no friends--that is why he is being buried by the Brothers +of Pity." + +I quite understood what I thought they must feel, because I had once +buried a cat who had no friends. It was a poor half-starved old thing, +for the people it belonged to had left it, and I used to see it slinking +up to the back door and looking at Tabby, who was very fat and sleek, +and at the scraps on the unwashed dishes after dinner. Mrs. Jones kicked +it out every time, and what happened to it before I found it lying +draggled and dead at the bottom of the Ha-ha, with the top of a kettle +still fastened to its scraggy tail, I never knew, and it cost me bitter +tears to guess. It cost me some hard work, too, to dig the grave, for my +spade was so very small. + +I don't think Mrs. Jones would have cared to be a Brother of Pity, for +she was very angry with me for burying that cat, because it was such a +wretched one, and so thin and dirty, and looked so ugly and smelt so +nasty. But that was just why I wanted to give it a good funeral, and why +I picked my crimson lily and put it in the grave, because it seemed so +sad the poor thing should be like that when it might have been clean and +fluffy, and fat and comfortable, like Tabby, if it had had a home and +people to look after it. + +It was remembering about the cat that made me think that there were no +Brothers of Pity (not even in Tuscany, for I asked Godfather Gilpin) to +bury beasts and birds and fishes when they have no friends to go to +their funerals. And that was how it was that I settled to be a Brother +of Pity without waiting till I grew up and could carry men. + +I had a shilling of my own, and with sixpence of it I bought a yard and +a half of black calico at the post-office shop, and Mrs. Jones made me a +cloak out of it; and with the other sixpence I bought a mask--for they +sell toys there too. It was not a right sort of mask, but I could not +make Mrs. Jones understand about a hood with two eye-holes in it, and I +did not like to show her the picture, for if she had seen that I wanted +to play at burying people, perhaps she would not have made me the cloak. +She made it very well, and it came down to my ankles, and I could hide +my spade under it. The worst of the mask was that it was a funny one, +with a big nose; but it hid my face all the same, and when you get +inside a mask you can feel quite grave whatever it's painted like. + +I had never had so happy a summer before as the one when I was a Brother +of Pity. I heard Nurse saying to Mrs. Jones that "there was no telling +what would keep children out of mischief," for that I "never seemed to +be tired of that old black rag and that ridiculous face." + +But it was not the dressing-up that pleased me day after day, it was the +chance of finding dead bodies with no friends to bury them. Going out is +quite a new thing when you have something to look for; and Godfather +Gilpin says he felt just the same in the days when he used to collect +insects. + +I found a good many corpses of one sort and another: birds and mice and +frogs and beetles, and sometimes bigger bodies--such as kittens and +dogs. The stand of my old wooden horse made a capital thing to drag them +on, for all the wheels were there, and I had a piece of blue +cotton-velvet to put on the top, but the day I found a dead mole I did +not cover him. I put him outside, and he looked like black velvet lying +on blue velvet. It seemed quite a pity to put him into the dirty ground, +with such a lovely coat. + +One day I was coming back from burying a mouse, and I saw a "flying +watchman" beetle lying quite stiff and dead, as I thought, with his legs +stretched out, and no friends; so I put him on the bier at once, and put +the blue velvet over him, and drew him to the place where the mouse's +grave was. When I took the pall off and felt him, and turned him over +and over, he was still quite rigid, so I felt sure he was dead, and +began to dig his grave; but when I had finished and went back to the +bier, the flying watchman was just creeping over the wheel. He had only +pretended to be dead, and had given me all that trouble for nothing. + +When first I became a Brother of Pity, I thought I would have a +graveyard to bury all the creatures in, but afterwards I changed my mind +and settled to bury them all near wherever I found them. But I got some +bits of white wood, and fastened them across each other with bits of +wire, and so marked every grave. + +At last there were lots of them dotted about the fields and woods I +knew. I remembered to whom most of them belonged, and even if I had +forgotten, it made a very good game, to pretend to be a stranger in the +neighbourhood, and then pretend to be somebody else, talking to myself, +and saying, "Wherever you see those little graves some poor creature has +been buried by the Brothers of Pity." + +I did not like to read the burial service, for fear it should not be +quite right (especially for frogs; there were so many of them in summer, +and they were so horrid-looking, I used to bury several together, and +pretend it was the time of the plague); but I did not like not having +any service at all. So when I put on my cloak and mask, and took my +spade and the bier, I said, "Brothers, let us prepare to perform this +work of mercy," which is the first thing the real _Fratelli della +Misericordia_ say when they are going out. And when I buried the body I +said, "Go in peace," which is the last thing that they say. Godfather +Gilpin told me, and I learnt it by heart. + +I enjoyed it very much. There were graves of beasts and birds who had +died without friends in the hedges and the soft parts of the fields in +almost all our walks. I never showed them to Nurse, but I often wondered +that she did not notice them. I always touched my hat when I passed +them, and sometimes it was very difficult to do so without her seeing +me, but it made me quite uncomfortable if I passed a grave without. When +I could not find any bodies I amused myself with making wreaths to hang +over particularly nice poor beasts, such as a bullfinch or a kitten. + +I had been a Brother of Pity for several months, when a very curious +thing happened. + +One summer evening I went by myself after tea into a steep little field +at the back of our house, with an old stone-quarry at the top, on the +ledges of which, where the earth had settled, I used to play at making +gardens. And there, lying on a bit of very stony ground, half on the +stones and half on the grass, was a dead robin-redbreast. I love robins +very much, and it was not because I wanted one to die, but because I +thought that if one did die, I should so like to bury him, that I had +wished to find a dead robin ever since I became a Brother of Pity. It +was rather late, but it wanted nearly an hour to my usual bedtime, so I +thought I would go home at once for my dress and spade and bier, and for +some roses. For I had resolved to bury this (my first robin-redbreast) +in a grave lined with rose-leaves, and to give him a wreath of +forget-me-nots. + +Just as I was going I heard a loud buzz above my head, and something hit +me in the face. It was a beetle, whirring about in the air, and as I +turned to leave poor Robin the beetle sat down on him, on the middle of +his red breast, and by still hearing the buzzing, I found that another +beetle was whirling and whirring just above my head in the air. I like +beetles (especially the flying watchmen), and these ones were black too; +so I said, for fun, "You've got on your black things, and if you'll take +care of the body till I get my spade you shall be Brothers of Pity." + +I ran home, and I need not have gone indoors at all, for I keep my cloak +and my spade and the bier in the summer-house, but the bits of wood were +in the nursery cupboard, so, after I had got some good roses, and was +quite ready, I ran up-stairs, and there, to my great vexation, Nurse met +me, and said I was to go to bed. + +I thought it was very hard, because it had been a very hot day, and I +had had to go a walk in the heat of the sun along the old coaching-road +with Nurse, and it seemed so provoking, now it was cool and the moon was +rising, that I should have to go to bed, especially as Nurse was sending +me there earlier than usual because she wanted to go out herself, and I +knew it. + +I tried to go to sleep, but I couldn't. Every time I opened my eyes the +moonlight was more and more like daylight through the white blind. At +last I almost thought I must have really been to sleep without knowing +it, and that it must be morning. So I got out of bed, and went to the +window and peeped; but it was still moonlight--only moonlight as bright +as day--and I saw Nurse and two of the maids just going through the +upper gate into the park. + +In one moment I made up my mind. Nurse had only put me to bed to get me +out of the way. I did not mean to trouble her, but I was determined not +to lose the chance of being Brother of Pity to a robin-redbreast. + +I dressed myself as well as I could, got out unobserved, and made my way +to the summer-house. Things look a little paler by moonlight, otherwise +I could see quite well. I put on my cloak, took my spade and the handle +of the bier in my right hand, and holding the mask over my face with my +left, I made my way to the quarry field. + +It was a lovely night, and as I strolled along I thought with myself +that the ground where Robin lay was too stony for my spade, and that I +must move him a little lower, where some soft earth bordered one side of +the quarry. + +I was as certain as I had ever been of anything that I did not think +about this till then, but when I got to the quarry the body was gone +from the place where I had found it; and when I looked lower, on the bit +of soft earth there lay Robin, just in the place where I was settling in +my mind that I would bury him. + +I could not believe my eyes through the holes in my mask, so I pulled it +off, but there was no doubt about the fact. There he lay; and round him, +when I looked closer, I saw a ridge like a rampart of earth, which +framed him neatly and evenly, as if he were already halfway into his +grave. + +The moonlight was as clear as day, there was no mistake as to what I +saw, and whilst I was looking the body of the bird began to sink by +little jerks, as if some one were pulling it from below. When first it +moved I thought that poor Robin could not be dead after all, and that he +was coming to life again like the flying watchman, but I soon saw that +he was not, and that some one was pulling him down into a grave. + +When I felt quite sure of this, when I had rubbed my eyes to clear them, +and pulled up the lashes to see if I was awake, I was so horribly +frightened that, with my mask in one hand and the spade and the handle +of my bier in the other, I ran home as fast as my legs would carry me, +leaving the roses and the cross and the blue-velvet pall behind me in +the quarry. + +Nurse was still out; and I crept back to bed without detection, where I +dreamed disturbedly of invisible gravediggers all through the night. + +I did not feel quite so much afraid by daylight, but I was not a bit +less puzzled as to how Cock Robin had been moved from the stony place to +the soft earth, and who dug his grave. I could not ask Nurse about it, +for I should have had to tell her I had been out, and I could not have +trusted Mrs. Jones either; but Godfather Gilpin never tells tales of me, +and he knows everything, so I went to him. + +The more I thought of it the more I saw that the only way was to tell +him everything; for if you only tell parts of things you sometimes find +yourself telling lies before you know where you are. So I put on my +cloak and my mask, and took the shovel and bier into the study, and sat +down on the little foot-stool I always wait on when Godfather Gilpin is +in the middle of reading, and keeps his head down to show that he does +not want to be disturbed. + +When he shut up his book and looked at me he burst out laughing. I meant +to have asked him why, but I was so busy afterwards I forgot. I suppose +it was the nose, for it had got rather broken when I fell down as I was +burying the old drake that Neptune killed. + +But he was very kind to me, and I told him all about my being a Brother +of Pity, and how I had wanted to bury a robin, and how I had found one, +and how he had frightened me by burying himself. + +"Some other Brother of Pity must have found him," said my godfather, +still laughing. "And he must have got Jack the Giant-killer's cloak of +darkness for _his_ dress, so that you did not see him." + +"There was nobody there," I earnestly answered, shaking my mask as I +thought of the still, lonely moonlight. "Nothing but two beetles, and I +said if they would take care of him they might be Brothers of Pity." + +"They took you at your word, _mio fratello_. Take off your mask, which a +little distracts me, and I will tell you who buried Cock Robin." + +I knew when Godfather Gilpin was really telling me things--without +thinking of something else, I mean,--and I listened with all my ears. + +"The beetles whom you very properly admitted into your brotherhood," +said my godfather, "were burying beetles, or sexton beetles,[A] as they +are sometimes called. They bury animals of all sizes in a surprisingly +short space of time. If two of them cannot conduct the funeral, they +summon others. They carry the bodies, if necessary, to suitable ground. +With their flat heads (for the sexton beetle does not carry a shovel as +you do) they dig trench below trench all round the body they are +committing to the earth, after which they creep under it and pull it +down, and then shovel away once more, and so on till it is deep enough +in, and then they push the earth over it and tread it and pat it neatly +down." + +"Then was it the beetles who were burying the robin-redbreast?" I +gasped. + +"I suspect so," said Godfather Gilpin. "But we will go and see." + +He actually knocked a book down in his hurry to get his hat, and when I +helped him to pick it up, and said, "Why, godfather, you're as bad as I +was about Taylor's _Sermons_," he said, "I am an old fool, my dear. I +used to be very fond of insects before I settled down to the work I'm at +now, and it quite excites me to go out into the fields again." + +I never had a nicer walk, for he showed me lots of things I had never +noticed, before we got to the quarry field; and then I took him straight +to the place where the bit of soft earth was, and there was nothing to +be seen, and the earth was quite smooth and tidy. But when he poked with +his stick the ground was very soft, and after he had poked a little we +saw some nut-brown feathers, and we knew it was Robin's grave. + +And I said, "Don't poke any more, please. I wanted to bury him with +rose-leaves, but the beetles were dressed in black, and I gave them +leave, and I think I'll put a cross over him, because I don't think it's +untrue to show that he was buried by the Brothers of Pity." + +Godfather Gilpin quite agreed with me, and we made a nice mound (for I +had brought my spade), and put the best kind of cross, and afterwards I +made a wreath of forget-me-nots to hang on it. + +He was the only robin-redbreast I have found since I became a Brother of +Pity, and that was how it was that it was not I who buried him after +all. + +Many of the walks that Nurse likes to take I do not care about, but one +place she likes to go to, especially on Sunday, I like too, and that is +the churchyard. + +I was always fond of it. It is so very nice to read the tombstones, and +fancy what the people were like, particularly the ones who lived long +ago, in 1600 and something, with beautifully-shaped sixes and capital +letters on their graves. For they must have dressed quite differently +from us, and perhaps they knew Charles the First and Oliver Cromwell. + +Diggory the gravedigger never talks much, but I like to watch him. I +think he is rather deaf, for when I asked him if he thought, if he went +on long enough, he could dig himself through to the other side of the +world, he only said "Hey?" and chucked up a great shovelful of earth. +But perhaps it was because he was so deep down that he could not hear. + +Now, when he is quite out of sight, and chucks the earth up like that, +it makes me think of the sexton beetles; for Godfather Gilpin says they +drive their flat heads straight down, and then lift them with a sharp +jerk, and throw the earth up so. + +I said to Diggory one day, "Don't you wish your head was flat, instead +of being as it is, so that you could shovel with it instead of having to +have a spade?" + +He wasn't so deep down that time, and he heard me, and put his head up +out of the grave and rested on his spade. But he only scratched his head +and stared, and said, "You be an uncommon queer young gentleman, to be +sure," and then went on digging again. And I was afraid he was angry, so +I daren't ask him any more. + +I daren't of course ask him if he is a Brother of Pity, but I think he +deserves to be, for workhouse burials at any rate; for if you have only +the Porter and Silly Billy at your funeral, I don't think you can call +that having friends. + +I have taken the beetles for my brothers, of course. Godfather Gilpin +says I should find far more bodies than I do if they were not burying +all along. I often wish I could understand them when they hum, and that +they knew me. + +I wonder if either they or Diggory know that they belong to the order of +_Fratelli della Misericordia_, and that I belong to it too? + +But of course it would not be right to ask them, even if either of them +would answer me, for if we were "known, even to each other," we should +not really and truly be Brothers of Pity. + + NOTE--Burying beetles are to the full as skilful as they + are described in this tale. With a due respect for the graces of + art, I have not embodied the fact that they feed on the carcases + which they bury. The last thing that the burying beetle does, after + tidying the grave, is to make a small hole and go down himself, + having previously buried his partner with their prey. Here the eggs + are laid, and the larvae hatched and fed. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote A: _Necrophorus humator_, &c.] + + + +FATHER HEDGEHOG AND HIS NEIGHBOURS. + + + * * * * * + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +The care of a large family is no light matter, as everybody knows. And +that year I had an unusually large family. No less than seven young +urchins for Mrs. Hedgehog and myself to take care of and start in life; +and there was not a prickly parent on this side of the brook, or within +three fields beyond, who had more than four. + +My father's brother had six one year, I know. It was the summer that I +myself was born. I can remember hearing my father and mother talk about +it before I could see. As these six cousins were discussed in a tone of +interest and respect which seemed to bear somewhat disparagingly on me +and my brother and sisters (there were only four of _us_), I was rather +glad to learn that they also had been born blind. My father used to go +and see them, and report their progress to my mother on his return. + +"They can see to-day." + +"They have curled themselves up. Every one of them. Six beautiful little +balls; as round as crab-apples and as safe as burrs!" + +I tried to curl myself up, but I could only get my coat a little way +over my nose. I cried with vexation. But one should not lose heart too +easily. With patience and perseverance most things can be brought about, +and I could soon both see and curl myself into a ball. It was about this +time that my father hurried home one day, tossing the leaves at least +three inches over his head as he bustled along. + +"What in the hedge do you think has happened to the six?" said he. + +"Oh, don't tell me!" cried my mother; "I am so nervous." (Which she was, +and rather foolish as well, which used to irritate my father, who was +hasty tempered, as I am myself.) + +"They've been taken by gipsies and flitted," said he. + +"What do you mean by _flitted_?" inquired my mother. + +"A string is tied round a hind-leg of each, and they are tethered in the +grass behind the tent, just as the donkey is tethered. So they will +remain till they grow fat, and then they will be cooked." + +"Will the donkey be cooked when he is fat?" asked my mother. + +"I smell valerian," said my father; on which she put out her nose, and +he ran at it with his prickles. He always did this when he was annoyed +with any member of his family; and though we knew what was coming, we +are all so fond of valerian, we could never resist the temptation to +sniff, just on the chance of there being some about. + +I had long wanted to see my cousins, and I now begged my father to let +me go with him the next time he went to visit them. But he was rather +cross that morning, and he ran at me with his back up. + +"So you want to gad about and be kidnapped and flitted too, do you? Just +let me--" + +But when I saw him coming, I rolled myself up as tight as a wood-louse, +and as my ears were inside I really did not hear what else he said. But +I was not a whit the less resolved to see my cousins. + +One day my father bustled home. + +"Upon my whine," said he, "they live on the fat of the land. Scraps of +all kinds, apples, and a dish of bread and milk under their very noses. +I sat inside a gorse bush on the bank, and watched them till my mouth +watered." + +The next day he reported-- + +"They've cooked one--in clay. There are only five now." + +And the next day-- + +"They've cooked another. Now there are only four." + +"There won't be a cousin left if I wait much longer," thought I. + +On the morrow there were only three. + +My mother began to cry. "My poor dear nephews and nieces!" said she +(though she had never seen them). "What a world this is!" + +"We must take it as we eat eggs," said my father, with that air of +wisdom which naturally belongs to the sayings of the head of the family, +"the shell with the yolk. And they have certainly had excellent +victuals." + +Next morning he went off as usual, and I crept stealthily after him. +With his spines laid flat to his sides, and his legs well under him, he +ran at a good round pace, and as he did not look back I followed him +with impunity. By and by he climbed a bank and then crept into a furze +bush, whose prickles were no match for his own. I dared not go right +into the bush for fear he should see me, but I settled myself as well as +I could under shelter of a furze branch, and looked down on to the other +side of the bank, where my father's nose was also directed. And there I +saw my three cousins, tethered as he had said, and apparently very busy +over-eating themselves on food which they had not had the trouble of +procuring. + +If I had heard less about the cooking, I might have envied them; as it +was, that somewhat voracious appetite characteristic of my family +disturbed my judgment sufficiently to make me almost long to be flitted +myself. I fancy it must have been when I pushed out my nose and sniffed +involuntarily towards the victuals, that the gipsy man heard me. + +He had been lying on the grass, looking much lazier than my +cousins--which is saying a good deal--and only turning his swarthy face +when the gipsy girl, as she moved about and tended the fire, got out of +the sight of his eyes. Then he moved so that he could see her again; +not, as it seemed, to see what she was doing or to help her to do it, +but as leaves move with the wind, or as we unpacked our noses against +our wills when my father said he smelt valerian. + +She was very beautiful. Her skin was like a trout pool--clear and yet +brown. I never saw any eyes like her eyes, though our neighbour's--the +Water Rat--at times recalls them. Her hair was the colour of ripe +blackberries in a hot hedge--very ripe ones, with the bloom on. She +moved like a snake. I have seen my father chase a snake more than once, +and I have seen a good many men and women in my time. Some of them walk +like my father, they bustle along and kick up the leaves as he does; and +some of them move quickly and yet softly, as snakes go. The gipsy girl +moved so, and wherever she went the gipsy man's eyes went after her. + +Suddenly he turned them on me. For an instant I was paralyzed and stood +still. I could hear my father bustling down the bank; in a few minutes +he would be at home, where my brother and sisters were safe and sound, +whilst I was alone and about to reap the reward of my disobedience, in +the fate of which he had warned me--to be taken by gipsies and flitted. + +Nothing, my dear children--my seven dear children--is more fatal in an +emergency than indecision. I was half disposed to hurry after my father, +and half resolved to curl myself into a ball. I had one foot out and +half my back rounded, when the gipsy man pinned me to the ground with a +stick, and the gipsy girl strode up. I could not writhe myself away from +the stick, but I gazed beseechingly at the gipsy girl and squealed for +my life. + +"Let the poor little brute go, Basil," she said, laughing. "We've three +flitted still." + +"Let it go?" cried the young man scornfully, and with another poke, +which I thought had crushed me to bits, though I was still able to cry +aloud. + +The gipsy girl turned her back and went away with one movement and +without speaking. + +"Sybil!" cried the man; but she did not look round. + +"Sybil, I say!" + +She was breaking sticks for the fire slowly across her knee, but she +made no answer. He took his stick out of my back, and went after her. + +"I've let it go," he said, throwing himself down again, "and a good +dinner has gone with it. But you can do what you like with me--and small +thanks I get for it." + +"I can do anything with you but keep you out of mischief," she answered, +fixing her eyes steadily on him. He sat up and began to throw stones, +aiming them at my three cousins. + +"Take me for good and all, instead of tormenting me, and you will," he +said. + +"Will you give up Jemmy and his gang?" she asked; but as he hesitated +for an instant, she tossed the curls back from her face and moved away, +saying, "Not you; for all your talk! And yet for your sake, _I_ would +give up--" + +He bounded to his feet, but she had put the bonfire between them, and +before he could get round it, she was on the other side of a tilted +cart, where another woman, in a crimson cloak, sat doing something to a +dirty pack of cards. + +I did not like to see the gipsy man on his feet again, and having +somewhat recovered breath, I scrambled down the bank and got home as +quickly as the stiffness and soreness of my skin would allow. + +I never saw my cousins again, and it was long before I saw any more +gipsies; for that day's adventure gave me a shock to which my children +owe the exceeding care and prudence that I display in the choice of our +summer homes and winter retreats, and in repressing every tendency to a +wandering disposition among the members of my family. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +That summer--I mean the summer when I had seven--we had the most +charming home imaginable. It was in a wood, and on that side of the wood +which is farthest from houses and highroads. Here it was bounded by a +brook, and beyond this lay a fine pasture field. + +There are fields and fields. I never wish to know a better field than +this one. I seldom go out much till the evening, but if business should +take one along the hedge in the heat of the sun, there are as juicy and +refreshing crabs to be picked up under a tree about half-way down the +south side, as the thirstiest creature could desire. + +And when the glare and drought of midday have given place to the mild +twilight of evening, and the grass is refreshingly damped with dew, and +scents are strong, and the earth yields kindly to the nose, what beetles +and lob-worms reward one's routing! + +I am convinced that the fattest and stupidest slugs that live, live near +the brook. I never knew one who found out I was eating him, till he was +half-way down my throat. And just opposite to the place where I +furnished your dear mother's nest, is a small plantation of burdocks, on +the underside of which stick the best flavoured snails I am acquainted +with, in such inexhaustible quantities, that a hedgehog might have +fourteen children in a season, and not fear their coming short of +provisions. + +And in the early summer, in the long grass on the edge of the wood--but +no! I will not speak of it. + +My dear children, my seven dear children, may you never know what it is +to taste a pheasant's egg--to taste several pheasant's eggs, and to eat +them, shells and all. + +There are certain pleasures of which a parent may himself have partaken, +but which, if he cannot reconcile them with his ideas of safety and +propriety, he will do well not to allow his children even to hear of. I +do not say that I wish I had never tasted a pheasant's egg myself, but, +when I think of traps baited with valerian, of my great-uncle's +great-coat nailed to the keeper's door, of the keeper's heavy-heeled +boots, and of the impropriety of poaching, I feel, as a father, that it +is desirable that you should never know that there are such things as +eggs, and then you will be quite happy without them. + +But it was not the abundant and varied supply of food which had +determined my choice of our home: it was not even because no woodland +bower could be more beautiful,--because the coppice foliage was fresh +and tender overhead, and the old leaves soft and elastic to the prickles +below,--because the young oaks sheltered us behind, and we had a +charming outlook over the brook in front, between a gnarled alder and a +young sycamore, whose embracing branches were the lintel of our doorway. + +No. I chose this particular spot in this particular wood, because I had +reason to believe it to be a somewhat neglected bit of what men call +"property,"--because the bramble bushes were unbroken, the fallen leaves +untrodden, the hyacinths and ragged-robins ungathered by human feet and +hands,--because the old fern-fronds faded below the fresh green +plumes,--because the violets ripened seed,--because the trees were +unmarked by woodmen and overpopulated with birds, and the water-rat sat +up in the sun with crossed paws and without a thought of +danger,--because, in short, no birds'-nesting, fern-digging, +flower-picking, leaf-mould-wanting, vermin-hunting creatures ever came +hither to replenish their ferneries, gardens, cages, markets, and +museums. + +My feelings can therefore be imagined when I was roused from an +afternoon nap one warm summer's day by the voices of men and women. +Several possibilities came into my mind, and I imparted them to my wife. + +"They may be keepers." + +"They may be poachers." + +"They may be boys birds'-nesting." + +"They may be street-sellers of ferns, moss, and so forth." + +"They may be collectors of specimens." + +"They may be pic-nic-ers--people who bring salt twisted up in a bit of +paper with them, and leave it behind when they go away. Don't let the +children touch it!" + +"They may be--and this is the worst that could happen--men collecting +frogs, toads, newts, snails, _and hedgehogs_ for the London markets. We +must keep very quiet. They will go away at sunset." + +I was quite wrong, and when I heard the slow wheels of a cart I knew +it. They were none of these things, and they did not go away. They were +travelling tinkers, and they settled down and made themselves at home +within fifty yards of mine. + +My nerves have never been strong since that day under the furze bush. My +first impulse was to roll myself up so tightly that I got the cramp, +whilst every spine on my back stood stiff with fright. But after a time +I recovered myself, and took counsel with Mrs. Hedgehog. + +"Two things," said she, "are most important. We must keep the children +from gadding, and we must make them hold their tongues." + +"They never can be so foolish as to wish to quit your side, my dear, in +the circumstances," said I. But I was mistaken. + +I know nothing more annoying to a father who has learned the danger of +indiscreet curiosity in his youth, than to find his sons apparently +quite uninfluenced by his valuable experience. + +"What are tinkers like?" was the first thing said by each one of the +seven on the subject. + +"They are a set of people," I replied, in a voice as sour as a green +crab, "who if they hear us talking, or catch us walking abroad, will +kill your mother and me, and temper up two bits of clay and roll us up +in them. Then they will put us into a fire to bake, and when the clay +turns red they will take us out. The clay will fall off and our coats +with it. What remains they will eat--as we eat snails. You seven will be +flitted. That is, you will be pegged to the ground till you grow big." +(I thought it well not to mention the bread and milk.) "Then they will +kill and bake and eat you in the same fashion." + +I think this frightened the children; but they would talk about the +tinkers, though they dared not go near them. + +"The best thing you can do," said Mrs. Hedgehog, "is to tell them a +story to keep them quiet. You can modulate your own voice, and stop if +you hear the tinkers." + +Hereupon I told them a story (a very old one) of the hedgehog who ran a +race with a hare, on opposite sides of a hedge, for the wager of a louis +d'or and a bottle of brandy. It was a great favourite with them. + +"The moral of the tale, my dear children," I was wont to say, "is, that +our respected ancestor's head saved his heels, which is never the case +with giddy-pated creatures like the hare." + +"Perhaps it was a very young hare," said Mrs. Hedgehog, who is amiable, +and does not like to blame any one if it can be avoided. + +"I don't think it can have been a _very_ young hare," said I, "or the +hedgehog would have eaten him instead of outwitting him. As it was, he +placed himself and Mrs. Hedgehog at opposite ends of the course. The +hare started on one side of the hedge and the hedgehog on the other. +Away went the hare like the wind, but Mr. Hedgehog took three steps and +went back to his place. When the hare reached his end of the hedge, Mrs. +Hedgehog, from the other side, called out, 'I'm here already.' Her voice +and her coat were very like her husband's, and the hare was not +observant enough to remark a slight difference of size and colour. The +moral of which is, my dear children, that one must use his eyes as well +as his legs in this world. The hare tried several runs, but there was +always a hedgehog at the goal when he got there. So he gave in at last, +and our ancestors walked comfortably home, taking the louis d'or and the +bottle of brandy with them." + +"What is a louis d'or?" cried three of my children; and "What is +brandy?" asked the other four. + +"I smell valerian," said I; on which they poked out their seven noses, +and I ran at them with my spines, for a father who is not an +Encyclopaedia on all fours must adopt _some_ method of checking the +inquisitiveness of the young. + +When grown-up people desire information or take an interest in their +neighbours, this, of course, is another matter. Mrs. Hedgehog and I had +never seen tinkers, and we resolved to take an early opportunity some +evening of sending the seven urchins down to the burdock plantations to +pick snails, whilst we paid a cautious visit to the tinker camp. + +But mothers are sad fidgets, and anxious as Mrs. Hedgehog was to gratify +her curiosity, she kept putting off our expedition till the children's +spines should be harder; so I made one or two careful ones by myself, +and told her all the news on my return. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +"The animal Man," so I have heard my uncle, who was a learned hedgehog, +say,--"the animal man is a diurnal animal; he comes out and feeds in the +daytime." But a second cousin, who had travelled as far as Covent +Garden, and who lived for many years in a London kitchen, told me that +he thought my uncle was wrong, and that man comes out and feeds at +night. He said he knew of at least one house in which the crickets and +black-beetles never got a quiet kitchen to themselves till it was nearly +morning. + +But I think my uncle was right about men in the country. I am sure the +tinker and his family slept at night. He and his wife were out a great +deal during the day. They went away from the wood and left the children +with an old woman, who was the tinker's mother. At one time they were +away for several days, and about my usual time for going out the +children were asleep, and the old woman used to sit over the camp fire +with her head on her hands. + +"The language of men, my dear," I observed to Mrs. Hedgehog, "is quite +different to ours, even in general tone; but I assure you that when I +first heard the tinker's mother, I could have wagered a louis d'or and a +bottle of brandy that I heard hedgehogs whining to each other. In fact, +I was about to remonstrate with them for their imprudence, when I found +out that it was the old woman who was moaning and muttering to herself." + +"What is the matter with her?" asked Mrs. Hedgehog. + +"I was curious to know myself," said I, "and from what I have overheard, +I think I can inform you. She is the tinker's mother, and judging from +what he said the other night, was not by any means indulgent to him when +he was a child. She is harsh enough to his young brats now; but it +appears that she was devoted to an older son, one of the children of +his first wife; and that it is for the loss of this grandchild that she +vexes herself." + +"Is he dead?" + +"No, my dear, but--" + +"Has he been flitted?" + +"Something of the kind, I fear. He has been taken to prison." + +"Dear, dear!" said Mrs. Hedgehog; "what a trial to a mother's feelings! +Will they bake him?" + +"I think not," said I. "I fancy that he is tethered up as a punishment +for taking what did not belong to him; and the grandmother's grievance +seems to be that she believes he was unjustly convicted. She thinks the +real robber was a gipsy. Just as if I were taken, and my skin nailed to +the keeper's door for pheasant's eggs which I had never had the pleasure +of eating." + +Mrs. Hedgehog was now dying of curiosity. She said she thought the +children's spines were strong enough for anything that was likely to +happen to them; and so the next fresh damp evening we sent the seven +urchins down to the burdocks to pick snails, and crept cautiously +towards the tinker's encampment to see what we could see. And there, by +the smouldering embers of a bonfire, sat the old woman moaning, as I had +described her, with her elbows on her knees, rocking and nursing her +head, from which her long hair was looped and fell, like grey rags, +about her withered fingers. + +"I don't like her looks," snorted Mrs. Hedgehog. "And how disgustingly +they have trampled the grass." + +"It is quite true," said I; "it will not recover itself this summer. I +wish they had left us our wood to ourselves." + +At this moment Mrs. Hedgehog laid her five toes on mine, to attract my +attention, and whispered--"Is it a gipsy?" and lifting my nose in the +direction of the rustling brushwood, I saw Sybil. There was no mistaking +her, though her cheeks looked hollower and her eyes larger than when I +saw her last. + +"Good-evening, mother," she said. + +The old woman raised her gaunt face with a start, and cried fiercely, +"Begone with you! Begone!" and then bent it again upon her hands, +muttering, "There are plenty of hedges and ditches too good for your +lot, without their coming to worrit us in our wood." + +The gipsy girl knelt quietly by the fire, and stirred up the embers. + +"What is the matter, mother?" she said. "We've only just come, and when +I heard that Tinker George and his mother were in the wood, I started to +find you. 'You makes too free with the tinkers,' says my brother's +wife. 'I goes to see my mother,' says I, 'who nursed me through a +sickness, my real mother being dead, and my own people wanting to bury +me through my not being able to speak or move, and their wanting to get +to the Bartelmy Fair.' I never forget, mother; have you forgotten me, +that you drives me away for bidding you good-day?" + +"Good days are over for me," moaned the old woman. "Begone, I say! Don't +let me see or hear any that belongs to Black Basil, or it may be the +worse for them." + +("The tinker-mother whines very nastily," said Mrs. Hedgehog. "If I were +the young woman, I should bite her." + +"Hush!" I answered, "she is speaking.") + +"Basil is in prison," said the gipsy girl hoarsely. + +The old woman's eyes shone in their sockets, as she looked up at Sybil +for a minute, as if to read the gipsy's sentence on her face; and then +she chuckled, + +"So they've taken the Terror of the Roads?" + +Sybil's eyes had not moved from the fire, before which she was now +standing with clasped hands. + +"The Terror of the Roads?" she said. "Yes, they call him that,--but I +could turn him round my finger, mother." Her voice had dropped, and she +smoothed one of her black curls absently round her finger as she spoke. + +"You couldn't keep him out of prison," taunted the old woman. + +"I couldn't keep him out of mischief," said the girl, sadly; and then, +with a sudden flash of anger, she clasped her hands above her head and +cried, "A black curse on Jemmy and his gang!" + +"A black curse on them as lets the innocent go to prison in their stead. +They comes there themselves in the end, and long may it hold them!" was +the reply. + +Sybil moved swiftly to the old woman's side. + +"I heard you was in trouble, mother, about Christian; but you don't +think--" + +"_Think!_" screamed the old woman, shaking her fists, whilst the girl +interrupted her-- + +"Hush, mother, hush! tell me now, tell me all, but not so loud," and +kneeling with her back to us, she said something more in a low voice, to +which the old woman replied in a whine so much moderated, that though +Mrs. Hedgehog and I strained our ears, and crept as near the group as we +dared, we could not catch a word. + +Only, after a while Sybil rose up and walked back slowly to the fire, +twisting the long lock of her hair as before, and saying--"I turns him +round my finger, mother, as far as _that_ goes--" + +"So you thinks," said the old crone. "But he never will--even if you +would, Sybil Stanley! Oh Christian, my child, my child!" + +The gipsy girl stood still, like a young poplar-tree in the dead calm +before thunder; and there fell a silence, in which I dared not have +moved myself, or allowed Mrs. Hedgehog to move, three steps through the +softest grass, for fear of being heard. + +Then Sybil said abruptly, "I've never rightly heard about Christian, +mother. What was it made you think so much more of him than you thinks +about the others?" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +"My son's first wife died after Christian was born," said the old woman. +"I've a sharp tongue, as you know, Sybil Stanley, and I'm doubtful if +she was too happy while she lived; but when she was gone I knew she'd +been a good 'un, and I've always spoken of her accordingly. + +"You're too young to remember that year; it was a year of slack trade +and hard times all over. Farmer-folk grudged you fourpence to mend the +kettle, and as to broken victuals, there wasn't as much went in at the +front door to feed the family, as the servants would have thrown out at +the back door another year to feed the pigs. + +"When one gets old, my daughter, and sits over the fire at night and +thinks, instead of tramping all day and sleeping heavy after it, as one +does when one is young--things comes back; things comes back, I say, as +they says ghosts does. + +"And when we camps near trees with long branches, like them over there, +that waves in the wind and confuses your eyes among the smoke, I +sometimes think I sees her face, as it was before she died, with a +pinched look across the nose. That is Christian's mother, my son's first +wife; and it comes back to me that I believes she starved herself to let +him have more; for he's a man with a surly temper, like my own, is my +son George. He grumbled worse than the children when he was hungry, and +because she was so slow in getting strong enough to stand on her legs +and carry the basket. You see he didn't hold his tongue when things were +bad to bear, as she could. Men doesn't, my daughter." + +"I know, I know," said the girl. + +"I thinks I was jealous of her," muttered the old woman; "it comes back +to me that I begrudged her making so much of my son, but I knows now +that she was a good 'un, and I speaks of her accordingly. She fretted +herself about getting strong enough to carry the child to be +christened, while we had the convenience of a parson near at hand, and I +wasn't going to oblige her; but the day after she died, the child was +ailing, and thinking it might require the benefit of a burial-service as +well as herself, I wrapped it up, and made myself decent, and took my +way to the village. I was half-way up the street, when I met a young +gentlewoman in a grey dress coming out of a cottage. + +"'Good-day, my pretty lady,' says I. 'Could you show an old woman the +residence of the clergyman that would do the poor tinkers the kindness +of christening a sick child whose mother lies dead in a tilted cart at +the meeting of the four roads?' + +"'I'm the clergyman's wife,' says she, with the colour in her face, 'and +I'm sure my husband will christen the poor baby. Do let me see it.' + +"'It's only a tinker's child,' says I, 'a poor brown-faced morsel for a +pretty lady's blue eyes to rest upon, that's accustomed to the delicate +sight of her own golden-haired children; long may they live, and many +may you and the gentle clergyman have of them!' + +"'I have no children,' says she, shortly, with the colour in her face +breaking up into red and white patches over her cheeks. 'Let me carry +the baby for you,' says she, a taking it from me. 'You must be tired.' + +"All the way she kept looking at it, and saying how pretty it was, and +what beautiful long eyelashes it had, which went against me at the time, +my daughter, for I knowed it was like its mother. + +"The clergyman was a pleasing young gentleman of a genteel appearance, +with a great deal to say for himself in the way of religion, as was +right, it being his business. 'Name this child,' says he, and she gives +a start that nobody sees but myself. So, thinking that the child being +likely to die, there was no loss in obliging the gentlefolk, says I, +looking down into the book as if I could read, 'Any name the lady thinks +suitable for the poor tinker's child;' and says she, the colour coming +up into her face, 'Call him Christian, for he shall be one.' So he was +named Christian, a name to give no manner of displeasure to myself or to +my family; it having been that of my husband's father, who was +unfortunate in a matter of horse-stealing, and died across the water." + +"What did _she_ want with naming the baby, mother?" asked Sybil. + +"I comes to that, my daughter, I comes to that, though it's hard to +speak of. I hate myself worse than I hates the police when I thinks of +it. But ten pounds--pieces of gold, my daughter, when half-pence were +hard to come by--and small expectation that he would outlive his mother +by many days--and a feeling against him then, for her sake, though I +thinks differently now--" + +"You sold him to the clergy-folks?" said Sybil. + +"Ten pieces of gold! You never felt the pains of starvation, my +daughter--nor perhaps those of jealousy, which are worse. The young +clergywoman had no children, on which score she fretted herself; and +must have fretted hard, before she begged the poor tinker's child out of +the woods." + +"What did Tinker George say?" asked the girl. + +"He used a good deal of bad language, and said I might as easily have +got twenty pounds as ten, if I had not been as big a fool as the child's +mother herself. Men are strange creatures, my daughter." + +"So you left Christian with them?" + +"I did, my daughter. I left him in the arms of the young clergywoman +with the politest of words on both sides, and a good deal of religious +conversation from the parson, which I does not doubt was well meant, if +it was somewhat tedious." + +"And then--mother?" + +"And then we moved to Banbury, where my son took his second wife, having +made her acquaintance in an alehouse; and then, my daughter, I begins to +know that Christian's mother had been a good 'un." + +"George isn't as happy with this one, then?" + +"Men are curious creatures, my daughter, as you will discover for your +own part without any instructions from me. He treats her far better than +the other, because she treats him so much worse. But between them they +soon put me a-one-side, and when I sat long evenings alone, sometimes in +a wood, as it might be this, where the branches waves and makes a +confusion of the shadows--and sometimes on the edge of a Hampshire heath +where we camps a good deal, and the light is as slow in dying out of the +bottom of the sky as he and she are in coming home, and the bits of +water looks as if people had drownded themselves in them--when I sat +alone, I say, minding the fire and the children--I wondered if Christian +had lived, till I was all but mad with wondering and coming no nearer to +knowing. + +"'His mother was a good daughter to you,' I thinks; 'and if you hadn't +sold him--sold your own flesh and blood--for ten golden sovereigns to +the clergywoman, he might have been a good son to your old age.' + +"At last I could bear idleness and the lone company of my own thoughts +no longer, my daughter, and I sets off to travel on my own account, +taking money at back-doors, and living on broken meats I begged into the +bargain, and working at nights instead of thinking. I knows a few arts, +my daughter, of one sort and another, and I puts away most of what I +takes, and changes it when the copper comes to silver, and _the silver +comes to gold_." + +"I wonder you never went to see if he was alive," said Sybil. + +"I did, my daughter. I went several times under various disguisements, +which are no difficulty to those who know how to adopt them, and with +servant's jewellery and children's toys, I had sight of him more than +once, and each time made me wilder to get him back." + +"And you never tried?" + +"The money was not ready. One must act honourably, my daughter. I +couldn't pick up my own grandson as if he'd been a stray hen, or a few +clothes off the line. It took me five years to save those ten pounds. +Five long miserable years." + +"Miserable!" cried the gipsy girl, flinging her hair back from her eyes. +"Miserable! Happy, you mean; too happy! It is when one can do nothing--" + +She stopped, as if talking choked her, and the old woman, who seemed to +pay little attention to any one but herself, went on, + +"It was when it was all but saved, and I hangs about that country, +making up my plans, that he comes to me himself, as I sits on the +outskirts of a wood beyond the village, in no manner of disguisement, +but just as I sits here." + +"He came to you?" said Sybil. + +"He comes to me, my daughter; dressed like any young nobleman of eight +years old, but bareheaded and barefooted, having his cap in one hand, +and his boots and stockings in the other. + +"'Good-morning, old gipsy woman,' says he. 'I heard there was an old +gipsy woman in the wood; so I came to see. Nurse said if I went about in +the fields, by myself, the gipsies would steal me; but I told her I +didn't care if they did, because it must be so nice to live in a wood, +and sleep out of doors all night. When I grow up, I mean to be a wild +man on a desert island, and dress in goats' skins. I sha'n't wear +hats--I hate them; and I don't like shoes and stockings either. When I +can get away from Nurse, I always take them off. I like to feel what I'm +walking on, and in the wood I like to scuffle with my toes in the dead +leaves. There's a quarry at the top of this wood, and I should so have +liked to have thrown my shoes and stockings and my cap into it; but it +vexes mother when I destroy my clothes, so I didn't, and I am carrying +them.' + +"Those were the very words he said, my daughter. He had a swiftness of +tongue, for which I am myself famous, especially in fortune-telling; +but he used the language of gentility, and a shortness of speech which +you will observe among those who are accustomed to order what they want +instead of asking for it. I had hard work to summon voice to reply to +him, my daughter, and I cannot tell you, nor would you understand it if +I could find the words, what were my feelings to hear him speak with +that confidence of the young clergywoman as his mother. + +"'A green welcome to the woods and the fields, my noble little +gentleman,' says I. 'Be pleased to honour the poor tinker-woman by +accepting the refreshment of a seat and a cup of tea.' + +"'I mayn't eat or drink anything when I am visiting the poor people,' +says he, 'Mother doesn't allow me. But thank you all the same, and +please don't give me your stool, for I'd much rather sit on the grass; +and, if you please, I should like you to tell me all about living in +woods, and making fires, and hanging kettles on sticks, and going about +the country and sleeping out of doors.'" + +"Did you tell him the truth, or make up a tale for him?" asked Sybil. + +"Partly one and partly the other, my daughter. But when persons sets +their minds on anything, they sees the truth in a manner according to +their own thoughts, which is of itself as good as a made-up tale. + +"He asks numberless questions, to which I makes suitable replies. Them +that lives out of doors--can they get up as early as they likes, without +being called? he asks. + +"Does gipsies go to bed in their clothes? + +"Does they sometimes forget their prayers, with not regularly dressing +and undressing? + +"Did I ever sleep on heather? + +"Does we ever travel by moonlight? + +"Do I see the sun rise every morning? + +"Did I ever meet a highwayman? + +"Does I believe in ghosts? + +"Can I really tell fortunes? + +"I takes his shapely little hand--as brown as your own, my daughter, for +his mother, like myself, was a pure Roman, and looked down upon by her +people in consequence for marrying my son, who is of mixed blood (my +husband being in family, as in every other respect, undeserving of the +slightest mention). + +"'Let me tell you your fortune, my noble little gentleman,' I says. 'The +lines of life are crossed early with those of travelling. Far will you +wander, and many things will you see. Stone houses and houses of brick +will not detain you. In the big house with the blue roof and the green +carpet were you born, and in the big house with the blue roof and the +green carpet will you die. The big house is delicately perfumed, my +noble little gentleman, especially in the month of May; at which time +there is also an abundance of music, and the singers sits overhead. Give +the old gipsy woman a sight of your comely feet, my little gentleman, by +the soles of which it is not difficult to see that you were born to +wander.' + +"With this and similar jaw I entertained him, my daughter, and his eyes +looks up at me out of his face till I feels as if the dead had come +back; but he had a way with him besides which frightened me, for I knew +that it came from living with gentlefolk. + +"'Are you mighty learned, my dear?' says I. 'Are you well instructed in +books and schooling?' + +"'I can say the English History in verse,' he says, 'and I do compound +addition; and I know my Catechism, and lots of hymns. Would you like to +hear me?' + +"'If you please, my little gentleman,' I says. + +"'What shall I say?' he asks. 'I know all the English History, only I am +not always quite sure how the kings come; but if you know the kings and +can just give me the name, I know the verses quite well. And I know the +Catechism perfectly, but perhaps you don't know the questions without +the book. The hymns of course you don't want a book for, and I know them +best of all.' + +"'I am not learned, myself,' says I, 'and I only know of two kings--the +king of England--who, for that matter, is a queen, and a very good +woman, they say, if one could come at her--and the king of the gipsies, +who is as big a blackguard as you could desire to know, and by no means +entitled to call himself king, though he gets a lot of money by it, +which he spends in the public-house. As regards the other thing, my +dear, I certainly does not know the questions without the book, nor, +indeed, should I know them with the book, which is neither here nor +there; so if the hymns require no learning on my part, I gives the +preference to them.' + +"'I like _them_ best, myself,' he says; and he puts his hat and his +shoes and stockings on the ground, and stands up and folds his hands +behind his back, and repeats a large number of religious verses, with +the same readiness with which the young clergyman speaks out of a book. + +"It partly went against me, my daughter, for I am not religious myself, +and he was always too fond of holy words, which I thinks brings +ill-luck. But his voice was as sweet as a thrush that sits singing in a +thorn-bush, and between that and a something in the verses which had a +tendency to make you feel uncomfortable, I feels more disturbed than I +cares to show. But oh, my daughter, how I loves him! + +"'The blessing of an old gipsy woman on your young head,' I says. 'Fair +be the skies under which you wanders, and shady the spots in which you +rests! + +"'May the water be clear and the wood dry where you camps! + +"'May every road you treads have turf by the wayside, and the +patteran[B] of a friend on the left.' + +"'What is the patteran?' he asks. + +"'It is a secret,' I says, looking somewhat sternly at him. 'The roads +keeps it, and the hedges keeps it--' + +"'I can keep it,' he says boldly. 'Pinch my finger, and try me!' + +"As he speaks he holds out his little finger, and I pinches it, my +daughter, till the colour dies out of his lips, though he keeps them +set, for I delights to see the nobleness and the endurance of him. So I +explains the patteran to him, and shows him ours with two bits of +hawthorn laid crosswise, for I does not regard him as a stranger, and I +sees that he can keep his lips shut when it is required. + +"He was practising the patteran at my feet, when I hears the cry of +'Christian!' and I cannot explain to you the chill that came over my +heart at the sound. + +"Trouble and age and the lone company of your own thoughts, my daughter, +has a tendency to confuse you; and I am not by any means rightly certain +at times about things I sees and hears. I sees Christian's mother when +I knows she can't be there, and though I believes now that only one +person was calling the child, yet, with the echo that comes from the +quarry, and with worse than twenty echoes in my own mind, it seems to me +that the wood is full of voices calling him. + +"In my foolishness, my daughter, I sits like a stone, and he springs to +his feet, and snatches up his things, and says, 'Good-bye, old gipsy +woman, and thank you very much. I should like to stay with you,' he +says, 'but Nurse is calling me, and Mother does get so frightened if I +am long away and she doesn't know where. But I shall come back.' + +"I never quite knows, my daughter, whether it was the echo that repeated +his words, or whether it was my own voice I hears, as I stretches my old +arms after him, crying, 'Come back!' + +"But he runs off shouting, 'Coming, coming!' + +"And the wood deafens me, it is so full of voices. + +"_Christian! Christian!--Coming! Coming!_ + +"And I thinks I has some kind of a fit, my daughter, for when I wakes, +the wood is as still as death, and he is gone, as dreams goes." + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +"I really feel for the tinker-mother," whispered Mrs. Hedgehog. + +"I feel for her myself," was my reply. "The cares of a family are heavy +enough when they only last for the season, and one sleeps them off in a +winter's nap. When--as in the case of men--they last for a lifetime, and +you never get more than one night's rest at a time, they must be almost +unendurable. As to prolonging one's anxieties from one's own families to +the families of each of one's children--no parent in his senses--" + +"What is the gipsy girl saying now?" asked Mrs. Hedgehog, who had been +paying more attention to the women than to my observations--an annoyance +to which, as head of the family, I have been subjected oftener than is +becoming. + +Sybil had been kneeling at the old woman's feet, soothing her and +chafing her hands. At last she said, + +"But you did get him, Mother. How was it?" + +"Not for five more years, my daughter. And never in all that time could +I get a sight of his face. The very first house I calls at next morning, +I sees a chalk mark on the gate-post, placed there by some travelling +tinker or pedler or what not, by which I knows that the neighbourhood is +being made too hot for tramps and vagrants, as they call us. And go back +in what disguisement I might, there was no selling a bootlace, nor +begging a crust of bread there--_there_, where _he_ lived. + +"I makes up the ten pounds, and ties it in a bag; but I gets worse and +worse in health and spirits and in confusion of mind, my daughter; and +when I comes accidentally across my son in a Bedfordshire lane, and his +wife is drinking, and he is in much bewilderment with the children, I +takes up again with them, and I was with them when Christian comes to me +the second time." + +"He came back to you?" + +"Learning and the confinement of stone walls, my daughter, than which no +two things could be more contrary to the nature of those who dwells in +the woods and lanes. I will not deny that the clergyman--and especially +the young clergywoman--had been very good to him; but for which he would +probably have run away long before. But what is bred in the bone comes +out in the flesh. He does pretty well with the learning, and he bears +with the confinement of school, though it is worse than that of the +clergy-house. But when a rumour has crept out that he is not the son of +the clergyman nor of the clergywoman, and he is taunted with being a +gipsy and a vagrant, he lays his bare hands on those nearest to him, my +daughter, and comes away on his bare feet." + +"How did he find you, Mother?" + +"He has no fixed intentions beyond running away, my daughter; but as he +is sitting in a hedge to bandage one of his feet with his handkerchief, +he sees our patteran, and he goes on, keeping it by the left, and sees +it again, and so follows it, and comes home." + +"You mean that he came to you?" + +"I do, my dear. For home is not a house that never moves from one place, +built of stone or brick, and with a front door for the genteel and a +back door for the common people. If it was so, prisons would be homes. +But home, my daughter, is where persons is whom you belongs to, and it +may be under a hedge to-day and in a fair to-morrow." + +"Mother," said Sybil, "what did you do about the ten pounds?" + +"I will tell you, my daughter. I was obliged to wait longer than was +agreeable to me before proceeding to that neighbourhood, for the police +was searching everywhere, and it would be wearisome to relate to you +with what difficulty Christian was concealed. My plans had been long +made, as you know. + +"Clergyfolk, my daughter, with a tediousness of jaw which makes them as +oppressive to listen long to as houses is to rest long in, has their +good points like other persons; they shows kindness to those who are in +trouble, and they spends their money very freely on the poor. This is +well known, even by those who has no liking for parsons, and I have more +than once observed that persons who goes straight to the public-house +when they has money in their pockets, goes straight to the parson when +their pockets is empty. + +"It is also well known, my daughter, that when the clergyman collects +money after speaking in his church, he doesn't take it for his own use, +as is the custom with other people, such as Punch and Judy men, or +singers, or fortune tellers; at the same time he is as pleased with a +good collection as if it were for his own use; and if some rich person +contributes a sovereign for the sick and poor, it is to him as it would +be to you, my daughter, if your hand was crossed with gold by some noble +gentleman who had been crossed in love. + +"I explain this, my dear, that you may understand how it was that I had +planned to pay back the clergy people's ten pounds in church, which +would be as good as paying it into their hands, with the advantage of +secrecy for myself. On the Saturday I drives into the little market in a +donkey-cart with greens, and on Sunday morning I goes to church in a +very respectable disguisement, and the sexton puts me in a pew with +some women of infirm mind in workhouse dresses, for which, my daughter, +I had much to do to restrain myself from knocking him down. But I does; +and I behaves myself through the service with the utmost care, following +the movements of the genteeler portion of the company, those in the pew +with me having no manners at all; one of them standing most of the time +and giggling over the pew-back, and another sitting in the corner and +weeping into her lap. + +"But with the exception of getting up and sitting down, and holding a +book open as near to the middle as I could guess, I pays little +attention, my daughter, for all my thoughts is taken up with waiting for +the collection to begin, and with trying to keep my eyes from the +clergywoman's face, which I can see quite clearly, though she is at some +distance from me." + +"Did she look very wild, Mother, as if she felt beside herself?" + +"She looked very bad, my daughter, and grey, which was not with age. I +tells you that I tried not to look at her; and by and by the collection +begins. + +"It seems hours to me, my daughter, whilst the money is chinking and the +clergyman is speaking, and the ten pieces of gold is getting so hot in +my hands, I fancies they burns me, and still not one of the +collecting-men comes near our pew. + +"At last, one by one, they begins to go past me and go up to the +clergyman who is waiting for them at the upper end, and then I perceives +that they regards us as too poor to pay our way like the rest, and that +the plates will never be put into our pew at all. So when the last but +one is going past me, I puts out my hand to beckon him, and the woman +that is standing by me bursts out laughing, and the other cries worse +than ever, and the collecting-man says, 'Hush! hush!' and goes past and +takes the plate with him. + +"'A black curse on your insolence!' says I; and then I grips the +laughing woman by the arm and whispers, 'If you make that noise again, +I'll break your head,' and she sits down and begins to cry like the +other. + +"There is one more collecting-man, who comes last, and he is the Duke, +who lives at the big house. + +"The nobility and gentry, my daughter, when they are the real thing, +has, like the real Romans, a quickness to catch your meaning, and a +politeness of manner which you doesn't meet with among such people as +the keeper of a small shop or the master of a workhouse. The Duke was a +very old man, with bent shoulders and the slow step of age, and I thinks +he did not see or hear very quickly; and when I beckons to him he goes +past. But when he is some way past he looks back. And when he sees my +hand out, he turns and comes slowly down again, and hands me the plate +with as much politeness as if I had been in his own pew, and he says in +a low voice, 'I beg your pardon.' + +"But when I sees him stumbling back, and knows that in his politeness he +will bring me the plate, there comes a fear on me, my daughter, that he +may see the ten pieces of gold and think I has stolen them. And then I +knows not what I shall do, for the nobility and gentry, though quick and +polite in a matter of obliging the poor, such as this one,--when they +sits as poknees[C] to administer justice, loses both their good sense +and their good manners as completely as any of the police. + +"But it comes to me also that being such a real one--such an +out-and-outer--his politeness may be so great that he may look another +way, rather than peep and pry to see what the poor workhouse-company +woman puts into the plate. And I am right, my daughter, for he looks +away, and I lays the ten golden sovereigns in the plate, and he gives a +little smile and a little bow, and goes slowly and stumblingly to the +upper end, where the clergyman is still speaking verses. + +"And then, my daughter, my hands, which made the gold sovereigns so +hot, turns very hot, and I gets up and goes out of the church with as +much respectfulness and quiet as I am able. + +"And I tries not to look at her face as I turns to shut the door, but I +was unable to keep myself from doing so, and as it looked then I can see +it now, my dear, and I know I shall remember it till I die. I thinks +somehow that she was praying, though it was not a praying part of the +service, and when I looks to the upper end I sees that the eyes of the +young clergyman her husband is fixed on her, as mine is. + +"And of all the words which he preached that day and the verses he spoke +with so much readiness, I could not repeat one to you, my daughter, to +save my life, except the words he was saying just then, and they remains +in my ears as her face remains before my eyes,-- + +"'GOD is not unrighteous, that He will forget your work, and +labour which proceedeth of love.'" + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +"We are all creatures of habit." So my learned uncle, Draen y Coed, who +was a Welsh hedgehog, used to say. "Which was why an ancestor of my own, +who acted as turnspit in the kitchen of a farmhouse in Yorkshire, quite +abandoned the family custom of walking out in the cool of the evening, +and declared that he couldn't take two steps in comfort except in a +circle, and in front of a kitchen-fire at roasting heat." + +Uncle Draen y Coed was right, and I must add that I doubt if, in all his +experience, or among the strange traditions of his most eccentric +ancestors, he could find an instance of change of habits so unexpected, +so complete, I may say so headlong, as when very quiet people, with an +almost surly attachment to home, break the bounds of the domestic +circle, and take to gadding, gossiping, and excitement. + +Perhaps it is because they find that their fellow-creatures are nicer +than they have been wont to allow them to be, and that other people's +affairs are quite as interesting as their own. + +Perhaps--but what is the good of trying to explain infatuations? + +Why do we all love valerian? I can only record that, having set up every +prickle on our backs against intruders into our wood, we now dreaded +nothing more than that our neighbours should forsake us, and wished for +nothing better than for fresh arrivals. + +In old days, when my excellent partner and I used to take our evening +stroll up the field, we were wont to regard it quite as a grievance if a +cousin, who lived at the far end of the hedge, came out and caught us +and detained us for a gossip. But now I could hardly settle to my midday +nap for thinking of the tinker-mother; and as to Mrs. Hedgehog, she +almost annoyed me by her anxiety to see Christian. However, curiosity is +the foible of her sex, and I accompanied her daily to the encampment +without a murmur. + +The seven urchins we sent down to the burdocks to pick snails. + +It was not many days after that on which we heard the old tinker-mother +relate Christian's history, that we were stopped on our way to the +corner where we usually concealed ourselves, by hearing strange voices +from the winding pathway above us. + +"It's a young man," said I. + +"It's Christian!" cried Mrs. Hedgehog. + +"I feel sure that it is not," said I; "but if you will keep quiet, I +will creep a little forward and see." + +I am always in the right, as I make a point of reminding Mrs. Hedgehog +whenever we dispute; and I was right on this occasion. + +The lad who spoke was a young gentleman of about seventeen, and no more +like a gipsy than I am. His fair hair was closely cropped, his eyes were +quick and bright, his manner was alert and almost anxious, and though he +was very slight as well as very young, he carried himself with dignity +and some little importance. A lady, much older than himself, was with +him, whom he was helping down the path. + +"Take care, Gertrude, take care. There is no hurry, and I believe +there's no one in the wood but ourselves." + +"The people at the inn told us that there were gipsies in the +neighbourhood," said the lady; "and oh, Ted! this is exactly the wood I +dreamt of, except the purple and white--" + +"Gertrude! What on earth are you after?" + +"The flowers, Ted, the flowers in my dream! There they are, a perfect +carpet of them. White--oh, how lovely!--and there, on the other side, +are the purple ones. What are they, dear? I know you are a good +botanist. He always raved about your collection." + +"Nonsense, I'm not a botanist. Several other fellows went in for it when +the prize was offered, and all that my collection was good for was his +doing. I never did see any one arrange flowers as he did, I must say. +Every specimen was pressed so as somehow to keep its own way of growing. +And when I did them, a columbine looked as stiff as a dog-daisy. I never +could keep any character in them. Watson--the fellow who drew so +well--made vignettes on the blank pages to lots of the specimens--'Likely +Habitats' we called them. He used to sit with his paint-box in my +window, and Christian used to sit outside the window, on the edge, +dangling his legs, and describing scenes out of his head for Watson to +draw. Watson used to say, 'I wish I could paint with my brush as that +fellow paints with his tongue'--and when the vignettes were admired, +I've heard him say, in his dry way, 'I copied them from Christian's +paintings;' and the fellows used to stare, for you know he couldn't +draw a line. And when--But I say, Gertrude, for Heaven's sake, don't +devour everything I say with those great pitiful eyes of yours. I am a +regular brute to talk about him." + +"No, Ted, no. It makes me so happy to hear you, and to know that you +know how good he really was, and how much he must have been aggravated +before--" + +"For goodness' sake, don't cry. Christian was a very good fellow, a +capital fellow. I never thought I could have got on so well with any one +who was--I mean who wasn't--well, of course I mean who was really a +gipsy. I don't blame him a bit for resenting being bullied about his +parents. I only blame myself for not looking better after him. But you +know that well enough--you know it's because I never can forgive myself +for having managed so badly when you put him in my care, that I am +backing you through this mad expedition, though I don't approve of it +one bit, and though I know John will blame me awfully." + +("It's the clergywoman," whispered Mrs. Hedgehog excitedly, "and I must +and will see her." + +When it comes to this with Mrs. Hedgehog's sex, there is nothing for it +but to let the dear creatures have their own way, and take the +consequences. She pushed her nose straight through the lower branches of +an arbutus in which we were concealed, and I myself managed to get a +nearer sight of our new neighbours. + +As we crept forward, the clergywoman got up from where she was kneeling +amongst the flowers, and laid her hand on the young gentleman's arm. I +noticed it because I had never seen such a white hand before; Sybil's +paws were nearly as dark as my own.) + +"John will blame no one if we find Christian," she said. "You are very, +very good, Cousin Ted, to come with me and help me when you do not +believe in my dream. But you must say it is odd about the flowers. And +you haven't told me yet what they are." + +"It is the bulbous-rooted fumitory," said the young man, pulling a piece +at random in the reckless way in which men do disfigure forest +flower-beds. "It isn't strictly indigenous, but it is naturalized in +many places, and you must have seen it before, though you fancy you +haven't." + +"I have seen it once before," she said earnestly--"all in delicate +glaucous-green masses, studded with purple and white, like these; but it +was in my dream. I never saw it otherwise, though I know you don't +believe me." + +"Dear Gertrude, I'll believe anything you like to tell me, if you'll +come home. I'm sure I have done very wrong. You know I'm always hard up, +but I declare I'd give a hundred pounds if you'd come home with me at +once. I don't believe there's a gipsy within--" + +"Good-day, my pretty young gentleman. Let the poor gipsy girl tell you +your fortune." + +He turned round and saw Sybil standing at his elbow, her eyes flashing +and her white teeth gleaming in a broad smile. He stood speechless in +sudden surprise; but the clergywoman, who was not surprised, came +forward with her white hands stretched so expressively towards Sybil's +brown ones, that the gipsy girl all but took them in her own. + +"Please kindly tell me--do you know anything of a young gipsy, named +Christian?" + +The clergywoman spoke with such vehemence that Sybil answered directly, +"I know his grandmother"--and then suddenly stopped herself. + +But as she spoke, she had turned her head with an expressive gesture in +the direction of the encampment, and without waiting for more, the +clergywoman ran down the path, calling on her cousin to follow her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +My ancestor's artifice was very successful when the race was run on two +sides of a hedge, backwards and forwards; but if a louis d'or and a +bottle of brandy had depended on my reaching the tinker-mother before +the clergywoman, I should have lost the wager. We hurried after her, +however, as fast as we were able, keeping well under the brushwood. + +When we could see our neighbours again, the tinker-mother was standing +up, and speaking hurriedly, with a wild look in her eyes. + +"Let me be, Sybil Stanley, and let me speak. I says again, what has fine +folk to do with coming and worriting us in our wood? If I did sell him, +I sold him fair--and if I got him back, I bought him back fair. Aye my +delicate gentlewoman, you may look at me, but I did! + +"Five years, five years of wind and weather, and hard days and lonely +nights:-- + +"Five years of food your men would chuck to the pigs, and of clothes +your maids would think scorn to scour in:-- + +"Five years--but I scraped it together, and _then_ they baulked me. You +shuts the door in the poor tinker-woman's face; you gives the words of +warning to the police. + +"Five more years--it was five more, wasn't it, my daughter?--Sometimes I +fancies I makes a mistake and overcounts. But, _he'll_ know. Christian, +my dear! Christian, I say!" + +"Sit down, Mother, sit down," said the gipsy girl; and the old woman sat +down, but she went on muttering,-- + +"I will speak! What has they to do, I say, to ask me where he has gone +to? A fine place for the fine gentleman they made of him. What has such +as them to say to it, if I couldn't keep him when I got him--that they +comes to taunt me and my grey hairs?" + +She wrung her grey locks with a passionate gesture as she spoke, and +then dropped her elbows on her knees and her head upon her hands. + +The clergywoman had been standing very still, with her two white hands +folded before her, and her eyes, that had dark circles round them which +made them look large, fixed upon the tinker-mother, as she muttered; +but when she ceased muttering the clergywoman unlocked her hands, and +with one movement took off her hat. Her hair was smoothly drawn over the +roundness of her head, and gathered in a knot at the back of her neck, +and the brown of it was all streaked with grey. She threw her hat on to +the grass, and moving swiftly to the old woman's side, she knelt by her, +as we had seen Sybil kneel, speaking very clearly, and, touching the +tinker-mother's hand. + +"Christian's grandmother--you are his grandmother, are you not?--you +must be much, much older than me, but look at _my_ hair. Am I likely to +taunt any one with having grown grey or with being miserable? It takes a +good deal of pain, good mother, to make young hair as white as mine." + +"So it should," muttered the old woman, "so it should. It is a plaguy +world, I say, as it is; but it would be plaguy past any bearing for the +poor, if them that has everything could do just as they likes and never +feel no aches nor pains afterwards. And there's a many fine gentlefolk +thinks they can, till they feels the difference. + +"'What's ten pound to me?' says you. 'I wants the pretty baby with the +dark eyes and the long lashes,' says you. + +"'Them it belongs to is poor, they'd sell anything,' says you. + +"'I wants a son,' you says; 'and having the advantages of gold and +silver, I can buy one.' + +"You calls him by a name of your own choosing, and puts your own name at +the end of that. His hands are something dark for the son of such a +delicate white lady-mother, but they can be covered with the kid gloves +of gentility. + +"You buys fine clothes for him, and nurses and tutors and schools for +him. + +"You teaches him the speech of gentlefolk, and the airs of gentlefolk, +and the learning of gentlefolk. + +"You crams his head with religion, which is a thing I doesn't hold with, +and with holy words, which I thinks brings ill-luck. + +"You has the advantages of silver and gold, to make a fine gentleman of +him, but the blood that flies to his face when he hears the words of +insult is gipsy blood, and he comes back to the woods where he was born. + +"Let me be, my daughter, I say I will speak--(Heaven keep my head +cool!)--it's good for such as them to hear the truth once in a way. +She's a dainty fine lady, and she taught him many fine things, besides +religion, which I sets my face against. Tell her she took mighty good +care of him--Ha! ha! the old tinker-woman had only one chance of +teaching him anything--_but she taught him the patteran_!" + +The clergywoman had never moved, except that when the tinker-mother +shook off her hand she locked her white fingers in front of her as +before, and her eyes wandered from the old woman's face, and looked +beyond it, as if she were doing what I have often done, and counting the +bits of blue sky which show through the oak-leaves before they grow +thick. But she must have been paying attention all the same, for she +spoke very earnestly. + +"Good mother, listen to me. If I bought him, you sold him. Perhaps I did +wrong to tempt you--perhaps I did wrong to hope to buy for myself what +GOD was not pleased to give me. I was very young, and one makes +many mistakes when one is young. I thought I was childless and unhappy, +but I know now that only those are childless who have had children and +lost them. + +"Do you know that in all the years my son was with me, I do not think +there was a day when I did not think of you? I used to wonder if you +regretted him, and I lived in dread of your getting him back; and when +he ran away, I knew you had. I never agreed with the lawyer's plans--my +husband will tell you so--I always wanted to find you to speak to you +myself. I knew what you must feel, and I thought I should like you to +know that I knew it. + +"Night after night I lay awake and thought what I would say to you when +we met. I thought I would tell you that I could quite understand that +our ways might become irksome to Christian, if he inherited a love for +outdoor life, and for moving from place to place. I thought I would say +that perhaps I was wrong ever to have taken him away from his own +people; but as it was done and could not be undone, we might perhaps +make the best of it together. I hope you understand me, though you say +nothing? You see, if he is a gipsy at heart, he has also been brought up +to many comforts you cannot give him, and with the habits and ideas of a +gentleman. You are too clever, and too fond of him, to mind my speaking +plainly. Now there are things which a gentleman might do if he had the +money, which would satisfy his love of roving as well. Many rich +gentlemen dislike the confinement of houses and domestic ways as much as +Christian, and they leave their fine homes to travel among dangers and +discomforts. I could find the money for Christian to do this by and by. +If he likes a wandering life, he can live it easily so--only he would be +able to wander hundreds of miles where you wander one, and to sleep +under other skies and among new flowers, and in forests to which such +woods as these are shrubberies. He need not fall into any of the bad +ways to which you know people are tempted by being poor. I have thought +of it all, night after night, and longed to be able to tell you about +it. He might become a famous traveller, you know; he is very clever and +very fond of books of adventure. This young gentleman will tell you so. +How proud we should both be of him! That is what I have thought might be +if you did not hide him from me, and I did not keep him from you. + +"And as to religion--dear good mother, listen to me. Look at me--see if +religion has been a fashion or a plaything to _me_. If it had not stood +by me when my heart was as heavy as yours, what profit should I have in +it? + +"Christian's grandmother--you are his grandmother, I know, and have the +better right to him--if you cannot agree to my plans--if you won't let +me help you about him--if you hide him from me, and I must live out my +life and never see his dear face again--spare me the hope of seeing it +when this life is over. + +"If I did my best for your grandson--and you know I did--oh! for the +love of Christ, our only Refuge, do not stand between him and the Father +of us all! + +"If you have felt what he must suffer if he is poor, and if you know so +well how little it makes sure of happiness to be rich--if in a long life +you have found out how hard it is to be good, and how rare it is to be +happy--if you know what it is to love and lose, to hope and to be +disappointed in one's hoping--let him be religious, good mother! + +"If you care for Christian, leave him the only strength that is strong +enough to hold us back from sin, and to do instead of joy." + +The tinker-mother lifted her head; but before she could say a word, the +young gentleman burst into indignant speech. + +"Gertrude, I can bear it no longer. Not even for you, not even for the +chance of getting Christian back. It's empty swagger to say that I wish +to GOD I'd the chance of giving my life to get him back for +you. But you must come home now. I've bitten my lip through in holding +my tongue, but I won't see you kneel another minute at the feet of that +sulky old gipsy hag." + +Whilst he was speaking the tinker-mother had risen to her feet, and when +she stood quite upright she was much taller than I had thought. The +young gentleman had moved to take his cousin by the hand, but the old +woman waved him back. + +"Stay where you are, young gentleman," she said. "This is no matter for +boys to mix and meddle in. Sybil, my daughter--Sybil, I say! Come and +stand near me, for I gets confused at times, and I fears I may not +explain myself to the noble gentlewoman with all the respect that I +could wish. She says a great deal that is very true, my daughter, and +she has no vulgar insolence in her manners of speaking. I thinks I shall +let her do as she says, if we can get Christian out, which perhaps, if +she is cousin to any of the justiciary, she may be able to do. + +"The poor tinker-folk returns you the deepest of obligations, my gentle +lady. If she'll let me see him when I wants to, it will be best, my +daughter; for I thinks I am failing, and I shouldn't like to leave him +with George and that drunken slut. + +"I thinks I am failing, I say. Trouble and age and the lone company of +your own thoughts, my noble gentlewoman, has a tendency to confuse you, +though I was always highly esteemed for the facility of my speech, +especially in the telling of fortunes. + +"Let the poor gipsy look into your white hand, my pretty lady. The lines +of life are somewhat broken with trouble, but they joins in peace. +There's a dark young gentleman with a great influence on your happiness, +and I sees grandchildren gathered at your knees. + +"What did the lady snatch away her hand for, my daughter? I means no +offence. She shall have Christian. I have told her so. Tell him to get +ready and go before his father gets back. He's a bad 'un is my son +George, and I knows now that she was far too good for him. + +"Come a little nearer, my dear, that I may touch you. I sees your face +so often, when I knows you can't be there, that it pleases me to be able +to feel you. I was afraid you bore me ill-will for selling Christian; +but I bought him back, my dear, I bought him back. Take him away with +you, my dear, for I am failing, and I shouldn't like to leave him with +George. Your eyes looks very hollow and your hair is grey. Not, that I +begrudges your making so much of my son, but he treats you ill, he +treats you very ill. Don't cry, my dear, it comes to an end at last, +though I thinks sometimes that all the men in the world put together is +not worth the love we wastes upon one. You hear what I say, Sybil? And +that rascal, Black Basil, is the worst of a bad lot." + +"Hold your jaw, Mother," said Sybil sharply; and she added, "Be pleased +to excuse her, my lady: she is old and gets confused at times, and she +thinks you are Christian's mother, who is dead." + +The old woman was bursting out again, when Sybil raised her hand, and we +all pricked our ears at a sound of noisy quarrelling that came nearer. + +"It's George and his wife," said Sybil. "Mother, the gentlefolks had +better go. I'll go to the inn afterwards, and tell them about Christian. +Take the lady away, sir. Come, Mother, come!" + +I've a horror of gipsy men, and even before our neighbours had +dispersed I hustled away with Mrs. Hedgehog into the bushes. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +Good Mrs. Hedgehog hurt one of her feet slightly in our hurried retreat, +and next day was obliged to rest it; but as our curiosity was more on +the alert than ever, I went down in the afternoon to the tinker camp. + +The old woman was sitting in her usual position, and she seemed to have +recovered herself. Sybil was leaning back against a tree opposite; she +wore a hat and shawl, and looked almost as wild as the tinker-mother had +looked the day before. She seemed to have been at the inn with the +clergywoman, and was telling the tinker-mother the result. + +"You told her he had got two years, my daughter? Does she say she will +get him out?" + +"She says she has no more power to do it than yourself, Mother--and the +young gentleman says the same--unless--unless it was made known that +Christian was innocent." + +"Two years," moaned the old woman. "Is she sure we couldn't buy him out, +my dear? Two years--oh! Christian, my child, I shall never live to see +you again!" + +She sobbed for a minute, and then raising her hand suddenly above her +head, she cried, "A curse on Black--" but Sybil seized her by the wrist +so suddenly, that it checked her words. + +"Don't curse him, Mother," said the gipsy girl, "and I'll--I'll see what +I can do. I meant to, and I've come to say good-bye. I've brought a +packet of tea for you; see that you keep it to yourself. Good-bye, +Mother." + +"Good-evening, my daughter." + +"I said good-bye. You don't hold with religion, do you?" + +"I does not, so far, my daughter; though I think the young clergywoman +speaks very convincingly about it." + +"Don't you think that there may be a better world, Mother, for them that +tries to do right, though things goes against them here?" + +"I think there might very easily be a better world, my dear, but I never +was instructed about it." + +"You don't believe in prayers, do you, Mother?" + +"That I does not, my daughter. Christian said lots of 'em, and you sees +what it comes to." + +"It's not unlucky to say 'GOD bless you,' is it, Mother? I +wanted you to say it before I go." + +"No, my daughter, I doesn't object to that, for I regards it as an +old-fashioned compliment, more in the nature of good manners than of +holy words." + +"GOD bless you, Mother." + +"GOD bless you, my daughter." + +Sybil turned round and walked steadily away. The last glimpse I had of +her was when she turned once more, and put the hair from her face to +look at the old woman: but the tinker-mother did not see her, for she +was muttering with her head upon her hands. + + * * * * * + +It was a remarkable summer--that summer when I had seven, and when we +took so much interest in our neighbours. + +I make a point of never disturbing myself about the events of by-gone +seasons. At the same time, to rear a family of seven urchins is not a +thing done by hedgehog-parents every year, and the careers of that +family are very clearly impressed upon my memory. + +Number one came to a sad end. + +What on the face of the wood made him think of pheasants' eggs, I cannot +conceive. I'm sure I never said anything about them! It was whilst he +was scrambling along the edge of the covert, that he met the Fox, and +very properly rolled himself into a ball. The Fox's nose was as long as +his own, and he rolled my poor son over and over with it, till he +rolled him into the stream. The young urchins swim like fishes, but just +as he was scrambling to shore, the Fox caught him by the waistcoat and +killed him. I do hate slyness! + +Numbers two and three were flitted. I told them so, but young people +will go their own way. They had excellent victuals. + +Number four (my eldest daughter) settled very comfortably in life, and +had a family of three. She might have sent them down to the burdocks to +pick snails quite well, but she would take them out walking with her +instead. They were picked up (all four of them) by two long-legged Irish +boys, who put them into a basket and took them home. I do not think the +young gentlemen meant any harm, for they provided plenty of food, and +took them to bed with them. They set my daughter at liberty next day, +and she spoke very handsomely of the young gentlemen, and said they had +cured the skins with saltpetre, and were stuffing them when she left. +But the subject was always an awkward one. + +Number five is still living. He is the best hand at a fight with a snake +that I know. + +Numbers six and seven went to Covent Garden in a hamper. They say +black-beetles are excellent eating. + +The whole seven had a narrow escape with their lives just after Sybil +left us. They over-ate themselves on snails, and Mrs. Hedgehog had to +stay at home and nurse them. I kept my eye on our neighbours and brought +her the news. + +"Christian has come home," I said, one day. "The Queen has given him a +pardon." + +"Then he _did_ take the pheasants' eggs?" said Mrs. Hedgehog. + +"Certainly not," said I. "In the first place it wasn't eggs, and in the +second place it was Black Basil who took whatever it was, and he has +confessed to it." + +"Then if Christian didn't do it, how is it that he has been forgiven?" +said Mrs. Hedgehog. + +"I can't tell you," said I; "but so it is. And he is at this moment with +the clergywoman and the tinker-mother." + +"Where is Sybil?" asked Mrs. Hedgehog. + +I did not know then, and I am not very clear about her now. I never saw +her again, but either I heard that she had married Black Basil, and that +they had gone across the water to some country where the woods are +bigger than they are here, or I have dreamt it in one of my winter naps. + +I am inclined to think it must be true, because I always regarded Sybil +as somewhat proud and unsociable, and I think she would like a big wood +and very few neighbours. + +But really when one sleeps for several months at a stretch it is not +very easy to be accurate about one's dreams. + +FOOTNOTES: + +Footnote B: _Patteran_ = the gipsy "trail." + +Footnote C: "Poknees," gipsy word for magistrate. + + + + + + +TOOTS AND BOOTS. + + + * * * * * + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +My name is Toots. Why, I have not the slightest idea. But I suppose very +few people--cats or otherwise--are consulted about their own names. If +they were, these would perhaps be, as a rule, more appropriate. + +What qualities of mind or body my name was supposed to illustrate, I +have not to this hour a notion. I distinctly remember the stage of my +kittenhood, when I thought that Toots was the English for cream. + +"Toots! Toots!" my young mistress used to say, in the most suggestive +tones, creeping after me as I would creep after a mouse, with a +saucerful of that delicious liquid in her hand. + +"Toots is first-rate stuff," I used to think, and I purred accordingly, +for I never was an ungrateful cat. + +This was in the dining-room, and in the morning. Later in the day, +"Toots" was served in the drawing-room. It was between these two +periods, I remember, that one day I found myself in the larder. Why I +went there, puzzled me at the time; for if there is anything I hate it +is a chill, and there was a horrid draught through a window pierced with +tiny holes, which seemed to let in a separate blast for every hair of +one's fur. I followed the cook, it is true; but I did not follow the +cook as a rule--not, for instance, when she went out to the coal-hole in +the yard. I had slipped in under her dress. I was behind the potato-tub +when she went out, shutting the door after her. For some mysterious +reason I felt on the tip-claw of expectation. My nose twitched with +agreeable sensations. An inward voice seemed to murmur, _Toots_! +Regardless of the draughts, I sprang on to the shelf close under the +window. And there was such a dish of cream! The saucers in which one got +it at breakfast did not hold a twentieth part of what this brimming pan +contained. As to the five o'clock china, in which visitors give you a +tepid teaspoonful, with bits of old tea-leaves in it--I grinned at the +thought as I drew in tongueful after tongueful of the thick yellow +cream. + +At this moment I heard my young mistress's voice in the distant +passages. + +"Toots, Toots!" said she. + +"I've got plenty," purred I, lifting my head to speak, by a great +effort. + +"Toots, Toots!" she miowed on, for she wasn't much quicker-witted than +the rest of her race. + +"No, thank you," thought I; "and if you want five o'clock toots for +yourself, I advise you to come here for it." I thought this, but speak I +really could not--I was too busy lapping. + +It was delicious stuff! But when the dish was about three-parts empty, I +began to feel as if I had had a good deal, and to wish I had more +appetite for the rest. "It's a shame to leave it, though," I thought, +"when a few more laps will empty the dish." For I come of an ancient and +rough-tongued cat family, who always lick their platters clean. So I set +to work again, though the draught was most annoying, and froze the cream +to butter on my whiskers. + +I was polishing the glazed earthenware with the family skill, when I +became conscious that the house was resounding to the cry of "Toots!" + +"Toots, Toots!" squeaked the housemaid, in the servants' hall. + +"Toots, Toots!" growled the elderly butler, in the pantry. + +"Toots, Toots, cock-a-Toots!" yelled that intolerable creature, the +Macaw. + +"Toots, Toots!" snapped the cook. + +"Miow," said I; for I had finished the cream, and could speak now, +though I confess I did not feel equal to any great exertion. + +The cook opened the door. She found me--she did not find the cream, +which she had left in the dish ready for whipping. + +Perhaps it was because she had no cream to whip, that she tried to whip +me. Certainly, during the next half-hour, I had reason to be much +confused as to the meaning of the word "Toots." In the soft voice of my +mistress it had always seemed to me to mean cream; now it seemed to mean +kicks, blows, flapping dish-cloths, wash-leathers and dusters, pokers, +carpet brooms, and every instrument of torture with which a poor cat +could be chased from garret to cellar. I am pretty nimble, and though I +never felt less disposed for violent exercise, I flatter myself I led +them a good dance before, by a sudden impulse of affectionate +trustfulness, I sprang straight into my mistress's arms for shelter. + +"You must beat him, miss," gasped the cook, "or there'll never be no +bearing him in the house. Every drop of that lovely cream gone, and half +the sweets for the ball supper throwed completely out of calculation!" + +"Naughty Toots, naughty Toots, naughty Toots!" cried the young lady, +and with every "Toots" she gave me a slap; but as her paws had no claws +in them, I was more offended than hurt. + +This was my first lesson in honesty, and it was also the beginning of +that train of reasoning in my own mind, by which I came to understand +that when people called "Toots" they meant me. And as--to do them +justice--they generally called me with some kind intention, I made a +point of responding to my name. + +Indeed, they were so kind to me, and my position was such a very +comfortable one, that when a lean tabby called one day for a charitable +subscription, and begged me to contribute a few spare partridge bones to +a fund for the support of starving cats in the neighbourhood, who had +been deserted by families leaving town, I said that really such cases +were not much in my line. There is a great deal of imposition +about--perhaps the cats had stolen the cream, and hadn't left off +stealing it when they were chased by the family. I doubted if families +where the cats deserved respect and consideration ever did leave town. +One has so many calls, if one once begins to subscribe to things; and I +am particularly fond of partridge. + +But when, a few months later, the very words which the lean tabby had +spoken passed between the butler and the cook in reference to our own +household, and I learnt that "the family" were going "to leave town," I +felt a pang of conscience, and wished I had subscribed the merry +thought, or even the breast-bone--there was very little on it--to the +Deserted Cats' Fund. + +But it was my young mistress who told me (with regrets and caresses, +which in the circumstances were mere mockery) that I was to be left +behind. + +I have a particularly placid temper, and can adapt myself pretty +comfortably to the ups and downs of life; but this news made my tail +stand on end. + +"Poor dear Toots!" said my mistress, kissing my nose, and tickling me +gently under the ear, as if she were saying the prettiest things +possible. "I am _so_ sorry! I don't know _what_ we are to do with you! +But we are going abroad, and we _can't_ take you, you dear old thing! +We've such heaps of luggage, and such lots of servants, and no end of +things that _must_ go! But I _can't bear to think_ of you left behind!" + +"No," said I indignantly; "that's just it, and the people at number ten, +and number fourteen, and number twenty-five, couldn't bear to think what +would become of their cats, so they went away and didn't think about it. +They couldn't bear to see them die, so they didn't give them a dose of +quick poison, but left them to die of starvation, when they weren't +there to see. You're a heartless, selfish race, you human beings, and I +suspect that Mrs. Tabby is not the only shabby-looking, true-hearted +soul, who has to pester people for subscriptions to patch up the dreary +end of existence for deserted pets, when caressing days are over. Fuff!" + +And I jumped straight out of her arms, and whisked through the +dining-room window. For some time I strolled thoughtfully along the top +of the area railings. I rather hoped I might see Mrs. Tabby. I wondered +how her subscription list was getting on. I felt all the difference +between a lady's interest in a Reduced Gentlewomen's Benevolent +Institution or a Poor Annuitants' Home, when she is well and wealthy, +and the same lady's interest when some turn of Misfortune's wheel has +left her "dependent on her own exertions." It seemed that I was to be +left dependent on my own exertions--and my thoughts turned naturally to +Mrs. Tabby and the Deserted Cats' Fund. + +But not a sign of the good creature! At this moment a hansom cab rattled +up, and a gentleman got out and rang our front-door bell. As he got out +of the cab, I jumped down from the railings, and rubbed against his +legs--he had very long legs. + +"Halloa, Toots! is that you?" said he in a kindly voice, which had +always had attractions for me, and which in my present mood was +particularly grateful. His hat was set well on the back of his head, and +I could clearly see the friendly expression of his countenance. Suddenly +he tilted it over his nose, which I have observed that he is apt to do +when struck by a new idea. "Toots!" said he abruptly, "what are they +going to do with you?" + +Blessings on this kind of friend! say I; the friend who will encumber +himself with the responsibility of thinking what's to become of you, +when you are down in the world. Those tender-hearted souls who can't +bear to think of your misfortunes are a much more numerous part of one's +acquaintance. + +A ray of hope began to dawn upon me. Perhaps a new and an even more +luxurious home was to be offered for my acceptance. In what foolish +panic had I begun to identify myself with the needy classes of society? +A cat of my stripes and style! Once more I thought of benevolent +institutions from a patronizing point of view. But I would be a patron, +and a generous one. The shock _had_ done so much! And the next time Mrs. +Tabby called I would _pick out a lot of my best bones for the Fund_. + +Meanwhile, I went back to the railings, and from these took a flying +leap, and perched myself on the gentleman's shoulder. I could hardly +have managed it from the ground, he had such very long legs. + +I think, by the bye, that I have mentioned this before. I do not wish to +repeat myself, or to dwell on my grievance, though, if his legs had been +shorter, his riding-boots would not have been so long, and I might at +this moment know what became of--but I must not forestall my story. + +I jumped on to the gentleman's shoulder. In doing so, I knocked his hat +over one eye. But I have seen it so since then, and he made no +complaint. The man-servant opened the door, and we went into the house +together. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +I flatter myself that my head is not remarkable for size and beauty +alone. I am a cat of mind, and I made it up at once as to the course of +conduct to pursue. + +I am also a cat with some powers of observation, and I have observed +that two things go a long way with men--flattery and persistence. Also +that the difficulty of coaxing them is not in direct proportion to their +size--rather the reverse. Another thing that I have observed is, that +if you want to be well-treated, or have a favour to ask, it is a great +thing to have a good coat on your back in good order. + +How many a human being has sleeked the rich softness of my magnificent +tiger skin, and then said, in perfect good faith, "How Toots enjoys +being stroked!" + +"How you enjoy the feel of my fur, you mean," I am tempted to say. But I +do not say it. It doesn't do to disturb the self-complacency of people +who have the control of the milk-jug. + +Having made up my mind to coax the gentleman into adopting me, I devoted +myself entirely to him for the evening, and ignored the rest of the +party, as serenely as a cat knows how. Again and again did he put me +down with firm, but not ungentle hands, saying--"Go down, Toots," and +pick stray hairs in a fidgety manner off his dress-trousers; and again +and again did I return to his shoulder (where he couldn't see the hairs) +and purr in his ear, and rub my long whiskers against his short ones. + +But it was not till he was comfortably established in an arm-chair by +the drawing-room fire, round which the rest of the family were also +seated, that the charm began to work. + +"How devoted Toots is to you!" purred the ladies, after an ineffectual +effort on my part to share the arm-chair. + +"You're a very foolish Toots," said the gentleman. (I was back on his +shoulder by this time.) + +"Toots, you've deserted me," said my young mistress. "I'm quite +jealous," she added. + +"Toots, you brute!" cried the gentleman, seizing me in both hands. +"Where's your good taste, and your gratitude? Go to your mistress, sir," +and he threw me into her lap. But I sprang back to his shoulder with one +leap. + +"It's really most extraordinary," said one lady. + +"And Toots never goes to strangers as a rule," added my mistress. + +Everybody is proud of being _exceptionally_ favoured. It was this last +stroke, I am convinced, that rubbed him the right way. A gratified +blandness pervaded his countenance. He made no further attempts to +dislodge me, and I settled myself into the angles of his shoulder and +affected to go to sleep. + +"What are you going to do with him?" he asked, crossing one long leg +over the other with a convulsive abruptness very trying to my balance, +and to the strength of the arm-chair. + +Both the ladies began to mew. They were _so_ sorry to leave me behind, +but it was _quite_ impossible to take me. They couldn't bear to think of +my being unhappy, and didn't know where in the world to find me a home. + +"I wish _you_ would take him!" said my mistress. + +I listened breathlessly for the gentleman's reply. + +"Pets are not in the least in my line," he said. "I am a bachelor, you +know, of very tidy habits. I dislike trouble, and have a rooted +objection to encumbrances." + +"We hear you have a pet mouse, though," said my mistress. He laughed +awkwardly. + +"My dear young lady, I never said that my practice always squared with +my principles. Helpless and troublesome creatures have sometimes an +insinuating way with them, which forms an additional reason for avoiding +them, especially if one is weak-minded. And----" + +"And you _have_ a pet mouse?" + +He sat suddenly upright with another jerk, which nearly shot me into the +fire-place, and said, + +"I'll tell you about it, for upon my word I wish you could see the +little beggar. It was one afternoon when I came in from riding, that I +found a mouse sitting on the fender. I could only see his back, with the +tail twitching, and I noticed that a piece had been bitten out of his +left ear. The little wretch must have heard me quite well, but he sat on +as if the place belonged to him. + +"'You're pretty cool!' I said; and being rather the reverse myself, I +threw the Queen's Regulations at him, and he disappeared. But it +bothered me, for I hate mice in one's quarters. You never know what +mischief they mayn't be doing. You put valuable papers carefully away, +and the next time you go to the cupboard, they are reduced to shreds. +The little brutes take the lining of your slippers to line their nests. +They keep you awake at night--in short, they're detestable. But I am not +fond of killing things myself, though I've a sort of a conscience about +knowing how it's done. I don't like leaving necessary executions to +servants. As to mice, you know--poisoning is out of the question, on +sanitary grounds. 'Catch-'em-alive' traps are like a policeman who +catches a pickpocket--all the trouble of the prosecution is to come; and +as to the traps with springs and spikes--my man set one in my bedroom +once, and in the middle of the night the mouse was caught. For nearly an +hour I doubt if I was much the happier of the two. Every moment I +thought the poor wretch would stop screaming, for I had ordered the trap +in the belief that death was instantaneous. At last I jumped up, and put +the whole concern into my tub and held it under water. The poor beast +was dead in six seconds. A catch-'em-alive trap and a tub of water is +the most merciful death, I fancy; but I am rather in favour of letting +one animal kill another. It seems more natural, and _fairer_. They have +a run for their lives, so to speak." + +"And who did you get to kill your mouse?" + +"Well, I know a youngster who has a terrier. They are a perfect pair. As +like as two peas, and equally keen about sport--they would go twenty +miles to chase a bluebottle round an attic, sooner than not hunt +something. So I told him there was a mouse _de trop_ in my rooms, and he +promised to bring Nipper next morning. I was going out hunting myself. + +"The meet was early, and my man got breakfast at seven o'clock for me in +my own quarters; and the first thing I saw when I came out of my bedroom +was the mouse sitting on the edge of my Indian silver sugar-basin. I +knew him again by his ear. And there he sat all breakfast-time, +twitching his tail, and nibbling little bits of sugar, and watching me +with such a pair of eyes! Have you ever seen a mouse's eyes close? Upon +my word, they are wonderfully beautiful, and it's uncommonly difficult +to hurt a creature with fine eyes. I didn't touch it, and as I was going +out I looked back, and _the mouse was looking after me_. I was a fool +for looking back, for I can't stand a pitiful expression in man or +beast, and it put an end to Nipper's sport, and left me with a mouse in +my quarters--a thing I hate. I didn't like to say I'd changed my mind +about killing the mouse, but I wrote to Nipper's master, and said I +wouldn't trouble him to come up for such a trifling matter." + +"So the mouse was safe?" + +"Well, _I_ thought so. But the young fellow (who is very good-natured) +wrote back to say it was no trouble whatever, and the letter lay on my +mantel-piece till I came home and found that he and Nipper had broken a +chair-leg, and two china plates." + +"_Did_ they kill the mouse?" + +"Well, no. But I nearly killed Nipper in saving him; and the little +rascal has lived with me ever since." + +The ladies seemed highly delighted with this anecdote, but, for my own +part, I felt feverish to the tips of my claws, as I thought of the +miserable creature who had usurped the place I wished to fill, and who +might be the means of my having to fall back after all on the Deserted +Cats' Fund. What bungling puss had had him under her paws, and allowed +him to escape with a torn ear and the wariness of experience? Let me but +once catch sight of that twitching tail!---- + +At this moment the gentleman got up, stretched his long---- + +But I will _not_ allude to them! It annoys me as much as the thought of +that bungling cat, or of Nipper's baulked attempt. He put up his hands +and lifted me from his shoulder, and my heart sank as he said, "If I am +to catch my train, I fear I must say good-bye." + +I believe that, in this hopeless crisis, my fur as usual was in my +favour. He rubbed his cheek against mine before putting me down, and +then said, "And you've not told me, after all, where poor Toots is +really going." + +"We have not found a home for him yet, I assure you," said my mistress. +"Our washerwoman wants him, and she is a most kind-hearted and +respectable person, but she has got nine children, and----" + +"Nine children!" ejaculated my friend, "My poor Toots, there will not be +an inch of that magnificent tail of yours left at the end of a week. +What cruelty to animals! Upon my word, I'd almost rather take Toots +myself, than think of him with a washerwoman and nine children. Eh, +Toots! would you like to come?" + +I was on the carpet, rubbing against his--yes, long or short, they were +_his_, and he was kind to me!--rubbing, I say, against his legs. I could +get no impetus for a spring, but I scrambled straight up him as one +would scramble up a tree (my grandmother was a bird-catcher of the first +talent, and I inherit her claws), and uttered one pitiful mew. + +The gentleman gave a short laugh, and took me into his arms. + +"Oh, _how_ good of you! Jones shall get a hamper," cried the ladies. But +he shook his head. + +"Three of the fourteen parcels I've got to pick up at the station are +hampers. I wouldn't have another on my mind for a fortune. If Toots +comes at all, he must come like a Christian and look after himself." + +I will not dwell on our departure. It was a sadly flurried one, for a +cat of my temperament. The ladies saw us off, and as my young mistress +covered me with farewell kisses, I felt an unquestionable pang of +regret. But one has to repress one's affections, and consider one's +prospects in life, if one does not want to come upon the Deserted Cats' +Fund! + +My master put his hat on the back of his head on the steps, and knocked +it off in shouting through a hole in the roof of the cab that we were to +drive like the wind, as we were late. At the last moment several things +were thrown in after us. A parcel of books he had lent the young lady, +and a pair of boots he had left behind on some former occasion. The +books were very neatly packed, and addressed, but the boots came "like +Christians, and looked after themselves." And through all, I clung fast, +and blessed the inherited vigour of my grandmother's claws. + +At the parcels office, I certainly risked nine lives among the fourteen +parcels which were dragged and pitched, and turned over in every +direction; but though he paid me no other attention, my master never +forgot to put back a hand to help me when we moved on. Eventually we +found ourselves alone in a very comfortable carriage, and I suppose the +fourteen packages were safe too, thanks to the desperate struggles of +five porters, who went off clutching their paws as if they were +satisfied with the result. + +After incommoding me for some time by rustling newspapers, and making +spasmodic struggles to find a posture that suited him, my master found +one at last and fell asleep, and I crept up to the velvet collar of his +great-coat and followed his example. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +I like living with bachelors. They have comfortable chairs, and keep +good fires. They don't put water into the tea-pot: they call the +man-servant and send for more tea. They don't give you a table-spoonful +of cream, fidgeting and looking round to see if anybody else wants it: +one of them turns the jug upside-down into your saucer, and before +another can lay hold of it and say, "Halloa! The milk's all gone,"--you +have generally had time to lap it up under the table. + +I prefer men's outsides, too, to women's in some respects. Why all human +beings--since they have no coats of their own, and are obliged to buy +them--do not buy handsomely marked furs whilst they are about it, is a +puzzle to a cat. As to the miserable stuff ladies cover themselves with +in an evening, there is about as much comfort and softness in it as in +going to sleep on a duster. Men's coats are nothing to boast of, either +to look at or to feel, but they _are_ thicker. If you happen to clutch a +little with gratification or excitement, your claws don't go through; +and they don't squeak like a mouse in a trap and call you treacherous +because their own coats are thin. + +I was very comfortable in my new home. My master was exceedingly kind to +me, and he has a fearless and friendly way of tickling one's toes which +is particularly agreeable, and not commonly to be met with. + +Yes, my life was even more luxurious than before. It is so still. To +eat, drink, and sleep, to keep oneself warm, and in good condition, and +to pay proper attention to one's personal appearance; that is all one +has to do in a life like mine in bachelors' quarters. + +One has unpleasant dreams sometimes. I think my tea is occasionally too +strong, though I have learned to prefer it to milk, and my master +always gives it to me in his own saucer. If he has friends to tea, they +give me some in their saucers. One can't refuse, but I fancy too much +tea is injurious to the nerves. + +The night before last, I positively dreamed that I was deserted. I +fancied that I was chased along a housetop, and fell from the gutter. +Down--down--but I woke up on the bear-skin before the fire, as our +man-servant was bringing in candles. + +It made me wonder how Mrs. Tabby was getting on. I had never done +anything further in that matter; but really when one's life goes in a +certain groove, and everything one can wish for is provided in +abundance, one never seems to have time for these things. It is +wonderful how energetic some philanthropic people are. I dare +say they like the fuss. (I can't endure fuss!) And Mrs. Tabby's +appearance--excellent creature!--would probably make her feel +ill-at-ease in bachelor quarters, if we could change places. Her fur is +really almost mangy, and she has nothing to speak of in the way of a +tail. But she is a worthy soul. And some day, when the Captain and I are +going to town without much luggage--or if she should happen to be +collecting in the country,--I will certainly _look up a few of my worst +bones for the Fund_. + +I really hesitate to approach the subject of my one source of +discontent. It seems strange that there should be any crook in a lot so +smooth as ours. Plenty to eat and drink, handsome coats, no +encumbrances, and a temperament naturally inclined--at least, in my +case--towards taking life easy. And yet, as I lay stretched full-length +down one of my master's knees the other night, before a delicious fire, +and after such a saucerful of creamy tea which he could not drink +himself--I kept waking up with uncomfortable starts, fancying I saw on +the edge of the fender--but I will tell the matter in proper order. + +I turned round to get my back to it, but I thought of it all the same; +and as every hair of my moustaches twitched, with the vexation of my +thoughts, I observed that my master was pulling and biting at his, and +glaring at the fire as if _he_ expected to see--however, I do not +trouble myself about the crumples in _his_ rose-leaves. He is big enough +to take care of himself. My own grievance I will state plainly and at +once. It may be a relief to my mind, which I sometimes fear will be +unhinged by dwelling on the thought of--but to begin. + +It will easily be understood that after my arrival at my new home, I +waited anxiously for the appearance of the mouse; but it will hardly be +credited by any one who knows me, or who knew my grandmother, that I saw +it and _let it escape me_. It was seated on the sugar-basin, just as the +Captain had described it. The torn ear, the jerking tail, the bright +eyes--all were there. + +If this story falls into the paws of any young cat who wishes to avoid +the mortifications which have embittered my favoured existence, let me +warn him to remember that a creature who has lived on friendly terms +with human beings cannot be judged by common rules. Many a mouse's eye +as bright as this one had I seen, but hitherto never one that did not +paralyze before my own. + +He looked at me--I looked at him. His tail jerked--mine responded. Our +whiskers twitched--joy filled my brain to intoxication--I crept--I +crouched--I sprang-- + +He was not spell-bound--he did not even run away. With a cool twinkle of +that hateful eye, and one twitch of the ragged ear, he just overbalanced +the silver sugar-pot and dropped to the ground, the basin and sugar +falling on the top of him with a crash which made me start against my +will. I think that start just baulked the lightning flash of my second +leap, and he was gone--absolutely gone. To add insult to injury, my +master ran in from his bedroom and shouted--"Stealing, Toots? confound +you, you've knocked down my sugar-pot," and threw both his hair-brushes +at me. + +_I_ steal?--and, worse still, _I_ knock down anything, who have walked +among three dozen wine-glasses, on a shelf in the butler's pantry, +without making them jingle! But I must be calm, for there is more to +tell. + +The mouse never returned. It was something, but it was not enough. My +pride had been deeply hurt, and it demanded revenge. At last I felt it +almost a grievance that I _did_ reign supreme in the Captain's quarters, +that the mouse did not come back--and let me catch him. + +Besides our in-door man, my master had an Irish groom, and the groom had +a place (something between a saddle-room and a scullery) where _he_ said +he "kept what the master required," but where, the master said, Terence +kept what was not wanted, and lost what was. + +There certainly were, to my knowledge, fifteen empty Day and Martin's +blacking-bottles in one corner, for I used occasionally to walk over +them to keep my feet in practice, and it was in this room that Terence +last had conscious possession of the hunting-breeches which were never +seen after the Captain's birthday, when Terence threw the clothes-brush +after me, because I would not drink the master's health in whisky, and +had to take the cleanest of the shoe brushes to his own coat, which was +dusty from lying in the corn-chest. + +But he was a good-natured creature, and now and then, for a change, I +followed him into the saddle-room. I am thankful to say I have never +caught mice except for amusement, and a cat of daintier tastes does not +exist. But one has inherited instincts--and the musty, fusty, mousey +smell of the room did excite me a little. Besides, I practised my steps +among the blacking-bottles. + +I was on the top of the most tottering part of the pile one afternoon, +when I saw a pair of bead-like eyes, and--yes, I could swear to it--a +torn ear. But before I could spring to the ground they had vanished +behind the corn-chest. + +This was how it came about that when the Captain's room was cosiest, and +he and his friends were kindest, I used to steal away from luxuries +which are dear to every fibre of my constitution, and pat hastily down +to the dirty hole, where Terence accumulated old rubbish and misused and +mislaid valuables--in the wild hope that I might hear, smell, or see the +ragged-eared enemy of my peace. + +What hours I have wasted, now blinking with sleep, now on the alert at +sounds like the revelries of mocking mice. + +When I say that I have even risked wet feet, on a damp afternoon, to get +there--every cat will understand how wild must have been the +infatuation! + +I tried to reason myself out of it. "Toots," I would say, "you banished +him from your master's room, and you have probably banished him from +Terence's. Why pursue the matter farther? So pitiful an object is +unworthy of your revenge." + +"Very true," I would reply to myself, "but I want a turn in the air. +I'll just step down as far as the saddle-room once more, and make myself +finally comfortable by looking behind the old barrel. I don't think I +went quite round it." + +There is no delusion so strong when it besets you, or so complete a +failure in its results--as the hope of getting relief from an +infatuation by indulging it once more. It grows worse every time. + +One day I was stealing away as usual, when I caught my master's eye with +a peculiar expression in it. He was gnawing his moustaches too. I am +very fond of him, and I ran back to the chair and looked up and mewed, +for I wanted to know what was the matter. + +"You're a curious cat, Toots," said he; "but I suppose you're only like +the rest of the world. I did think you did care a little bit for me. +It's only the cream, is it, old fellow? As a companion, you prefer +Terence? Eh? Well, off with you!" + +But I need hardly say that I would not leave him. It was no want of love +for him that led me to the saddle-room. I was not base enough to forget +that he had been my friend in need, even if he had been less amiable to +me since. All that evening I lay on his breast and slept. _But I dreamt +of the mouse!_ + +The next morning he went out riding. + +"He will not miss me now," thought I. "I will devote the morning to +hunting through that wretched room inch by inch, for the last time. It +will satisfy me that the mouse is not there, and it really is a duty to +try and convince myself of this, that I may be cured of an infatuation +which causes annoyance to so excellent a master." + +I hurried off as rapidly as befitted the vigour of the resolution, and +when I got into the saddle-room I saw the mouse. And when the mouse saw +me he fled like the wind. + +I confess that I should have lost him then, but that a hole on which he +had reckoned was stopped up, and he had to turn. + +What a chase it was! Never did I meet his equal for audacity and +fleetness. But I knew the holes as well as he did, and cut him off at +every one. Round and round we went--behind the barrel, over the +corn-chest, and then he made for the middle of the room. + +Now, amongst all the rubbish which Terence had collected about him, +there were many old articles of clothing belonging to the Captain, +including a pair of long riding-boots, which had been gathering mildew, +and stiffening out of shape in their present position ever since I came. +One of these was lying on the floor; and just as I was all but upon the +mouse, he darted into the boot. + +A quiver of delight ran through me. With all his unwonted sagacity, +Master Mouse had run straight into a trap. The boot was wide, and head +and shoulders I plunged in after my prey. + +I scented him all the way down the leg, but the painful fact is that I +could not quite get to the bottom. He must have crouched in the toe or +heel, and I could get no farther than the calf. Oh, if my master's legs +had but been two inches shorter! I should have clawed into the remotest +corner of the foot. As it was, I pushed, I struggled, I shook, I worried +the wretched boot--but all in vain. + +Only when I was all but choked did I withdraw my head for a gasp of +fresh air. And there was the Captain himself, yelling with laughter, and +sprawling all over the place in convulsions of unseemly merriment, with +those long legs which--but they are not his fault, poor man! + + * * * * * + +That is my story--an unfinished tale, of which I do not myself know the +end. This is the one crook in my luxurious lot--that I cannot see the +last of that mouse. + +Happily, I don't think that my master any longer misunderstands my +attachment to the saddle-room. The other day, he sat scribbling for a +long time with a pencil and paper, and when he had done it, he threw the +sketch to me and said, "There, Toots, look at that, and you will see +what became of your friend!" + +It was civilly meant, and I append the sketch for the sake of those whom +it may inform. I do not understand pictures myself. + +Those boots have a strange fascination for me now. I sit for hours by +the mouth of the one where he went in and never came back. Not the +faintest squeak from its recesses has ever stirred the sensitive hairs +of my watchful ear. He must be starving, but not a nibble of the leather +have I heard. I doze, but I am ever on the alert. Nightmares +occasionally disturb me. I fancy I see him, made desperate by hunger, +creep anxiously to the mouth of the boot, pricking his tagged ear. Once +I had a terrible vision of his escaping, and of his tail as it vanished +round the corner. + +But these are dreams. He has never returned, I suspect that the truth +is, that he had a fit from fright, in the toe of the boot, and is dead. +Some day Terence will shake out his skeleton. + +It grows very cold. This place is full of draughts, and the floor is +damp. + +He _must_ be dead. He never could have lasted so long without a move or +a nibble. + +And it is tea-time. I think I shall join the Captain. + +[Illustration] + + + + +THE HENS OF HENCASTLE. + +(_Translated from the German of_ VICTOR BLUeTHGEN.) + + + +What a hot, drowsy afternoon it was. + +The blazing sun shone with such a glare upon the farmyard that it was +almost unbearable, and there was not a vestige of grass or any green +thing to relieve the eye or cast a little shade. + +But the fowls in the back yard were not disturbed by the heat the least +bit in the world, for they had plenty of time in which to doze, and they +were fond of taking a _siesta_ in the hottest place that could be found. +Certainly the hottest place that afternoon, by far, was the yard in +which they reposed. + +There were five of them--a cock and four hens. Two of the hens were +renowned throughout the whole village, for they wore tufts of feathers +on their heads instead of the usual red combs; and the cock was very +proud of having such distinguished-looking wives. + +Besides which, he was naturally a very stately bird himself in +appearance, and had a splendid blackish-green tail and a golden speckled +hackle, which shone and glistened in the sun. He had also won many sharp +battles with certain young cocks in the neighbourhood, whom curiosity +about the tufted foreigners had attracted to the yard. The consequence +of these triumphs was that he held undisputed dominion as far as the +second fence from the farmyard, and whenever he shut his eyes and +sounded his war-clarion, the whole of his rivals made off as fast as +wings and legs could carry them. + +So the five sat or stood by themselves in the yard, dozing in the +sunshine, and they felt bored. + +During the middle of the day they had managed to get some winks of +sleep, but now the farmer's men began to thresh in a barn close by, +making noise enough to wake the dead, so there was small chance of +well-organized fowls being able to sleep through the din. + +"I wish some one would tell a story," said one of the common hens, as +she ruffled all her feathers up on end, and then shook them straight +again, for coolness. "I am tired of scrabbling in the dust, and +fly-catching is an amusement only suited to sparrows and such vulgar +birds." + +This was a hit at one of the foreign hens, who had wandered away a +little and was pecking at flies on the wall. The two common hens were +very fond of vexing the foreign ones, for their feelings were hurt at +being reckoned less beautiful and rare. + +The tufted fair one heard the remark, and called out spitefully from a +distance: "If certain people were not ignorant country bumpkins, they +would be able to tell a good story themselves." + +"That remark can't apply to me, for I know a great number of stories," +replied the common hen, turning her head on one side to show her +contempt. "For instance: once upon a time there was a hen who laid +nothing but soft-shelled eggs--" + +"You can't mean _me_ by that story," said the tufted one, "for I have +only laid one soft-shelled egg in my whole life. So there! But do tell +me how your interesting story ends--I am so anxious to hear the end." + +"You know that best yourself," retorted the other. + +"Now I'm sure, dear Father Cock, you could tell us something really +amusing if you would be so kind," said the second common hen, who was +standing near him. "Those two make one's life a burthen, with their +everlasting wrangling and bickering." + +"Hush!" said the cock, who was standing motionless with one leg in the +air, an attitude he often assumed when any very hard thinking had to be +done; "I was just trying to recollect one." + +After a pause, he said in a solemn voice: "I will tell you the terrible +tale of the troubles of 'The Hens of Hencastle.' + +"Once upon a time--it was the village fair week, when, as you know, +every one eats and drinks as much as he possibly can, and consequently a +great many animals are killed,--the farmer's cook came into the +fowlyard, and after carefully looking over all the chickens, remarked +that seven of them would be twisting merrily on the spit next morning. +On hearing this, all the fowls were plunged into the deepest despair, +for no one felt sure that he would not be of the seven, and no one could +guess how the victims would be chosen. Two young cockerels, in their +deep perplexity, at last went to the yard-dog, Flaps by name, who was a +very great friend of theirs, and to him they cackled out their woes. + +"'Why do you stop here?' asked Flaps. 'If you had any pluck at all you +would run away.' + +"'Ah! Perhaps so--but who has enough courage for such a desperate step?' +sighed the young cockerels. 'Why, you yourself are no more courageous +than we, else why do you stop here chained up all day, and allow those +tiresome children to come and tease you?' + +"'Well,' replied the dog, 'I earn a good livelihood by putting up with +these small discomforts, and besides that, _I_ am not going to be set +twisting on a spit. However, if you particularly wish it, we can go +away somewhere together; but if we do, I may as well tell you at once, +that you will have to feed me.' + +"The cockerels, fired by this bold advice, betook themselves at once to +the henroost with the courage of young lions; and after a short but +animated discussion, persuaded the whole of the cocks and hens to run +away and to take Flaps as protector of the community. + +"When darkness fell, the dog was unchained for the night as usual, and +as soon as the coast seemed clear, he went to the henhouse, pushed back +the sliding door with his nose, and let them all out. + +"Then he and the whole company stole away as quietly as possible through +the yard-gate, away out into the open country. + +"The fowls flew and wandered on, the livelong night, perfectly happy in +their freedom, and feeding themselves from the sheaves of corn that +stood in the stubble-fields. + +"Whenever Flaps felt hungry, the hens laid him a couple of eggs or so +which he found far nicer than barley-meal and dog-biscuit. + +"When they passed through thinly-populated places where they were not +likely to be observed, they marched gaily forward; but whenever there +was a chance of danger, they only travelled by night. + +"Meanwhile the cook went early in the morning to kill the chickens; but +on finding the whole place as empty as Mother Hubbard's cupboard, she +fell into a violent fit of hysterics, and the kitchen-maid and pig-boy +had to put her under the pump, and work it hard for a quarter of an hour +before they could revive her. + +"After some days' journeying, the wanderers arrived at a large +desolate-looking heath, in the middle of which stood an old +weather-beaten house, apparently uninhabited. Flaps was sent forward to +examine it, and he searched from garret to cellar without finding a +trace of a human being. The fowls then examined the neighbourhood for +two whole days and nights with a like result, and so they determined to +take up their abode in the dwelling. + +"In they trooped, and set themselves to work to turn it into a strong +castle, well fortified against all danger. They stopped up the holes and +cracks with tufts of grass, and piled a wall of big and little stones +right round the house. When the repairs were completed they called it +Hencastle. + +"During the autumn some of the fowls ventured forth into the cornfields +that lay near the haunts of men, and collected a store of grain to +supply them with food during the winter. They kept it on the floor of a +loft, and when spring came they sowed the remainder of the stock in a +field, where it produced such an abundant crop that they had plenty of +provisions for the following winter. + +"Thus they lived a peaceful and happy life, which was so uneventful that +it has no history; and Mark, the watchman, who always stood on the +coping-stone of the highest chimney to act as sentinel, used constantly +to fall asleep, partly from sheer boredom, and partly from the combined +effects of old age, good living, and having nothing on earth to do. +Flaps, too, who had undertaken to guard the castle against intruders, +and who at first used to patrol the house carefully inside and out every +night, soon came to the conclusion that the game was not worth the +candle. + +"One chilly evening, about the time of the first snows, when the wind +was beginning to whistle over the heath and make strange noises in the +castle, two old hens were up in the loft having a chat and picking up a +few stray grains of corn for supper. All of a sudden they heard a +mysterious 'Piep.' 'Hollo!' said one, 'what's that? no one can be +hatching out at this time of the year--it's impossible; yet surely +something said "Piep" down there in the corner.' + +"Just then another 'Piep' was heard. + +"'I don't think it sounds _quite_ like a young chicken,' replied the +other hen. + +"In the middle of their discussion on this knotty point, they descried +a couple of mice at the edge of the corn-heap. One of them was sitting +on his hind-legs, washing his ears and whiskers with his fore-paws, but +his wife was gobbling up corn at a rapid rate, and in this sight the +wise and far-seeing old hens discerned the probability of future +troubles. + +"'Hollo there! that's our corn,' they cried; 'you mustn't steal it. Of +course you may have a few grains in the depth of winter to keep you from +starving; but remember, when spring comes again, this sort of thing must +stop, and you must go away and never come here any more.' + +"'Piep,' said the mice, and vanished. + +"The two hens told the rest what had happened, but nobody troubled +themselves about such an insignificant matter, and some said that the +poor old things made mountains out of molehills. Anyhow, in two days +everybody, including the wise hens themselves, had forgotten all about +it. Later on, that winter, the mice had seven young ones--seven such +skinny, thread-limbed, beady-eyed little beasts that no one noticed +their arrival. + +"Very soon after, almost before any hen had time to look round or think, +behold! mice were squeaking in every corner, and there were holes behind +every wainscot, plank, and rafter. + +"A year passed away, and when winter returned again the mice came and +took the stored corn away in such quantities that everybody saw none +would be left to sow in the spring. + +"Matters had come to a crisis; many and anxious discussions were held +amongst the fowls, for good counsel was a thing much sought after at +Hencastle. + +"At first they took very energetic measures, and many a mouse fell a +victim to a well-aimed peck from a cock's beak; but alas! the mice took +energetic measures also, and resisted to the death, so that many a +fowl's leg was bitten to the bone. Much had been said, and much was +done, but the mice were more numerous than before. + +"The commonwealth then decided on sending three experienced cocks out +into the world, to try and find some means for getting rid of the plague +of mice. + +"The cocks journeyed for one whole day without finding anything to help +them in their trouble, but towards evening they came to a wild, rocky +mountainside, full of caves and clefts, and made up their minds to stay +there for the night; so they crept into a hole under a ledge of rock, +put their heads under their wings, and went to sleep. + +"In the middle of the night they were roused by the sound of flapping +wings, followed by a whispering voice, saying, 'whish--ish,' which soon +broke out into a loud 'Whoo--hoo! whoo--hoo!' They popped their heads +out of the hole to see what was the matter, and they perceived a great +owl sitting on a stump, flapping its wings up and down, and rolling its +great round eyes about, which glared like red-hot coals in its head. + +"'Mice here! Mice here! Whoo--hoo!' it shrieked. + +"On hearing this the cocks nudged one another, and said, 'We are in +luck's way at last.' Then as the owl still continued to call for mice, +one of them plucked up courage and addressed it: 'If you will only come +with us, sir, you shall have as many mice as you can eat--a whole +house-full, if you like.' + +"'Who may you be?' hissed the owl, and glared with its fiery eyes into +the cleft. + +"'We come from Hencastle, where there are hundreds of mice, who devour +our corn day and night. + +"'Whoo--hoo! I'll come, I'll come,' screamed the owl, snapping its beak +with pleasure. + +"In the grey of the dawn the fowls sat on the roof-tree, listening to +Mark, the watchman, who stood on the top of, his chimney, and cried, + + "'What do I see? + Here come the three! + And with them, I reckon, + A bird with no neck on.' + +"Thereupon the owl and the three messengers flew up with a rush to the +top of the castle. + +"'Ha! ha! I smell mice,' shrieked the new comer, and dashed through a +hole in the roof, from whence it shortly reappeared with a mouse in its +claws. + +"This sight filled all the fowls with joy; and as they sat on the edge +of the roof in a row, they nudged each other, and remarked, + +"'This has indeed been a happy venture.' + +"For a few days everything went as smoothly as possible, but after a +time the mice began to find out that the owl could only see really well +at night, that it saw badly by day, and hardly at all when the midday +sun was shining through the window into the loft. So they only came out +at noon, and then dragged enough corn away into their holes to last them +till the following day. + +"One night the owl did not catch a single mouse, and so, being very +hungry, drove its beak into some hen's eggs that lay in a corner, and +ate them. Finding them more to its taste than the fattest mouse, and +much less trouble to catch, henceforth the owl gave up mouse-hunting, +and took to egg-poaching. This the fowls presently discovered, and the +three wise cocks were sent to tell the owl to go away, as it was no +longer of use to anybody, for it never caught mice but only ate eggs. + +"'Whoo--hoo! whoo--hoo! More eggs--give me more eggs, or I'll scratch +your eyes out,' shrieked the owl, and began to whet its beak on a beam +in such a savage manner that the three cocks fled in terror to the top +of the chimney. + +"Having somewhat recovered from their alarm, they went down and told +Flaps, who was basking in the sunshine, that the owl must be got rid of. + +"'What, are all the mice eaten, then?' inquired he. + +"'Alas!' answered one of the cocks, 'the brute will eat nothing but eggs +now, and threatens to scratch our eyes out if we don't supply as many +more as it wants.' + +"'Wait till noonday,' said the dog, 'and I'll soon bring the rascal to +reason.' + +"At twelve o'clock Flaps quietly pushed the door open and went up into +the loft. There sat the old owl winking and blinking in a corner. + +"'So you are the robber who is going to scratch people's eyes out,' said +Flaps. 'For this you must die!' + +"'That remains to be seen,' sneered the owl; 'but eyes I will have, and +dogs' eyes too!' and with that it swooped down upon Flaps' head; but the +old dog seized the bird between his teeth and killed it, though not +before one of his own eyes had been scratched out in the struggle. + +"'No matter,' said Flaps; 'I've done my duty, at any rate, and I don't +know why I should want more than one eye to see with;' and so saying, he +went back to his post. + +"The fowls made a great feast, which lasted the whole day, to celebrate +the owl's death. + +"But the mice remained in the castle, and continued to increase and +multiply. So the three wise cocks had to go forth on a second voyage of +discovery, in order to try and find a remedy against the intruders. + +"They flew on for a night and a day without any result; but towards +morning, on the second day, they alighted to rest in a thick wood, and +there, in one of the forest glades, just as the sun was rising, they saw +a red-coated animal watching a mouse-hole. It was a fox, who had come +out to find something for breakfast. They soon saw him catch a mouse and +eat it, and then heard him say, 'Heaven be praised for small mercies! I +have managed to secure a light breakfast at last, though I've been +hunting all night in vain.' + +"'Do you hear that?' said one of the messengers. 'He considers himself +very lucky to have caught a single mouse. That's the sort of animal we +want.' + +"So the cock called down from the tree--'I say! below there! Mr. +Mouse-eater! you can have a whole loft-full of such long-tailed vermin +as that, if you will come with us. But you must first solemnly swear +that you will never eat eggs instead of mice.' + +"'Nothing on earth shall ever tempt me to touch an egg. I swear it most +solemnly,' said the fox, staring up into the tree. 'But whence do you +come, my worthy masters?' + +"'We live at Hencastle, but no one knows where that is except the mice, +who eat us out of house and home.' + +"'You don't say so,' said the fox from below, licking his lips. 'And are +there many more such handsome, magnificent birds as you are, at +Hencastle?' + +"'Why, of course, the whole place is full of them.' + +"'Then I'll come with you,' said the fox, lowering his eyes, lest the +cocks should discern the hungry look in them. 'And if there are a +thousand mice in the loft, they shall all soon lick the dust. Ah! you +don't know what delicious dainties such--mice--are.' + +"This time the fowls had to wait till evening before they heard Mark, +the watchman, crowing from his chimney, and calling forth, + + "'Here come the three! + But what do I see? + Why, the friend that they bring + Is a four-legged thing.' + +"When the fox got to the outer wall, he sniffed about uneasily and +said, + +"'I smell a dog, and I am not fond of the race, nor do they as a rule +like me.' + +"'You need not be alarmed,' replied the cocks; 'there is only one of +them here--our friend Mr. Flaps,--and he is always stationed outside the +castle; besides, he is just as glad as we are that you have come to kill +the mice.' + +"But in spite of this assurance, the fox did not at all like the idea of +going in past Flaps, who stood at the door, showing his teeth, and with +the hair down his back standing on end; but at last, catching sight of a +number of plump young chickens looking out at a window, Reynard could +resist no longer, and with his mouth watering in anxiety to be among +them, he slipped past Flaps like lightning, and scampered up into the +loft. Once there, he behaved so affably to the fowls, and especially to +some of the oldest and most influential hens, that very soon every one +looked on him as their friend in time of need, and their enthusiasm was +brought to a climax when they saw him catch four mice in half as many +minutes. + +"In the dead of the night, when all were asleep, Reynard crept up to +where the fowls roosted, and finding out where the youngest and fattest +were perched, he snapped off the heads of a couple before they had even +time to flutter a feather. He then carried them to the window, opened it +very gently, dropped the dead bodies out on to the ground beneath, and +then sped away down to the house-door and bolted it. + +"When he had done this, he returned to the old hens and woke them by +groaning in such a heartbreaking manner, that all the fowls crowded +round him to know what was amiss. + +"'Alas!' cried he, 'it has been my sad lot to witness a most fearful +sight. That dog whom you keep down below to guard the house slipped in +at the door, and going to the corner where the lovely young chickens +roost, quicker than thought killed two that were more beautiful than +angels. I was chasing a mouse under the stairs at the time, and happened +to come up just as the dreadful deed was done, and I saw the robber +making off with his booty. Only come with me a minute, and you shall see +that I have spoken the truth.' + +"He took the scared and frightened fowls to the window, and when they +looked out, they saw to their horror their guardian Flaps sniffing at +the dead bodies on the ground outside. + +"'Who would have thought it!' said the hens, in an awe-stricken whisper. + +"'You may thank me,' said the fox, 'for my presence of mind in bolting +the house-door when he ran out, or no one knows how many more he would +have killed! If you will take my advice, you will send him about his +business; and if you will put me in his place, I can assure you that you +shall be protected in quite another manner.' + +"'Hi! open the door,' cried Flaps, who saw something was wrong; 'you've +got another King Stork, I'll be bound.' But though he rattled and shook +the door, no one unbolted it. 'Ah!' sighed Flaps, 'before long the whole +pack of idiots will be killed and eaten.' So he scratched open an old +hole in the wall that had been stopped up, and crept in. He arrived just +in time to hear the old hens giving orders that no more eggs were to be +given him, and that the door was to be kept bolted, in order that he +might be obliged either to leave the place or to starve. + +"They were all talking at once, and so eagerly, that no one noticed the +dog come up behind them. He gave one spring and seized the fox by the +throat. The attack was quite unexpected, but the fox fought, writhed, +and wriggled like an eel, and just as he was being borne down, he made +one desperate snap, and bit off the dog's ear close to the head. + +"'Well, my ear is done for, but so is this blood-thirsty villain,' said +Flaps, looking down at the fox, which lay dead at his feet; 'and as for +you, you pack of ungrateful fools, one ear is quite enough to listen to +you with. Here have I been your faithful comrade for all these years, +and yet you believe that I have turned murderer in my old age on the +word of this rogue, who did the evil deed himself last night.' + +"Now that the panic was over, the fowls felt heartily ashamed of +themselves for having been deceived by the fox, and done Flaps such +great injustice. So they all asked his pardon, and the feast which they +held to celebrate their deliverance from the fox was even more +magnificent than the last, and it went on for two whole days. + +"Hencastle was _en fete_ for a time, but it was a very short time. For +the mice were no less glad than the fowls that their enemy was dead; and +now that both he and the owl had disappeared, they came out fearlessly +at all hours of the day, and lived a life quite free from trouble and +care. + +"Not so the fowls. What was to be done with the ever-increasing colony +of corn-stealers? The more the fowls meditated, the more the mice +squeaked and played about, and the more corn they dragged away into +their holes. There was even a rumour that some one meddled with the +eggs. + +"There was nothing for it but to dispatch the three messengers a third +time, with directions to be more vigilant and careful than before. Away +they flew, farther than ever. The first chance of help that arose was +from a couple of cats and a kite, who seemed likely to perform the +required work, but the cocks declined to accept their aid, feeling that +the Hencastle had suffered too much already from two-winged and +four-legged protectors. + +"At length the messengers reached a bit of waste ground close to a +village, and there they saw an extremely grimy-looking gipsy sitting on +a bank. He knocked the ashes out of his black pipe, and muttered, 'I've +the luck of a dog! Here am I with a lot of the best mouse-traps in the +world, and I haven't sold one this blessed day!' + +"'Here's luck!' said the wise birds. 'That is exactly the man for us; he +is neither two-winged nor four-legged, so he will be quite safe.' + +"They flew down at once to the rat-catcher and made their proposition. +He laughed softly and pleasantly to himself, and accepted their +invitation without any demur, and started at once with a light step and +lighter heart for Hencastle. + +"Two days after this, the fowls heard Mark, the watchman, crowing away +lustily from his chimney-pot, + + "'What do I see? + Here come the three! + And the black beast they bring + Has no tail and no wing.' + +"'But,' added the sentinel in less official language, 'he carries a +bundle of things that look like little houses made of wire.' + +"The gipsy was at once taken up to the loft, and having, luckily, a few +scraps of strong-smelling bacon left over from his last night's supper, +he struck a light and managed to make a small fire in the long-disused +grate with some bits of dry grass and chips. He then frizzled some bacon +and baited his traps, and in less than ten minutes he had filled them +all, for the mice had never smelt such a delicious thing as fried bacon +before, and besides, they were new to the wiles of man. + +"The fowls were wild with delight, and in their thankfulness they +bethought them of a special mark of favour, and every hen came clucking +up to him and laid an egg at his feet. + +"For about a week the gipsy did nothing but catch mice and eat eggs; but +all things must have an end, and the bacon ran out, just when the gipsy +had come to the conclusion that he was heartily sick of egg-diet. Being +a man of action, he put out his hand suddenly and caught the fattest and +nicest young chicken within reach, and promptly wrung its neck. + +"Oh, what a row there was in the henroost! The cocks began to crow loud +enough to split their throats, and the hens to fly about and cackle. The +man was nearly deafened, and yelled out at the top of his voice, 'What +do you expect, you fools? Mice can only be caught with meat, and meat I +must and will have too.' He then let them rave on, and quietly and +methodically continued to pluck his chicken. When it was ready, he made +a fire and began to roast it. + +"In the meanwhile, Flaps had heard all the noise and outcry, and as it +showed no signs of abating, he thought the man was most likely in +mischief, so he went into the castle. + +"'Oh! Woe! Misery! Horror! Despair!' cried all the fowls at once as soon +as they saw him. 'The murderer has slain young Scratchfoot the cock, and +is just going to roast him!' + +"'You're a dead man,' growled Flaps to the rat-catcher, as soon as he +got up to the loft. + +"'I'm not so sure of that, my fine cur,' said the man, taking hold of +the cudgel he had brought with him, and tucking up his sleeves. + +"But the brave old dog sprang at him and bit him so severely that he +uttered a savage groan, and dealt Flaps a heavy blow with his cudgel. +This nearly broke the dog's leg and obliged him to relax his hold, on +which the gipsy dashed down-stairs and ran away with such speed that +Flaps on three legs had no chance of overtaking him. + +"'Wait a bit!' cried the man from afar. 'I'll remember you!' And then +his retreating figure became smaller and smaller on the heath until at +last it disappeared altogether. + +"This time the fowls had no heart for a feast. They sat brooding and +moping in rows on the rafters, for they began to see very clearly that +it was quite hopeless to try and get rid of the mice. + +"Poor old Flaps, too, was very ill. A good many days elapsed before he +could get about, and for years he walked lame on his injured leg. + +"One morning as the fowls were listlessly wandering about, wondering +what was to happen next, Mark, the watchman, was heard crowing away in a +very excited manner, + + "'What do I see? + Twenty and three!' + +"'What do you see?' cried they all in a great fright. 'Twenty and three +what?' + +"'An army of soldiers dressed in smock frocks. They are armed with +pitchforks, and the black gipsy is their general.' + +"The fowls flew up like a cloud to the roof, and sure enough they saw +the rat-catcher coming across the heath with a crowd of villagers +towards the castle. + +"When they broke the doleful news to Flaps, he said, 'That scoundrel of +a man has betrayed our hiding-place, and we must wander forth again. Get +ready, and keep up your spirits, and remember that in any case we should +not have been able to stay here much longer, on account of the mice.' + +"So the hens filled their crops as full as possible, and escaped with +Flaps out at the back door. + +"When the country-folk got to the house, they found nothing in it but a +small heap of corn; so they fell upon the gipsy and half killed him for +having brought them on a fool's errand. Then they divided what little +corn there was left, and went away. + +"As to the mice they were left to whistle for their food. + +"So ends the tale of the Hens of Hencastle." + +"And a very fine tale too," said one of the stranger-hens who had been +asleep all the time, and woke up with a jump. "It was deeply +interesting." The threshers happened to have stopped to rest for a +moment, or she would never have woke at all. + +"Of course it was!" said the cock, full of dignity; and he shook his +feathers straight. + +"But what became of the fowls afterwards?" asked one of the common hens. + +"I never tell a hen a secret," said the cock; and he strutted off to +hunt for worms. + + + + +FLAPS. + +A SEQUEL TO "THE HENS OF HENCASTLE." + + + +And what became of Flaps after they all left Hencastle? Well, he led his +company on and on, but they could find no suitable place to settle in; +and when the fowls recovered from their fright, they began to think that +they had abandoned the castle too hastily, and to lay the blame on +Flaps. + +Mark himself said that he might have overestimated the number of the +invaders. There might not have been twenty-three, but really Flaps was +in such a hurry for the news, and one must say something when it was +one's duty to make a report. + +The three wise cocks objected to speak of themselves or their services, +but they had had some experience on behalf of the community in times of +danger, and in their opinion there had been a panic, and the hasty +action taken by Flaps was injudicious and regrettable. + +The oldest hen of Hencastle shook her feathers to show how much Flaps +was in the wrong, and then puffed them out to show how much she was in +the right; and after clearing her throat almost as if she were going to +crow, she observed very shrilly that she "didn't care who contradicted +her when she said that the common sense of the Mother of a Family was +enough to tell _her_ that an old dog, who had lost an eye and an ear and +a leg, was no fit protector for the feminine and the young and the +inexperienced." + +The chief cock was not so free of his opinions as the chief hen, but he +grumbled and scolded about everything, by which one may make matters +amply unpleasant without committing oneself or incurring responsibility. + +Another of the hens made a point of having no opinion. She said that was +her way, she trusted everybody alike and bore her share of suffering, +which was seldom small, without a murmur. But her good wishes were +always at any one's service, and she would say that she sincerely hoped +that a sad injustice had not been done to the red-haired gentleman with +the singularly agreeable manners, who would have been gatekeeper of +Hencastle at this moment if it had not been for Flaps. + +Poor Flaps! Well might he say, "One ear is enough to listen to you with, +you pack of ungrateful fools!" + +He was beginning to find out that, as a rule, the Helpless have a nice +way with them of flinging all their cares upon the Helpful, and +reserving their own energies to pick holes in what is done on their +behalf; and that they are apt to flourish, in good health and poor +spirits, long after such friends as Flaps have been worn out, bit by +bit, in their service. + +"First an eye, then an ear, then a leg," the old dog growled to himself; +"and there's not a fowl with a feather out of him. But I've done my +duty, and that's enough." + +Matters went from bad to worse. The hens had no corn, and Flaps got no +eggs, and the prospect of either home or food seemed very remote. One +evening it was very rainy, the fowls roosted in a walnut-tree for +shelter, and Flaps fell asleep at the foot of it. + +"Could anything be more aggravating than that creature's indifference?" +said Hen No. 2. "Here we sit, wet to the skin, and there he lies asleep! +Dear me! I remember one of my neck feathers got awry once, at dear old +Hencastle (the pencilling has been a good deal admired in my time, +though I say it that shouldn't), and the Red-haired Gentleman noticed it +in a moment. I remember he put his face as close to mine as I am to you, +but in the most gentlemanly manner, and murmured so softly, + +"'Excuse me--there's just one of those lovely little feathers the least +bit in the world--' + +"I believe it was actually between his lips, when we were interrupted, +and I had to put it tidy myself. But we might all be plucked as bare as +poor young Scratchfoot before Flaps would think of smoothing us down. +Just hear how he snores! Ah! it's a trying world, but I never complain." + +"I do, though," said the chief hen. "I'm not one to put up with neglect. +Hi, there! are you asleep?" And scratching a bit of the rough bark off +the walnut-tree, she let it drop on to Flaps' nose. + +"I'm awake," said Flaps; "what's the matter?" + +"I never knew any one snore when he was awake before," said the hen; and +all the young cockerels chuckled. + +"Well, I believe I was napping," said Flaps. "Damp weather always makes +me sleepy, and I was dreaming of the old farmyard." + +"Poor old farm!" sighed Hen No. 2. "We had board and lodging there, at +any rate." + +"And now we've neither," said Hen No. 1. "Mr. Flaps, do you know that +we're wet to the skin, and dying of starvation, whilst you put your nose +into your great-coat pocket and go to sleep?" + +"You're right," said Flaps. "Something must be done this evening. But I +see no use in taking the whole community about in the rain. We will send +out another expedition." + +"Cock-a-doodle-doo!" screamed the three wise ones; "that means that +we're to face the storm whilst you have another nap, eh?" + +"It seems an odd thing," said the chief cock, scratching his comb with +his claw, "that Flaps never thinks of going himself on these +expeditions." + +"You're right," said Flaps. "It is an odd thing, for times out of mind +I've heard our old friend, the farmer, say, 'If you want a thing +done--Go; if not--Send.' This time I shall go. Cuddle close to each +other, and keep up your spirits. I'll find us a good home yet." + +The fowls were much affected by Flaps' magnanimity, and with one voice +they cried: "Thank you, dear Flaps. Whatever you decide upon will do for +us." + +And Mark added, "I will continue to act as watchman." And he went up to +the top of the tree as Flaps trotted off down the muddy road. + +All that evening and far into the night it rained and rained, and the +fowls cuddled close to each other to keep warm, and Flaps did not +return. In the small hours of the morning the rain ceased, and the +rain-clouds drifted away, and the night-sky faded and faded till it was +dawn. + +"Cock-a-doodle-doo!" said Mark, and all the fowls woke up. + +"What do you see and hear from the tree-top, dear Mark?" said they. "Is +Flaps coming?" + + "Not a thing can I see + From the top of the tree, + But a long, winding lane + That is sloppy with rain;" + +replied Mark. And the fowls huddled together again, and put their heads +back under their wings. + +Paler and paler grew the grey sky, and at last it was broken with golden +bars, and at the first red streak that caught fire behind them, Mark +crowed louder than before, and all the hens of Hencastle roused up for +good. + +"What do you see and hear from the tree-top, dear Mark?" they inquired. +"Is Flaps coming?" + + "Not a sound do I hear, + And I very much fear + That Flaps, out of spite, + Has deserted us quite;" + +replied Mark. And the fowls said nothing, for they were by no means at +ease in their consciences. + +Their delight was proportionably great when, a few minutes later, the +sentinel sang out from his post, + + "Here comes Flaps, like the mail! + And he's waving his tail." + +"Well, dear, dear Flaps!" they all cackled as he came trotting up, +"where is our new home, and what is it like?" + +"Will there be plenty to eat?" asked the cocks with one crow. + +"Plenty," replied Flaps. + +"Shall we be safe from mice, owls, wild beasts, and wild men?" cried the +hens. + +"You will," answered Flaps. + +"Is it far, dear Flaps?" + +"It is very near," said Flaps; "but I may as well tell you the truth at +once--it's a farmyard." + +"Oh!--" said all the fowls. + +"We may be roasted, or have our heads chopped off," whimpered the young +cockerels. + +"Well, Scratchfoot was roasted at Hencastle," said Flaps; "and he wasn't +our only loss. One can't have everything in this world; and I assure +you, if you could see the poultry-yard--so dry under foot, nicely wired +in from marauders; the most charming nests, with fresh hay in them; +drinking-troughs; and then at regular intervals, such abundance of corn, +mashed potatoes, and bones, that my own mouth watered at--are served +out--" + +"That sounds good," said the young cockerels. + +"Ahem! ahem!" said the chief cock. "Did you see anything very +remarkable--were the specimens of my race much superior in strength and +good looks?----" + +"My dear cock!" said Flaps; "there's not a tail or a comb or a hackle to +touch you. You'll be cock of the walk in no time." + +"Ahem! ahem!" said the chief cock modestly. "I have always had a sort of +fatality that way. Pray, my dears, don't look so foolish and deplorable, +but get the young people together, and let us make a start. Mr. Flaps is +a person of strong common sense, a quality for which I myself have +always been remarkable, and I thoroughly endorse and support his +excellent advice, of which I am the best judge. I have very much +regretted of late to observe a tendency in this family (I say a +tendency, for I hope it goes no further) to undervalue Mr. Flaps, and +even (I hardly like to allude to such reprehensible and disgusting +absurdity) to recall the memory of a vulgar red-haired impostor, who +gained a brief entrance into our family circle. I am not consulted as I +should be in these fluctuations of opinion, but there are occasions when +it is necessary that the head of a family should exercise his discretion +and his authority, and, so to speak, put down his claw. I put down my +claw. We are going to Mr. Flaps' farmyard. Cock-a-doodle-doo +Cock-a-doodle-doo!" + +Now, when the head of a family says "Cock-a-doodle-doo!" there is +nothing more to be said. So to the farmyard the whole lot of them went, +and were there before the sun got one golden hair of his head over the +roof of the big barn. + +And only Mark, as they all crowded into their new home, turned his head +round over his back to say: "And you, Flaps; what shall you do?" + +"Oh, I shall be all right," said Flaps. "Good-bye and good luck to you." + +It cannot be said that Flaps was positively in high spirits when he had +settled his proteges in their new home in the farmyard, and was left +alone; but there are some good folk who contrive to make duty do the +work of pleasure in this life, and then a piece of business fairly +finished is as good as a treat. + +It is not bread and bones, however, and Flaps was very hungry--so hungry +that he could not resist the temptation to make his way towards the +farmhouse, on the chance of picking up some scraps outside. And that was +how it came about, that when the farmer's little daughter Daisy, with a +face like the rosy side of a white-heart cherry set deep in a lilac +print hood, came back from going with the dairy lass to fetch up the +cows, she found Flaps snuffing at the back door, and she put her arms +round his neck (they reached right round with a little squeezing) and +said: + +"Oh, I never knew you'd be here so early! You nice thing!" + +And Flaps' nose went right into the print hood, and he put out his +tongue and licked Daisy's face from the point of her chin up her right +cheek to her forehead, and then from her forehead down her left cheek +back to her chin, and he found that she was a very nice thing too. + +But the dairymaid screamed, "Good gracious! where did that nasty strange +dog come from? Leave him alone, Miss Daisy, or he'll bite your nose +off." + +"He won't!" said Daisy indignantly. "He's the dog Daddy promised me;" +and the farmer coming out at that minute, she ran up to him crying, +"Daddy! Isn't this my dog?" + +"Bless the child, no!" said the farmer; "it's a nice little pup I'm +going to give thee. Where did that dirty old brute come from?" + +"He would wash," said little Daisy, holding very fast to Flaps' coat. + +"Fine washing too!" said the dairymaid, "And his hair's all lugs." + +"I could comb them," said Daisy. + +"He's no but got one eye," said the swineherd. "Haw! haw! haw!" + +"He sees me with the other," said Daisy. "He's looking up at me now." + +"And one of his ears gone!" cried the dairy lass. "He! he! he!" + +"Perhaps I could make him a cap," said Daisy, "as I did when my doll +lost her wig. It had pink ribbons and looked very nice." + +"Why, he's lame of a leg," guffawed the two farming-men. "See, missy, he +hirples on three." + +"I can't run very fast," said Daisy, "and when I'm old enough to, +perhaps his leg will be well." + +"Why, you don't want this old thing for a play-fellow, child?" said the +farmer. + +"I do! I do!" wept Daisy. + +"But why, in the name of whims and whamsies?" + +"Because I love him," said Daisy. + +When it comes to this with the heart, argument is wasted on the head; +but the farmer-went on: "Why he's neither useful nor ornamental. He's +been a good dog in his day, I dare say; but now--" + +At this moment Flaps threw his head up in the air and sniffed, and his +one eye glared, and he set his teeth and growled. + +He smelt the gipsy, and the gipsy's black pipe, and every hair stood on +end with rage. + +"The dog's mad!" cried the swineherd, seizing a pitchfork. + +"You're a fool," said the farmer (who wasn't). "There's some one behind +that haystack, and the old watch-dog's back is up. See! there he runs; +and as I'm a sinner, it's that black rascal who was loitering round, the +day my ricks were fired, and you lads let him slip. Off after him, for I +fancy I see smoke." And the farmer flew to his haystacks. + +Hungry and tired as he was, Flaps would have pursued his old enemy, but +Daisy would not let him go. She took him by the ear and led him indoors +to breakfast instead. She had a large basin of bread-and-milk, and she +divided this into two portions, and gave one to Flaps and kept the other +for herself. And as she says she loves Flaps, I leave you to guess who +got most bread-and-milk. + +That was how the gipsy came to live for a time in the county gaol, where +he made mouse-traps rather nicely for the good of the rate-payers. + +And that was how Flaps, who had cared so well for others, was well cared +for himself, and lived happily to the end of his days. + + * * * * * + +"Why, it's in print!" said Father Cock; "and I said as plain as any cock +could crow, that it was a secret. Now, who let it out?" + +"Don't talk to me about secrets," said the fair foreigner; "I never +trouble my head about such things." + +"Some people are very fond of drawing attention to their heads," said +the common hen; "and if other people didn't think more of a great +unnatural-looking chignon than of all the domestic virtues put together, +they might have their confidences respected." + +"I's all very well," said Father Cock, "but you're all alike. There's +not a hen can know a secret without going and telling it." + +"Well, come!" said a little Bantam hen, who had newly arrived; +"whichever hen told it, the cock must have told it first." + +"What's that ridiculous nonsense your talking?" cried the cock; and he +ran at her and pecked her well with his beak. + +"Oh! oh! oh!" cried the Bantam. + +Dab, dab, dab, pecked the cock. + +"Now! has anybody else got anything to say on the subject?" + +But nobody had. So he flew up on to the wall, and cried +"Cock-a-doodle-doo!" + +[Illustration] + + + + +A WEEK SPENT IN A GLASS POND. + +BY THE GREAT WATER-BEETLE. + + + +Very few beetles have ever seen a Glass Pond. I once spent a week in +one, and though I think, with good management, and in society suitably +selected, it may be a comfortable home enough, I advise my +water-neighbours to be content with the pond in the wood. + +The story of my brief sojourn in the Glass Pond is a story with a moral, +and it concerns two large classes of my fellow-creatures: those who live +in ponds and--those who don't. If I do not tell it, no one else will. +Those connected with it who belong to the second class (namely, Francis, +Molly, and the learned Doctor, their grandfather) will not, I am sure. +And as to the rest of us, there is none left but-- + +However, that is the end of my tale, not the beginning. + +The beginning, as far as I am concerned, was in the Pond. It is very +difficult to describe a pond to people who cannot live under water, just +as I found it next door to impossible to make a minnow I knew believe in +dry land. He said, at last, that perhaps there might be some little +space beyond the pond in hot weather, when the water was low; and that +was the utmost that he would allow. But of all cold-blooded +unconvinceable creatures, the most obstinate are fish. + +Men are very different. They do not refuse to believe what lies beyond +their personal experience. I respected the learned Doctor, and was +really sorry for the disadvantages under which he laboured. That a +creature of his intelligence should have only two eyes, and those not +even compound ones--that he should not be able to see under water or in +the dark--that he should not only have nothing like six legs, but be +quite without wings, so that he could not even fly out of his own window +for a turn in the air on a summer's evening--these drawbacks made me +quite sorry for him; for he had none of the minnow's complacent +ignorance. He knew my advantages as well as I knew them myself, and bore +me no ill-will for them. + +"The _Dyticus marginalis_, or Great Water-Beetle," I have heard him say, +in the handsomest manner, "is equally at home in the air, or in the +water. Like all insects in the perfect state, it has six legs, of which +the hindmost pair are of great strength, and fringed so as to serve as +paddles. It has very powerful wings, and, with Shakespeare's witches, it +flies by night. It has two simple, and two sets of compound eyes. When +it goes below water, it carries a stock of air with it, on the +diving-bell principle; and when this is exhausted, comes to the surface, +tail uppermost, for a fresh supply. It is the most voracious of the +carnivorous water-beetles." + +The last sentence is rather an unkind reflection on my good appetite, +but otherwise the Doctor spoke handsomely of me, and without envy. + +And yet I am sure it could have been no matter of wonder if my compound +eyes, for instance, had been a very sore subject with a man who knew of +them, and whose one simple pair were so nearly worn out. + +More than once, when I have seen the old gentleman put a green shade on +to his reading-lamp, and glasses before his eyes, I have felt inclined +to hum,--"Ah, my dear Doctor, if you could only take a cool turn in the +pond! You would want no glasses or green shades, where the light comes +tenderly subdued through water and water-weeds." + +Indeed, after living, as I can, in all three--water, dry land, and +air,--I certainly prefer to be under water. Any one whose appetite is as +keen, and whose hind-legs are as powerful as mine, will understand the +delights of hunting, and being hunted, in a pond; where the light comes +down in fitful rays and reflections through the water, and gleams among +the hanging roots of the frog-bit, and the fading leaves of the +water-starwort, through the maze of which, in and out, hither and +thither, you pursue, and are pursued, in cool and skilful chase, by a +mixed company of your neighbours, who dart, and shoot, and dive, and +come and go, and any one of whom at any moment may either eat you or be +eaten by you. + +And if you want peace and quiet, where can one bury oneself so safely +and completely as in the mud? A state of existence, without mud at the +bottom, must be a life without repose. + +I was in the mud one day, head downwards, when human voices came to me +through the water. It was summer, and the pond was low at the time. + +"Oh, Francis! Francis! The Water-Soldier[D] is in flower." + +"Hooray! Dig him up for the aquarium! Grandfather says it's very +rare--doesn't he?" + +"He says it's not at all common; and there's only one, Francis. It +would be a pity if we didn't get it up by the roots, and it died." + +"Nonsense, Molly. I'll get it up. But let's get the beasts first. You +get the pickle-jar ready, whilst I fix the stick on to the colander." + +"Does cook know you've taken it, Francis?" + +"By this time she does, I should think. Look here, Molly--I wish you +would try and get this stick right. It wants driving through the +handles. I'm just going to have a look at the Water-Soldier." + +"You always give me the work to do," Molly complained; and as she spoke, +I climbed up an old stake that was firmly planted in the mud, and seated +myself on the top, which stood out of the water, and looked at her. + +She was a neat-looking little soul, with rosy cheeks, and a resolute +expression of countenance. She looked redder and firmer than usual as +she drove the broomstick through the handles of the colander, whilst the +boy was at the other side of the pond with the Water-Soldier, whose +maiden-blossom shone white among its sword-leaves. + +It shone in the sunshine which came gaily through a gap in the trees, +and warmed my coat through to my wings, and made the pond look lovely. +That greedy _Ranatra_, who eats so much, and never looks a bit the more +solid for his meals, crept up a reed and sunned his wings; the +water-gnats skimmed and skated about, measuring the surface of the water +with their long legs; the "boatmen" shot up and down till one was quite +giddy, showing the white on their bodies, like swallows wheeling for +their autumn-flight. Even the water-scorpion moved slowly over a sunny +place from the roots of an arrow-head lily to a dark corner under the +duck-weed. + +"Molly!" shouted the boy; "I wish you'd come and give a pull at the +Water-Soldier. I've nearly got him up; but the leaves cut my hands, and +you've got gloves. If the colander is ready, I'll begin to fish. There's +a beetle on that stick. I wish I were near enough, I could snatch him up +like anything." + +"I wouldn't advise you to," said Molly. "Grandfather says that +water-beetles have got daggers in their tails. Besides, some of the +beetles are very greedy and eat the fish." + +"The Big Black one doesn't," said Francis. "He said so. _Hydroeus piceus_ +is the name, and I dare say that's the one. It's the biggest of all the +water-beetles and very harmless." + +"He _may_ be a good one," said Molly, looking thoughtfully and +unmistakably at me, "but then he may be one of the bad ones; and if he +is, he'll eat everything before him." + +But by this time Francis was dipping the colander in and out on the +opposite side, and she was left to struggle with the Water-Soldier. + +"He's up at last," she announced, and the Soldier was landed on the +bank. + +"Come round," said the boy; "I've filled three jars." + +"I hope you've been careful, Francis. You know Grandfather says that to +stock a fresh-water aquarium is like the puzzle of the Fox and the Geese +and the bag of seed. It's no use our having things that eat each other." + +"They must eat something," said the boy; "they're used to it at home; +and I wish you wouldn't be always cramming Grandfather down my throat. I +want to do my aquarium my own way; and I gave most towards buying the +bell-glass, so it's more mine than yours." + +"Well, do as you like; only let us have plenty of water-boatmen," said +Molly. + +"I've got half-a-dozen at least; and the last sweep I went very low, +quite in the mud, and I've got some most horrid things. There's one of +them like a flat-iron, with pincers at the point." + +"That's a water-scorpion. Oh, Francis! he eats dreadfully." + +"I don't believe he can, he's so flat. Molly, is that nasty-looking +thing a dragon-fly larva?" + +"I believe it is; for there is the mask. You know his face is so ugly +nothing would come near him if he didn't wear a mask. Then he lifts it +up and snaps suddenly; _he_ really _does_ eat everything!" + +"Well, I can't help it. I must have him. I want to see him hatch; and I +shall plant a bullrush for him to climb up." + +"I found a caddis-worm, with a beautifully built house, in the roots of +the Water-Soldier, and I'm going to look along the edge for some shells. +We must have shell-fish, you know, to keep the aquarium clean. Oh!" + +"What is it, Molly? What have you found?" + +"Oh, such a lovely spider! A water-spider--a scarlet spider. He's very +small, but such a colour! Francis dear, may I keep him all to myself? I +don't think I _can_ let him go in with the others. If the dragon-fly +larva ate him, I should never forgive myself, and you know you don't +know for certain that the beetle is _Hydroeus piceus_. I shall give him +an aquarium of his very own in a green finger-glass, with nothing but a +little very nice duckweed, and one small snail to keep it clean, like a +general servant. May I, Francis?" + +"By all means. I don't want your scarlet spider. I can get lots more." +He went on dipping with the colander, and she began to dig up +water-plants and lay them in a heap. I sat and watched them, but the +_Ranatra_ got nervous and tried to go below. As usual, the dry bristles +in his tail would not pierce the water without a struggle, and after +floundering in the most ludicrous fashion for a few minutes, he fell +straight into the colander, and was put into one of the pickle-jars. + +"I've got enough now," said the boy, "and I want to go home and see +about my net. I must have some fish. Can you carry the plants, Molly?" + +"I'll manage," said Molly. "Now I'm ready." + +"Wait a minute, though--I'd forgotten the beetle." + +When I heard this I dropped into the water; but somehow or other I +turned over very clumsily, and, like the _Ranatra_, I fell through into +the colander, and was transferred to a pickle-jar. + +Anything more disagreeable than being shaken up in a glass bottle, with +beetles, and boatmen, and larvae of all sorts and sizes, including a +dragon-fly in the second stage of his career, I can hardly imagine. When +they took us out and put us into the glass pond, matters were certainly +better, though there is a vast difference between a glass pond and a +pond in a wood. + +The first day it was by no means a bad imitation of a real pond, except +for the want of a bed of mud. Molly had covered the bottom of the glass +with gravel which she had steadily washed till water would run clear +from it, in spite of the impatient exclamations of Francis, that it +"would do now," and quite regardless of the inconvenience to which I was +subjected by being kept in the pickle-jar. In this gravel she had +embedded the roots of some Water Crowfoot and other pond-plants. The +stones in the middle were nicely arranged, and well covered with moss +and water-weeds. When water had been poured in up to the brim of the +bell-glass, and we had been emptied out of the jars, the dragon-fly +larva got into a good hole among the stones and ate most of the May-fly +grubs, water-shrimps, and so forth, as they came into sight. I did not +do badly myself, and only the bigger and stronger members of our society +and a few skins were there next day, when Francis brought a jar full of +minnows, a small carp, and a bull's-head, and turned them out in our +midst. + +"How they dart and swim round and round!" he exclaimed. + +"Splendid," said Molly. "I _am_ so sorry I am going away just now. You +will try and keep the water fresh, won't you?" + +"Of course I will. And let me have the scarlet spider whilst you are +away. I couldn't find another." + +"Well, if you must; but do take care, Francis. And here are the two +bits of gutta-percha tubing to make into syphons. You must put them into +hot water for a minute before you bend them, you know." + +"I'll do it to-morrow, Molly; I have nothing else _to_ do, you know, +because Edward Brown won't be back for three or four days. So we can do +nothing about the cricket club." + +It was on the third day, when both the pieces of gutta-percha tubing +were in a wash-hand basin of hot water, and the dragon-fly larva and I +were finishing a minnow, with the help of the water-scorpion, that +Master Edward Brown arrived unexpectedly, and so pressed his friend +Francis to come out and consult "just for two minutes," and so delayed +him when he got him, that the tubing melted into a shapeless lump, and +the carp died unnoticed by any one but myself. + +On the fourth day the glass pond was moved into the conservatory, "to be +out of the way." The fish were excellent eating, and though the snails +were at their wits' end as the refuse rotted, and the water became more +stagnant, and the weeds grew, till all the shell-fish in the pond could +not have kept the place clean,--I did not mind it myself. As the water +got low, I found a nice bit of rockwork above water, where I could sit +by day, and at night the lights from the drawing-room gave an +indescribable stimulus to my wings, and I sailed in, and flew round and +round till I was tired, and (forgetting that no pond, not even a bed of +mud, was below me!) drew in my wings, and dropped sharply down on to the +floor. To do the family justice, they learned to know the sound of my +fall, and even the old Doctor himself would go down on hands and knees +to hunt for me under the sofa, for fear I should be trodden on. + +On the fifth day I swallowed the scarlet spider. I hated myself for +doing it, when I thought of Molly; but the spider was very foolish to +meet me. He should have kept behind. And if I hadn't eaten him, the +dragon-fly larva would. What _he_ had eaten, I do not think he could +have told himself. There was very little left now for any one; even the +water-scorpion had disappeared. + +On the sixth day the glass pond had only two tenants worth speaking +of--the dragon-fly larva and myself. We had both over-eaten ourselves, +and for some hours we moved slowly about through the thickening puddle, +nodding civilly when we passed each other among the feathery sprays of +the Water Crowfoot. Then I began to get hungry. I knew it by feeling an +impulse to look out for the dragon-fly larva, and I knew he knew it +because he began to avoid me. + +On the seventh day Molly ran into the conservatory, followed by her +brother, and uttered a cry of dismay. + +"Oh, what a state it's in! Where are the syphons?" + +"Why, they melted the day Edward Brown came back. We've been having such +a lot of cricket, Molly!" + +"There isn't a fish left, and it smells horribly." + +"I'm very sorry, Molly. Let's throw it out. I don't want Grandfather to +see it. Let me come." + +"No, no, Francis! There may be some left. Yes, there's the beetle. I +shall put it all in a pail and take it back to the pond. Oh dear! oh +dear! I can't see anything of the scarlet spider. My beautiful scarlet +spider! I was so fond of him. Oh, I am so sorry! And no one has watered +the Soldier, and he's dead too." + +"Don't cry, Molly! Please don't cry! I dare say the spider is there, +only it's so small." + +For some time Molly poked carefully here and there, but the spider was +not to be found, and the contents of the aquarium were carried back to +the wood. + +I was very glad to see the pond again. The water-gnats were taking +dimensions as usual, a blue-black beetle sat humming on the stake, and +dragon-flies flitted hungrily about, like splinters of a broken +rainbow; but the Water-Soldier's place was empty, and it was never +refilled. He was the only specimen. + +Molly was probably in the right when, after a last vain search for the +scarlet spider, as Francis slowly emptied the pail, she said with a +sigh, + +"What makes me so very sorry is, that I don't think we ought to have +'collected' things unless we had really attended to them, and knew how +to keep them alive." + +FOOTNOTES: + +Footnote D: Water-soldier--_Stratiotes aloides._ A handsome and rare +plant, of aloe-like appearance, with a white blossom rising in the +centre of its sword-leaves. + + + + + +AMONG THE MERROWS. + +A SKETCH OF A GREAT AQUARIUM. + + +I remember the time when I, and a brother who was with me, devoutly +believed in a being whom we supposed to live among certain black, +water-rotted, weed-grown stakes by the sea. These old wooden ruins were, +I fancy, the remains of some rude pier, and amid them, when the tide was +low, we used to play, and to pay fancy visits to our fancy friend. + +We called her Shriny--why, I know no more than when I first read +Croker's delightful story of "The Soul Cages" I knew why the Merrow whom +Jack went to see below the waves was called Coomara. + +My remembrance of even what we fancied about Shriny is very dim now; and +as my brother was only four years old (I was eight), his is not more +distinct. I know we thought of her, and talked of her, and were always +eager to visit her supposed abode, and wander together amongst its +rotten pillars (which, as we were so small, seemed lofty enough in our +eyes), where the mussels and limpets held tightly on, and the slimy, +olive-green fucus hung loosely down--a sea-ivy covering ruins made by +the waves. + +I have never been to the place since those days. If Shriny's palace is +there now at all, I dare say I should find the stakes to be stumps, and +all the vastness and mystery about them gone for ever. And yet we used +to pretend to feast with her there. We served up the seed-vessels of the +fucus as fish. I do not think we really ate them, we only sucked out the +salt water, and tried to fancy we were enjoying the repast. Once we +_began_ to eat a limpet!--Beyond that point my memory is dumb. + +I wonder how we should have felt if Shriny had really appeared to us, as +Coomara appeared to Jack Dogherty, and taken us down below the waves, or +kept us among the stakes of her palace till the tide flooded them, and +perhaps filled it with wonderful creatures and beautiful things, and +floated out the dank, dripping fucus into a veil of lace above our +heads; as our mother used to float out little dirty lumps of seaweed +into beautiful web-like pictures when she was preserving them for her +collection. + +Shriny never did come, though Mr. Croker says Coomara came to Jack. + +Perhaps, young readers, some of you have never read the story of the +Soul Cages. It is a long one, and I am not going to repeat it here, +only to say a word or two about it, for which I have a reason. + +Jack Dogherty--so the story goes--had always longed to see a Merrow. +Merrow is the Irish name for seafolk; indeed, it properly means a +mermaid. And Jack, you know, lived in a fairy tale, and not in lodgings +at a watering-place on the south coast; so he saw his Merrow, though we +never saw Shriny. + +I do not think any of the after-history of the Merrow is equal to Mr. +Croker's account of his first appearance to Jack: afterwards "Old Coo" +becomes more like a tipsy old fisherman than the man-fish that he was. + +The first appearance was on the coast to the northward, when "just as +Jack was turning a point, he saw something, like to nothing he had ever +seen before, perched upon a rock at a little distance out to sea; it +looked green in the body, as well as he could discern at that distance, +and he would have sworn, only the thing was impossible, that it had a +cocked-hat in its hand. Jack stood for a good half-hour, straining his +eyes and wondering at it, and all the time the thing did not stir hand +or foot. At last Jack's patience was quite worn out, and he gave a loud +whistle and a hail, when the Merrow (for such it was) started up, put +the cocked-hat on its head, and dived down, head foremost, from the +rocks." + +For a long time Jack could get no nearer view of "the sea-gentleman +with the cocked-hat," but at last, one stormy day, when he had taken +refuge in one of the caves along the coast, "he saw, sitting before him, +a thing with green hair, long green teeth, a red nose, and pig's eyes. +It had a fish's tail, legs with scales on them, and short arms like +fins. It wore no clothes, but had the cocked-hat under its arm, and +seemed engaged thinking very seriously about something." + +As I copy these words--_It wore no clothes, but had the cocked-hat under +its arm, and seemed engaged thinking very seriously about something_--it +seems to me that the portrait is strangely like something that I have +seen. And the more I think of it, the more I am convinced that the type +is familiar to me, and that, though I do not live in a fairy story, I +have been among the Merrows. And further still that any one who pleases +may go and see Coomara's cousins any day. + +There can be no doubt of it! I have seen a Merrow--several Merrows. That +unclothed, over-harnessed form is before me now; sitting motionless on a +rock, "engaged thinking very seriously," till in some sudden impulse it +rises, turns up its red nose, makes some sharp angular movements with +head and elbows, and plunges down, with about as much grace as if some +stiff, red-nosed old admiral, dressed in nothing but cocked-hat, +spectacles, telescope, and a sword between his legs, were to take a +header from the quarter-deck into the sea. + +I do not want to make a mystery about nothing. I should have resented it +thoroughly myself when I was young. I make no pretence to have had any +glimpses of fairyland. I could not see Shriny when I was eight years +old, and I never shall now. Besides, no one sees fairies now-a-days. The +"path to bonnie Elfland" has long been overgrown, and few and far +between are the Princes who press through and wake the Beauties that +sleep beyond. For compensation, the paths to Mother Nature's Wonderland +are made broader, easier, and more attractive to the feet of all men, +day by day. And it is Mother Nature's Merrows that I have seen--in the +Crystal Palace Aquarium. + +How Mr. Croker drew that picture of Coomara the Merrow, when he probably +never saw a sea crayfish, a lobster, or even a prawn at home, I cannot +account for, except by the divining and prophetic instincts of genius. +And when I speak of his seeing a crayfish, a lobster, or a prawn at +home, I mean at their home, and not at Mr. Croker's. Two very different +things for our friends the "sea-gentlemen," as to colour as well as in +other ways. In his own home, for instance, a lobster is of various +beautiful shades of blue and purple. In Mr. Croker's home he would be +bright scarlet--from boiling! So would the prawn, and as solid as you +please; who in his own home is colourless and transparent as any ghost. + +Strangely beautiful those prawns are when you see them at home. And that +one seems to do in the Great Aquarium; though, I suppose, it is much +like seeing land beasts and birds in the Zoological Gardens--a poor +imitation of their free life in their natural condition. Still, there is +no other way in which you can see and come to know these wonderful "sea +gentlemen" so well, unless you could go, like Jack Dogherty, to visit +them at the bottom of the sea. And whilst I heartily recommend every one +who has not seen the Aquarium to visit it as soon as possible, let me +describe it for the benefit of those who cannot do so at present. It may +also be of some little use to them hereafter to know what is most worth +seeing there, and where to look for it. + +No sooner have you paid your sixpence at the turnstile which admits you, +than your eye is caught by what seems to be a large window in the wall, +near the man who has taken your money. You look through the glass, and +find yourself looking into a deep sea-pool, with low stone-grey rocks +studded with sea-anemones in full bloom. There are twenty-one different +species of sea-anemones in the Aquarium; but those to be seen in this +particular pool are chosen from about seven of the largest kinds. The +very biggest, a _Tealia crassicornis_, measures ten inches across when +he spreads his pearly fingers to their full extent. "In my young days" +we called him by the familiar name of Crassy; and found him so difficult +to keep in domestic captivity, that it was delightful to see him +blooming and thriving as he does in Tank No. 1 of the Great Aquarium. +His squat build--low and broad--contrasts well with those tall white +neighbours of his (_Dianthus plumosa_), whose faces are like a plume of +snowy feathers. All the sea-anemones in this tank have settled +themselves on the rocks according to their own fancy. They are of lovely +shades of colour, rosy, salmon-coloured, and pearly-white. + +There are more than five thousand sea-anemones of various kinds in the +Aquarium; and they have an attendant, whose sole occupation is to feed +them, by means of a pair of long wooden forceps. + +Reluctantly breaking away from such old friends, we pass through a door +into a long vault-like stone passage or hall, down one side of which +there seem to be high large windows, about as far apart as windows of a +long room commonly are. Behind each of these is a sea-pool like the +first one. + +Take the first of the lot--Tank No. 2. It is stocked with _Serpulae_. +Sea-anemones are well-known to most people, but tube-worms are not such +familiar friends; so I will try to describe this particular kind of +"sea-gentlemen." The tube-worms are so called because, though they are +true worms (sea-worms), they do not trust their soft bodies to the sea, +as our common earth-worms trust theirs in a garden-bed, but build +themselves tubes inside which they live, popping their heads out at the +top now and then like a chimney-sweep pushing his brush out at the top +of a tall round chimney. Now if you can fancy one of our tall round +manufactory chimneys to be white instead of black, and the round +chimney-sweep's brush to have lovely gay-coloured feathers all round it +instead of dirty bristles, or if you can fancy the sweep letting off a +monster catherine-wheel at the chimney's mouth, you may have some idea +what a tube-worm's head is like when he pokes it out of his tube. + +The _Serpulae_ make their tubes of chalky stuff, something like +egg-shell; and they stick them on to anything that comes to hand down +below. Those in the Great Aquarium came from Weymouth. They were dredged +up with the white pipes or tubes sticking to oyster-shells, old bottles, +stones, and what not, like bits of maccaroni glued on to old crockery +sherds. These odds and ends are overgrown, however, with weeds and +zoophytes, and (like an ugly house covered by creepers) look picturesque +rather than otherwise. The worms have small bristles down their bodies, +which serve as feet, and help them to scramble up inside their tubes, +when they wish to poke their heads out and breathe. These heads are +delicate, bright-coloured plumes. Each species has its own plume of its +own special shape and colour. They are only to be seen when the animal +is alive. A good many little _Serpulae_ have been born in the Aquarium. + +Through the next window--Tank No. 3--you may see more tube-worms, with +ray-like, daisy heads, and soft muddy tubes. They are _Sabellae_. + +Have you ever see a "sea-mouse"? Probably you have: preserved in a +bottle. It is only like a mouse from being about the size of a mouse's +body, without legs, and with a lot of rainbow-coloured hairs. You may be +astonished to hear that it is classed among the worms. There is a +sea-mouse in the Great Aquarium. I did not see him; perhaps because he +is given to burrowing. If he is not in one of the two tanks just named +he is probably in No. 21 or No. 25. He is so handsome dead and in a +bottle, that he must be gorgeous to behold alive and in a pool. You +should look out for him. + +It is a disappointing feature of this water wonderland that some of the +"sea-gentlemen" are apt to hide, like hobbledehoy children, when +visitors call. Indeed, a good many of them--such as the swimming-crabs, +the burrowing-crabs, the sea-scorpions, and the eels--are night-feeders, +and one cannot expect them to change their whole habits and customs to +be seen of the British public. Anyhow, whether they hide from custom or +caprice, they are quite safe from interference. Much happier, in this +respect, than the beasts in the Zoological Gardens. One may disturb the +big elephant's repose with umbrella-points, or throw buns at the brown +bear, but the "sea-gentlemen" are safe in their caves, and humanity +flattens its nose against the glass wall of separation in vain. + +When I looked into Tank No. 5, however, there were several +swimming-crabs and sea-scorpions to be seen. The sea-scorpions are fish, +but bold-faced, fiery, greedy little fellows. The swimming-crabs are +said to be "the largest, strongest, and _hungriest_" of English crabs. +What a thought for those they live on! Let us picture to ourselves the +largest, strongest, and _hungriest_ of cannibals! Doubtless he would +make short work even of the American Giant, as the swimming-crabs, by +night, devour other crabs, larger but milder-tempered than themselves. +It speaks volumes for the sea-scorpions, who are small fish, that they +can hold their own in the same pool with the swimming-crabs. + +Tank 4 contains big spider-crabs, who sit with their knees above their +heads, winking at you with their eyes and feelers; or scramble out +unexpectedly from dens and caves here and there, high up in the rocky +sides of the pool. + +Nos. 6, 7, and 8 contain fish. + +It really is sad to think how completely our ideas on the subject of cod +spring from the kitchen and the fish-kettle. (As to our cod-liver oil, +we know no more how much of it has anything to do with cod-fish than we +can guess where our milk and port-wine come from.) Poor cod! If of a +certain social standing, it's odds if we will recognize any of him but +his head and shoulders. I have seen him served up in country inns with a +pickled walnut in the socket of each eye; and in life, and at home, he +has the attentive, inquisitive, watchful, humorous eyes common to all +fishes. + +Fishes remind me rather of Chinese, who are also a cold-blooded race: +slow, watchful, inquisitive, acquisitive, and full of the sense of +humour. There are fishes in the Great Aquarium whose faces twinkle again +with quiet fun. + +The cod here seemed quite as much interested in looking at us through a +glass window as we were in looking at them. They are tame, and have +very large appetites--so tame, and so hungry, that the fish who live +with them are at a disadvantage at meal-times, and it is feared that +they must be removed. + +These other fish are plaice, soles, brill, turbot, and skate. The skate +love to lie buried over head and ears in the sand. The faintest outline +of tail or a flapping fin betrays the spot, and you long for an +umbrella-poke from some Zoological-Garden-frequenting old lady, to stir +the lazy creature up; but it is impossible. + +Suddenly, when you are as tired of waiting as Jack was when Coomara was +"engaged thinking," the fin movement becomes more distinct, a cloud of +sand rises into the water, and a grey-coated skate, with two ornamental +knobs upon his tail, flaps slowly away across the pool. + +Sometimes these flat-fish flap upwards to the surface, poke their noses +into the other world, and then, like larks, having gone up with effort, +let themselves easily down again to the ground. + +As we were looking into No. 7, an ambitious little sole took into his +head to climb up the rocks, in the caves of which dwell crusty crabs. By +marvellously agile doubles of his flat little body, he scrambled a good +way up. Then he fell, and two or three valiant efforts still proving +vain, he gave it up. + +"He's turned giddy!" shouted a man beside us, who, like every one else, +was watching the sea-gentlemen with rapt interest. + +Why the little sole tried rock climbing I don't know, and I doubt if he +knew himself. + +Tank 7 is full of Basse--glittering fish who keep their silver armour +clean by scrubbing it among the stones. Like other prettily-dressed +people, they look out of the window all along. + +At Tanks 1, 2, and 3, your chief feelings will be curiosity and +admiration. The sea-flowers and the worms are rather low in the scale of +living things. Far be it from you to decide that there are any living +creatures with whom a loving and intelligent patience will not at last +enable us to hold communion. But though, when you put the point of your +little finger towards a Crassy, he gives it a very affectionate squeeze, +and seems rather anxious to detain it permanently, the balance of +evidence favours the idea that his appetite rather than his affections +are concerned, and that he has only mistaken you for his dinner. + +At present our intercourse is certainly limited, and though the +_Serpulae_ and _Sabellae_ have their heads out of their chimneys all +along, there is no reason to suppose that they take the slightest +interest in the human beings who peer at them through the glass. + +But with the fishes it is quite another thing. When you can fairly look +into eyes as bright and expressive as your own, a long stride has been +taken towards friendly relations. You flatten your nose on one side of +the glass, and Mr. Fish flattens his on the other. If you have the +stoniest of British stares he will outstare you. You long to scratch his +back, or show him some similar attention, and (if he be a cod) to ask +him, as between friends, why on earth (I mean in sea) he wears that +queer horn under his chin. + +Now with the _Crustaceans_(hard-shelled sea-gentlemen) it is different +again. So far as one feels friendly towards a fish it is a fellow +feeling. You know people like this or that cod, as one knows people like +certain sheep, dogs, and horses. And a very short acquaintance with fish +convinces you that not only is there a type of face belonging to each +species, but that individual countenances vary, as with us. It is said +that shepherds know the faces of their sheep as well as of their other +friends, and I have no doubt that the keeper of the Great Aquarium knows +his cod apart quite well. + +And if one's feeling for the _Crustaceans_--the crabs, lobsters, prawns, +&c.--is different, it is not because one feels them to be less +intelligent than fishes, but because their intelligence is altogether a +mysterious, unfathomable, unmeasurable quantity. There's no saying what +they don't know. There is no telling how much they can see. And the +great puzzle is what they can be thinking of. For that the spiny +lobsters are thinking, and "thinking very seriously about something," +you can no more doubt than Jack did about the Merrow. + +The spiny lobsters (commonly, but erroneously called craw-fish or +cray-fish) and the common lobsters are in Tank No. 9. + +Ah! that is a wonderful pool. The first glimpse of the spiny lobsters is +enough for any one who has read of Coomara. We are among the Merrows at +last. + +I don't know that Coomara was a lobster, but I think he must have been a +crustacean. Even his green hair reminds one of the spider-crabs; though +matter-of-fact naturalists tell us that _their_ green hair is only +seaweed which grows luxuriantly on their shells from their quiet habits, +and because they are not given to burrowing, or cleaning themselves +among the stones like the silver-coated basse. At one time, by the bye, +it was supposed that they dressed themselves in weeds, whence they were +called "vanity-crabs." + +But the spiny lobsters--please to look at them, and see if you can so +much as guess their age, their capabilities, or their intentions. I +fancy that the difference between the feelings with which they and the +fishes inspire us is much the same as that between our mental attitude +towards hill-men or house-elves, and towards men and women. + +The spiny lobsters are red. The common lobsters are blue. The spiny +lobsters are large, their eyes are startlingly prominent, their powerful +antennae are longer and redder than Coomara's nose, and wave about in an +inquisitive and somewhat threatening manner. When four or five of them +are gathered together in the centre of the pool, sitting solemnly on +their tails, which are tucked neatly under them, each with his ten sharp +elbows a-kimbo "engaged thinking" (and perhaps talking) "very seriously +about something," it is an impressive but _uncanny_ sight. + +We witnessed such a conclave, sitting in a close circle, face to face, +waving their long antennae; and as we watched, from the shadowy caves +above another merrow appeared. How he ever got his cumbersome coat of +mail, his stiff legs, and long spines safely down the face of the cliff +is a mystery. But he scrambled down ledge by ledge, bravely, and in some +haste. He knew what the meeting was about, though we did not, and soon +took his place, arranged his tail, his scales, his elbows, his +cocked-hat, and what not, and fell a-thinking, like the rest. We left +them so. + +Most of the common lobsters were in their caves, from which they +watched this meeting of the reds with fixed attention. + +In their dark-blue coats, peering with their keen eyes from behind +jutting rocks and the mouths of sea caverns, they looked somewhat like +smuggler sailors! + +Tanks 10 to 13 have fish in them. The Wrasses are very beautiful in +colour. Most gorgeous indeed, if you can look at them in a particular +way. Tank 32 has been made on purpose to display them. It is in another +room. + +No tank in the Aquarium is more popular than Tank 14. Enthusiastic +people will sit down here with needlework or luncheon, and calmly wait +for a good view of--the cuttle-fish! + +Cuttle is the name for the whole race of cephalopods, and is supposed to +be a corruption of the word cuddle, in the sense of hugging. + +They are curious creatures, the one who favoured us with a good view of +him being very like a loose red velvet pincushion with eight legs, and +most of the bran let out. + +Yet this strange, unshapely creature has a distinct brain in a soft kind +of skull, mandibles like a parrot, and plenty of sense. His sight, +hearing, touch, taste, and smell are acute. He lies kicking his legs in +the doorway of his favourite cavern, which he selected for himself and +is attached to, for a provokingly long time before he will come out. +When he does appear, a subdued groan of gratified expectation runs +through the crowd in front of his window, as head over heels, hand over +hand, he sprawls downwards, and moves quickly away with the peculiar +gait induced by having suckers instead of feet to walk with. + +Tank 15 contains eels. It seems to be a curious fact that fresh-water +eels will live in sea-water. I should think, when they have once got +used to the salt, they must find a pond very tasteless afterwards. They +are night-feeders, as school-boys know well. + +Tank 16. Fish--grey mullet. Tank 17. Prawns. + +If with the fishes we had felt with friends, and with the lobsters as if +with hobgoblins, with the prawns we seemed to find ourselves among +ghosts. + +A tank that seems only a pool for a cuttle-fish, or a cod, is a vast +region where prawns and shrimps are the inhabitants. The caves look +huge, and would hold an army of them. The rocks jut boldly out, and +throw strange shadows on the pool. The light falls effectively from +above, and in and out and round about go the prawns, with black eyes +glaring from their diaphanous helmets, in colourless, translucent, if +not transparent armour, and bristling with spears. + +"They are like disembodied spirits," said my husband. + +But in a moment more we exclaimed, "It's like a scene from Martin's +mezzo-tint illustrations of the _Paradise Lost_. They are ghostly hosts +gathering for battle." + +This must seem a most absurd idea in connection with prawns; but if you +have never seen prawns except at the breakfast-table, you must go to the +Great Aquarium to learn how impressive is their appearance in real life. + +The warlike group which struck us so forcibly had gathered rapidly from +all parts of the pool upon a piece of flat table-rock that jutted out +high up. Some unexplained excitement agitated the host; their +innumerable spear-like antennae moved ceaselessly. From above a ray of +light fell just upon the table-rock where they were gathered, making the +waving spears glitter like the bayonet points of a body of troops, and +forming a striking contrast with the dark cliffs and overshadowed water +below, from which stragglers were quickly gathering, some paddling +across the deep pool, others scrambling up the rocks, and all with the +same fierce and restless expression. + +How I longed for a chance of sketching the scene! + +Prawns are not quite such colourless creatures in the sea as they are +here. Why they lose their colour and markings in captivity is not known. +They seem otherwise well. + +They are hungry creatures, and their scent is keen. + +The shrimps keep more out of sight; they burrow in the sand a good deal. +You know one has to look for fresh-water shrimps in a brook if one wants +to find them. + +In Tank 18 are our old friends the hermit-crabs. As a child, I think I +believed that these curious creatures killed the original inhabitants of +the shells which they take for their own dwelling. It is pleasant to +know that this is not the case. The hermit-crab is in fact a +sea-gentleman, who is so unfortunate as to be born naked, and quite +unable to make his own clothes, and who goes nervously about the world, +trying on other people's cast-off coats till he finds one to fit him. + +They are funnily fastidious about their shells, feeling one well inside +and out before they decide to try it, and hesitating sometimes between +two, like a lady between a couple of becoming bonnets. They have been +said to be pugnacious; but I fancy that the old name of soldier-crabs +was given to them under the impression that they killed the former +proprietors of their shells. + +With No. 18 the window tanks come to an end. + +In two other rooms are a number of shallow tanks open at the top, in +which are smaller sea-anemones, star-fish, more crabs, fishes, &c., &c. + +Blennies are quaint, intellectual-looking little fish; friendly too, +and easy to be tamed. In one of Major Holland's charming papers in +_Science Gossip_ he speaks of a pet blenny of his who was not only tame +but musical. "He was exceedingly sensitive to the vibrations of stringed +instruments; the softest note of a violin threw him into a state of +agitation, and a harsh scrape or a vigorous _staccato_ drove him wild." + +In Tank 34 are gurnards, fish-gentlemen, with exquisite blue fins, like +peacock's feathers. + +No. 35 contains dragonets and star-fish. The dragonets are quaint, +wide-awake little fish. I saw one snap at a big, fat, red star-fish, who +was sticking to the side of a rock. Why the dragonet snapped at him I +have no idea. I do not believe he hurt him; but the star-fish gradually +relaxed his hold, and fell slowly and helplessly on to his back; on +which the dragonet looked as silly as the Sultan of Casgar's purveyor +when the hunchback fell beneath his blows. Another dragonet came hastily +up to see what was the matter; but prudently made off again, and left +the star-fish and his neighbour as they were. I waited a long time by +the tank, watching for the result; but in vain. The star-fish, looking +abjectly silly, lay with his white side up, without an effort to help +himself. As to the dragonet, he stuck out his nose, fixed his eyes, and +fell a-thinking. So I left them. + +In Tank 38 are some Norwegian lobsters; red and white, very pretty, and +differing from the English ones in form as well as colour. + +The green anemones in Tank 33 are very beautiful. + +The arrangement of most of these tanks is temporary. As some +sea-gentlemen are much more rapacious than others, and as some prey upon +others, the arranging of them must have been very like the old puzzle of +the fox, the goose, and the bag of seed. Then when new creatures arrive +it necessitates fresh arrangements. + +There is not much vegetation as yet in the tanks, which may puzzle some +people who have been accustomed to balance the animal and vegetable life +in their aquaria by introducing full-grown sea-weeds. But it has been +found that these often fail, and that it is better to trust to the weeds +which come of themselves from the action of light upon the invisible +seeds which float in all sea-water. + +The pools are also kept healthy by the water being kept in constant +motion through the agency of pipes, steam-engines, and a huge reservoir +of sea-water. + +It is not easy to speak with due admiration of the scientific skill, the +loving patience, the mindfulness of the public good which must have gone +to the forming of this Public Aquarium. With what different eyes must +innumerable "trippers" from the less-educated masses of our people look +into tide pools or crab holes, during their brief holiday at the +seaside, if they have previously been "trippers" to the Crystal +Palace, and visited the Great Aquarium. + +Let us hope that it may stir up some sight-seers to be naturalists, and +some naturalists to devote their powers to furthering our too limited +friendship with the sea-gentry. How much remains to be done may be +gathered from the fact that we can as yet keep no deep-sea Merrows in +aquaria, only shore-dwellers will live with us, and not all of these. +And so insuperable, as yet, are the difficulties of transport, that +"distinguished foreigners" are rare indeed. + +Still, as it stands, this Great Aquarium is wonderful--wonderful +exceedingly. There is a still greater one at Brighton, holding greater +wonders--a baby alligator amongst them--and we are very glad to hear +that one is to be established in Manchester also. + +It has been well said that a love of nature is a strong characteristic +even of the roughest type of Britons. An Englishman's first idea of a +holiday is to get into the country, even if his second is apt to be a +search for the country beer-house. + +Of birds, and beasts, and trees, and flowers, there is a good deal even +of rustic lore. Of the wonders of the deep we know much less. + +Thousands of us can sing with understanding, + + O Lord, how manifold are thy works! + In wisdom hast thou made them all. + The earth is full of Thy riches. + +Surely hereafter more of us shall swell the antiphon, + + So is the great and wide sea also, + Wherein are things creeping innumerable, + Both small and great beasts. + + * * * * * + + NOTE.--A Great Aquarium (and something more) is being made + at Naples by a young German naturalist--Dr. Dohrn, of Stettin--at + an expense of between L7000 and L8000, nearly all of which comes + out of his own pocket. The ground-floor of the building (an area of + nearly eight thousand square feet) is to hold the Great Aquarium. + It is hoped that the money obtained by opening this to the public + will both support the Aquarium itself, and do something towards + defraying the expenses of the upper story of the Zoological + Station, as it is called. This will contain a scientific library, + including Dr. Dohrn's own valuable private collection, and tables + for naturalists to work at, furnished with necessary appurtenances, + including tanks supplied with a constant stream of sea-water. + Sea-fishing and dredging will be carried on in connection with the + establishment, to supply subjects for study. Dr. Dohrn proposes to + let certain of these tables to governments and scientific + societies, who will then have the privilege of giving certificates, + which will enable their naturalists to enjoy all the benefits of + the institution. + + Surely some new acquaintances will be made among the sea-gentry in + this paradise of naturalists! + + + + + +TINY'S TRICKS AND TOBY'S TRICKS. + +TINY. + + +[Illustration] + +"Oh Toby, my dear old Toby, you portly and princely Pug! + +"You know it's bad for you to lie in the fender:--Father says that's +what makes you so fat--and I want you to come and sit with me on the +Kurdistan rug. + +"Put your lovely black nose in my lap, and I'll count your great velvet +wrinkles, and comfort you with kisses. + +"If you'll only keep out of the fender--Father says you'll have a fit if +you don't!--and give good advice to your poor Little Missis. + +"Father says you are the wisest creature he knows, and you are but eight +years old, and three months ago I was six. + +"And yet Mother says I'm the silliest little girl that she ever met +with, because I am always picking up tricks. + +[Illustration] + +"She does not know where I learnt to stand on one leg (unless it was +from a goose), but it has made one of my shoulders stick out more than +the other. + +"It wasn't the goose who taught me to whistle up and down-stairs. I +learnt that last holidays from my brother. + +"The baker's man taught me to put my tongue in my cheek when I'm writing +copies, for I saw him do it when he was receipting a bill. + +"And I learnt to wrinkle my forehead, and squeeze up my eyes, and make +faces with my lips by imitating the strange doctor who attended us when +we were ill. + +"It was Brother Jack himself who showed me that the way to squint is to +look at both sides of your nose. + +"And then, Toby--would you believe it?--he turned round last holidays +and said--'Look here, Tiny, if the wind changes when you're making that +face it'll stay there, and remember you can't squint properly and keep +your eye on the weathercock at the same time to see how it blows.' + +"But boys are so mean!--and I catch stammering from his school +friend--'_Tut-tut-tut-tut-Tom_,' as we call him--but I soon leave it off +when he goes. + +"I did not learn stooping and poking out my chin from any one; it came +of itself. It is so hard to sit up; but Mother says that much my worst +trick + +"Is biting my finger nails; and I've bitten them nearly all down to the +quick. + +"She says if I don't lose these tricks, and leave off learning fresh +ones, I shall never grow up like our pretty great-great-grandmamma. + +"Do you know her, dear Toby? I don't think you do. I don't think you +ever look at pictures, intelligent as you are! + +"It's the big portrait, by Romney, of a beautiful lady, sitting +beautifully up, with her beautiful hands lying in her lap. + +"Looking over her shoulder, out of lovely eyes, with a sweet smile on +her lips, in the old brocade Mother keeps in the chest, and a pretty +lace cap. + +"I should very much like to be like her when I grow up to that age; +Mother says she was twenty-six. + +"And of course I know she would not have looked so nice in her picture +if she'd squinted, and wrinkled her forehead, and had one shoulder out, +and her tongue in her cheek, and a round back, and her chin poked, and +her fingers all swollen with biting;--but, oh, Toby, you clever Pug! how +am I to get rid of my tricks? + +"That is, if I must give them up; but it seems so hard to get into +disgrace + +"For doing what comes natural to one, with one's own eyes, and legs, and +fingers, and face." + + +TOBY. + +"Remove your arms from my neck, Little Missis--I feel unusually +apoplectic--and let me take two or three turns on the rug, + +"Whilst I turn the matter over in my mind, for never was there so +puzzled a Pug! + +"I am, as your respected Father truly observes, a most talented +creature. + +"And as to fit subjects for family portraits and personal +appearance--from the top of my massive brow to the tip of my curly +tail, I believe myself to be perfect in every feature. + +"And when my ears are just joined over my forehead like a black velvet +cap, I'm reckoned the living likeness of a late eminent divine and once +popular preacher. + +[Illustration] + +"Did your great-great-grandmamma ever take a prize at a show? But let +that pass--the real question is this: + +"How is it that what I am most highly commended for, should in your +case be taken amiss? + +"Why am I reckoned the best and cleverest of dogs? Because I've picked +up tricks so quickly ever since I was a pup. + +"And if I couldn't wrinkle my forehead and poke out my chin, and grimace +at the judges, do you suppose I should ever have been--Class Pug. First +Prize--Champion and Gold Cup? + +"We have one thing in common--I do _not_ find it easy to sit up. + +"But I learned it, and so will you. I can't imagine worse manners than +to put one's tongue in one's cheek; as a rule, I hang mine gracefully +out on one side. + +"And I've no doubt it's a mistake to gnaw your fingers. I gnawed a good +deal in my puppyhood, but chewing my paws is a trick that I never tried. + +"How you stand on one leg I cannot imagine; with my figure it's all I +can do to stand upon four. + +"I balance biscuit on my nose. Do you? I jump through a hoop (an +atrocious trick, my dear, after one's first youth--and a full meal!)--I +bark three cheers for the Queen, and I shut the dining-room door. + +"I lie flat on the floor at the word of command--In short, I've as many +tricks as you have, and every one of them counts to my credit; + +"Whilst yours--so you say--only bring you into disgrace, which I could +not have thought possible if you had not said it. + +"Indeed--but for the length of my experience and the solidity of my +judgment--this would tempt me to think your mamma a very foolish person, +and to advise you to disobey her; but I do _not_, Little Missis, for I +know + +"That if you belong to good and kind people, it is well to let them +train you up in the way in which they think you should go. + +"Your excellent parents trained me to tricks; and very senseless some of +them seemed, I must say: + +"But I've lived to be proud of what I've been taught; and glad too that +I learned to obey. + +"For, depend upon it, if you never do as you're told till you know the +reason why, or till you find that you must; + +"You are much less of a Prize Pug than you might have been if you'd +taken good government on trust." + + * * * * * + +"Take me back to your arms, Little Missis, I feel cooler, and calmer in +my mind. + +"Yes, there can be no doubt about it. You must do what your mother +tells you, for you know that she's wise and kind. + +"You must take as much pains to _lose your_ tricks as I took to _learn +mine_, long ago; + +"And we may all live to see you yet--'Class, Young Lady. First Prize. +Gold Medal--of a Show.'" + + +TINY. + +"Oh, Toby, my dear old Toby, you wise and wonderful Pug! + +"Don't struggle off yet, stay on my knee for a bit, you'll be much +hotter in the fender, and I want to give you a great, big hug. + +"What are you turning round and round for? you'll make yourself giddy, +Toby. If you're looking for your tail, it is there, all right. + +"You can't see it for yourself because you're so fat, and because it is +curled so tight. + +"I dare say you could play with it, like Kitty, when you were a pup, but +it must be a long time now since you've seen it. + +"It's rather rude of you, Mr. Pug, to lie down with your back to me, and +a grunt, but I know you don't mean it. + +"I wanted to hug you, Toby, because I do thank you for giving me such +good advice, and I know every word of it's true. + +"I mean to try hard to follow it, and I'll tell you what I shall do. + +"Nurse wants to put bitter stuff on the tips of my fingers, to cure me +of biting them, and now I think I shall let her. + +"I know they're not fit to be seen, but she says they would soon become +better. + +"I mean to keep my hands behind my back a good deal till they're well, +and to hold my head up, and turn out my toes; and every time I give way +to one of my tricks, I shall go and stand (_on both legs_) before the +picture, and confess it to great-great-grandmamma. + +"Just fancy if I've no tricks left this time next year, Toby! Won't that +show how clever we are? + +"I for trying so hard to do what I'm told, and you for being so wise +that people will say--'That sensible pug cured that silly little girl +when not even her mother could mend her.' + +"--Ah! Bad Dog! Where are you slinking off to?--Oh, Toby, darling! do, +_do_ take a little of your own good advice, and try to cure yourself of +lying in the fender!" + + + + + + +[Illustration: THE OWL IN THE IVY BUSH] + + + + +THE OWL IN THE IVY BUSH; + +OR, + +THE CHILDREN'S BIRD OF WISDOM. + + + + +INTRODUCTION. + + + "Hoot toots, man, yon's a queer bird!" + + _Bonnie Scotland._ + +I AM an Owl; a very fluffy one, in spite of all that that Bad +Boy pulled out! I live in an Ivy Bush. Children are nothing to me, +naturally, so it seems strange that I should begin, at my time of life, +to observe their little ways and their humours, and to give them good +advice. + +And yet it is so. I am the Friend of Young People. In my flight abroad I +watch them. As I sit meditating in my Ivy Bush, it is their little +matters which I turn over in my fluffy head. I have established a +letter-box for their communications at the Hole in the Tree. No other +address will find me. + +It is well known that I am a Bird of Wisdom. I am also an Observing +Bird; and though my young friends may think I see less than I do, +because of my blinking, and because I detest that vulgar glare of bright +light without which some persons do not seem able to see what goes on +around them, I would have children to know that if I can blink on +occasion, and am not apt to let every starer read my counsel in my eyes, +I am wide awake all the same. I am on the look-out when it's so dark +that other folk can't see an inch before their noses, and (a word to the +foolish and naughty!) I can see what is doing behind my back. And +Wiseacre, Observer, and Wide-awake--I am the Children's Owl. + +Before I open my mouth on their little affairs, before even I open my +letters (if there are any waiting for me) I will explain how it came +about that I am the Children's Owl. + +It is all owing to that little girl; the one with the fluffy hair and +the wise eyes. As an Observer I have noticed that not only I, but other +people, seem to do what she wants, and as a Wiseacre I have reflected +upon it as strange, because her temper is as soft and fluffy as her hair +(which mine is not), and she always seems ready to give way to others +(which is never my case--if I can help it). On the occasion I am about +to speak of, I could _not_ help it. + +[Illustration] + +It was last summer that that Bad Boy caught me, and squeezed me into a +wicker cage. Little did I think I should ever live to be so poked out, +and rummaged, and torn to shreds by such a thing as a boy! I bit him, +but he got me into the cage and put a cloth over it. Then he took me to +his father, who took me to the front door of the house, where he is +coachman and gardener, and asked for Little Miss to come out and see the +new pet Tom had caught for her. + +"It's a nasty-tempered brute, but she's such a one for taming things," +said the coachman, whipping off the cloth to show me to the housemaid, +and letting in a glare of light that irritated me to a frenzy. I flew at +the housemaid, and she flew into the house. Then I rolled over and +growled and hissed under my beak, and tried to hide my eyes in my +feathers. + +"Little Miss won't tame me," I muttered. + +[Illustration] + +She did not try long. When she heard of me she came running out, the +wind blowing her fluffy hair about her face, and the sun shining on it. +Fluffed out by the wind, and changing colour in the light and shade, the +hair down her back is not entirely unlike the feathers of my own, though +less sober perhaps in its tints. Like mine it makes a small head look +large, and as she had big wise eyes, I have seen creatures less like an +owl than Little Miss. Her voice is not so hoarse as mine. It is clear +and soft, as I heard when she spoke: + +"Oh, _how_ good of you! And how good of Tom! I do so love owls. I +always get Mary to put the silver owl by me at luncheon, though I am +not allowed to eat pepper. And I have a brown owl, a china one, sitting +on a book for a letter weight. He came from Germany. And Captain Barton +gave me an owl pencil-case on my birthday, because I liked hearing +about his real owl, but, oh, I never hoped I should have a real owl of +my very own. It _was_ kind of Tom." + +[Illustration] + +To hear that Bad Boy called kind was too much for endurance, and I let +them see how savage I felt. If the wicker work had not been very strong +the cage would not have held me. + +"He's a Tartar," said the coachman. + +"Oh no, Williams!" said Little Miss, "he's only frightened by the light. +Give me the cloth, please." + +"Take care, Miss. He'll bite you," cried the coachman, as she put the +cloth over the cage, and then over her own head. + +"No he won't! I don't mind his snapping and hissing. I want him to see +me, and know me. Then perhaps he'll get to like me, and be tame, and sit +on the nursery clock and look wise. Captain Barton's owl used to sit on +his clock. Poor fellow! Dear old owlie! Don't growl, my owl. Can you +hoot, darling? I should like to hear you hoot." + +Sometimes as I sit in my Ivy Bush, and the moon shines on the spiders' +webs and reminds me of the threads of her hair, on a mild, sleepy night, +if there's nothing stirring but the ivy boughs; sitting, I say, blinking +between a dream and a doze, I fancy I see her face close to mine, as it +was that day with the wicker work between. Our eyes looking at each +other, and our fluffiness mixed up by the wind. Then I try to remember +all the kind things she said to me to coax me to leave my ivy bush, and +go to live on the nursery clock. But I can't remember half. I was in +such a rage at the time, and when you are in a rage you miss a good +deal, and forget a good deal. + +I know that at last she left off talking to me, and I could see her wise +eyes swimming in tears. Then she left me alone under the cloth. + +"Well, Miss," said the coachman, "you don't make much of him, do ye? +He's a Tartar, Miss, I'm afraid." + +[Illustration] + +"I think, Williams, that he's too old. Captain Barton's owl was a little +owlet when he first got him. I shall never tame this one, Williams, and +I never was so disappointed in all my life. Captain Barton said he kept +an owl to keep himself good and wise, because nobody could be foolish in +the face of an owl sitting on his clock. He says both his godfathers are +dead, and he has taken his owl for his godfather. These are his jokes, +Williams, but I had set my heart on having an owl on the nursery clock. +I do think I have never wished so much for anything in the world as that +Tom's owl would be our Bird of Wisdom. But he never will. He will never +let me tame him. He wants to be a wild owl all his life. I love him very +much, and I should like him to have what he wants, and not be miserable. +Please thank Tom very much, and please ask him to let him go." + +"I'm sorry I brought him, Miss, to trouble you," said the coachman. "But +Tom won't let him go. He'd a lot of trouble catching him, and if he's no +good to you, Tom'll be glad of him to stuff. He's got some glass eyes +out of a stuffed fox the moths ate, and he's bent on stuffing an owl, is +Tom. The eyes would be too big for a pheasant, but they'll look well +enough in an owl, he thinks." + +My hearing is very acute, and not a word of that Bad Boy's brutal +intentions was lost on me. I shrunk among my feathers and shivered with +despair; but when I heard the voice of Little Miss I rounded my ear once +more. + +"No, Williams, no! He must not be stuffed. Oh, please beg Tom to come +to me. Perhaps I can give him something to persuade him not. If he must +stuff an owl, please, please let him stuff a strange owl. One I haven't +made friends with. Not this one. He is very wild, but he is very lovely +and soft, and I do so want him to be let go." + +"Well, Miss, I'll send Tom, and you can settle it with him. All I say, +he's a Tartar, and stuffing's too good for him." + +Whether she bribed Tom, or persuaded him, I don't know, but Little Miss +got her way, and that Bad Boy let me go, and I went back to my Ivy Bush. + + + + +OWLHOOT I. + + + "What can't be cured must be endured." + _Old Proverb._ + + +It was the wish to see Little Miss once more that led my wings past her +nursery window; besides, I had a curiosity to look at the clock. + +It is an eight-day clock, in a handsome case, and would, undoubtedly, +have been a becoming perch for a bird of my dignified appearance, but I +will not describe it to-day. Nor will I speak of my meditations as I sit +in my Ivy Bush like any other common owl, and reflect that if I had not +had my own way, but had listened to Little Miss, I might have sat on an +Eight-day Clock, and been godfather to the children. It is not seemly +for an owl to doubt his own wisdom, but as I have taken upon me, for the +sake of Little Miss, to be a child's counsellor, I will just observe, +in passing, that though it is very satisfactory at the time to get your +own way, you may live to wish that you had taken other folk's advice +instead. + +[Illustration] + +From that nursery I have taken flight to others. I sail by the windows, +and throw a searching eye through these bars which are, I believe, +placed there to keep top-heavy babies from tumbling out. Sometimes I +peer down the chimney. From the nook of a wall or the hollow of a tree, +I overlook the children's gardens and playgrounds. I have an eye to +several schools, and I fancy (though I may be wrong) that I should look +well seated on the top of an easel--just above the black-board, with a +piece of chalk in my feathery foot. + +Not that I have any notion of playing school-master, or even of advising +school-masters and parents how to make their children good and wise. I +am the Children's Owl--their very own--and all my good advice is +intended to help them to improve themselves. + +It is wonderful how children _do_ sometimes improve! I knew a fine +little fellow, much made of by his family and friends, who used to be so +peevish about all the little ups and downs of life, and had such a +lamentable whine in his voice when he was thwarted in any trifle, that +if you had heard without seeing him, you'd have sworn that the most +miserable wretch in the world was bewailing the worst of catastrophes +with failing breath. And all the while there was not a handsomer, +healthier, better fed, better bred, better dressed, and more dearly +loved little boy in all the parish. When you might have thought, by the +sound of it, that some starving skeleton of a creature was moaning for a +bit of bread, the young gentleman was only sobbing through the soap and +lifting his voice above the towels, because Nurse would wash his fair +rosy cheeks. And when cries like those of one vanquished in battle and +begging and praying for his life, rang through the hall and up the front +stairs, it proved to be nothing worse than Master Jack imploring his +friends to "_please, please_" and "_do, do_," let him stay out to run in +a final "go as you please" race with the young Browns (who dine a +quarter of an hour later), instead of going in promptly when the gong +sounded for luncheon. + +[Illustration] + +Now the other day I peeped into a bedroom of that little boy's home. The +sun was up, and so was Jack, but one of his numerous Aunts was not. She +was in bed with a headache, and to this her pale face, her eyes +shunning the light like my own, and her hair restlessly tossed over the +pillow bore witness. When a knock came on the bedroom door, she started +with pain, but lay down again and cried--"Come in!" + +[Illustration] + +The door opened, but no one came in; and outside the voices of the +little boy and his nurse were audible. + +"I want to show her my new coat." + +"You can't, Master Jack. Your Aunt's got a dreadful headache, and can't +be disturbed." + +No peevish complaints from Jack: only a deep sigh. + +"I'm very sorry about her headache; and I'm very very sorry about my +coat. For I am going out, and it will never be so new again." + +His Aunt spoke feebly. + +"Nurse, I must see his coat. Let him come in." + +Enter Jack. + +It was his first manly suit, and he was trying hard for a manly soul +beneath it, as a brave boy should. He came in very gently, but with +conscious pride glowing in his rosy cheeks and out of his shining eyes. +His cheeks were very red, for a step in life is a warming thing, and so +is a cloth suit when you've been used to frocks. + +It was a bottle-green coat, with large mother-o'-pearl buttons and three +coachman's capes; and there were leggings to match. The beaver hat, too, +was new, and becomingly cocked, as he stood by his Aunt's bedside and +smiled. + +"What a fine coat, Jack!" + +"Made by a tailor, Auntie Julie. Real pockets!" + +"You don't say so!" + +He nodded. + +"Leggings too!" and he stuck up one leg at a sudden right angle on to +the bed; a rash proceeding, but the boy has a straight little figure, +and with a hop or two he kept his balance. + +"My dear Jack, they are grand. How warm they must keep your legs!" + +He shook his beaver hat. + +"No. They only tickles. That's what they do." + +There was a pause. His Aunt remembered the old peevish ways. She did not +want to encourage him to discard his winter leggings, and was doubtful +what to say. But in a moment more his eyes shone, and his face took that +effulgent expression which some children have when they are resolved +upon being good. + +"--_and as I can't shake off the tickle, I have to bear it_," added the +little gentleman. + +I call him the little gentleman advisedly. There is no stronger sign of +high breeding in young people, than a cheerful endurance of the rubs of +life. A temper that fits one's fate, a spirit that rises with the +occasion. It is this kind of courage which the Gentlemen of England +have shown from time immemorial, through peace and war, by land and sea, +in every country and climate of the habitable globe. Jack is a child of +that Empire on which the sun never sets, and if he live he is like to +have larger opportunities of bearing discomfort than was afforded by the +woolly worry of his bottle-green leggings. I am in good hopes that he +will not be found wanting. + +Some such thoughts, I believe, occurred to his Aunt. + +"That's right, Jack. What a man you are!" + +[Illustration] + +The rosy cheeks became carmine, and Jack flung himself upon his Aunt, +and kissed her with resounding smacks. + +A somewhat wrecked appearance which she presented after this boisterous +hug, recalled the headache to his mind, and as he settled the beaver +hat, which had gone astray, he said ruefully, + +"Is your headache _very_ bad, Auntie Julie?" + +"Rather bad, Jack. _And as I can't shake if off, I have to bear it._" + +He went away on tiptoe, and it was only after he had carefully and +gently closed the bedroom door behind him, that he departed by leaps +and bounds to show himself in his bottle-green coat and capes, and +white buttons and leggings to match, and beaver hat to boot, first to +the young Browns, and after that to the General Public. + +[Illustration] + +As an Observer, I may say that it was a sight worth seeing; and as a +Bird of some wisdom, I prophesy well of that boy. + + +PROVERBS. + +Fine feathers make fine birds. + +Manners make the man. + +Clowns are best in their own company; gentlemen are best everywhere. + +Where there's a will there's a way. + +All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. + +What can't be cured must be endured. + +[Illustration: OWL HOOT NO 2] + + + + +OWLHOOT II. + +"Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling." +_The Raven._ + +"Taffy was a thief."--_Old Song._ + + +I find the following letters at the Hole in the Tree. + +"X LINES, SOUTH CAMP, ALDERSHOT. + +"SIR,--You speak with great feeling of that elevated position +(I allude, of course, to the top of the eight-day clock), which +circumstances led you somewhat hastily to decline. It would undoubtedly +have become you, and less cannot be said for such a situation as the +summit of an easel, overlooking the blackboard, in an establishment for +the education of youth. Meanwhile it may interest you to hear of a bird +(not of your wisdom, but with parts, and a respectable appearance) who +secured a somewhat similar seat in adopting that kind of home which you +would not. It was in driving through a wood at some little distance from +the above address that we found a wounded crow, and brought him home to +our hut. He became a member of the family, and received the name of +Slyboots, for reasons with which it is unnecessary to trouble you. He +was made very welcome in the drawing-room, but he preferred the kitchen. +The kitchen is a brick room detached from the wooden hut. It was once, +in fact, an armourer's shop, and has since been converted to a kitchen. +The floor is rudely laid, and the bricks gape here and there. A barrack +fender guards the fire-place, and a barrack poker reposes in the fender. +It is a very ponderous poker of unusual size and the commonest +appearance, but with a massive knob at the upper end which was wont to +project far and high above the hearth. It was to this seat that Slyboots +elevated himself by his own choice, and became the Kitchen Crow. Here he +spent hours watching the cook, and taking tit-bits behind her back. He +ate what he could (more, I fear, than he ought), and hid the rest in +holes and corners. The genial neighbourhood of the oven caused him no +inconvenience. His glossy coat, being already as black as a coal, was +not damaged by a certain grimeyness which is undoubtedly characteristic +of the (late) armourer's shop, of which the chimney is an inveterate +smoker. Companies of his relatives constantly enter the camp by ways +over which the sentries have no control (the Balloon Brigade being not +yet even in the clouds); but Slyboots showed no disposition to join +them. They flaunt and forage in the Lines, they inspect the ashpits and +cookhouses, they wheel and manoeuvre on the parades, but Slyboots sat +serene upon his poker. He had a cookhouse all to himself.... He died. We +must all die; but we need not all die of repletion, which I fear, was +his case. He buried his last meal between two bricks in the kitchen +floor, and covered it very tidily with a bit of newspaper. The poker is +vacant. Sir, I was bred to the sword and not to the pen, but I have a +foolish desire for literary fame. I should be better pleased to be in +print than to be promoted--for that matter one seems as near as the +other--and my wife agrees with me. She is of a literary turn, and has +helped me in the composition of this, but we both fear that the story +having no moral you will not admit it into your Owlhoots. But if your +wisdom could supply this, or your kindness overlook the defect, it would +afford great consolation to a bereaved family to have printed a +biography of the dear deceased. For we were greatly attached to him, +though he preferred the cook. I can at any rate give you my word as a +man of honour that these incidents are true, though, out of soldierly +modesty, I will not trouble you with my name, but with much respect +subscribe myself by that of + +"SLYBOOTS." + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration] + +The gallant officer is too modest. This biography is not only true but +brief, and these are rare merits in a memoir. As to the moral--it is not +far to seek. Dear children, for whom I hoot! avoid greediness. If +Slyboots had eaten tit-bits in moderation, he might be sitting on the +poker to this day. I have great pleasure in making his brief career +public to the satisfaction of his gallant friend, and I should be glad +to hear that the latter had got his step by the same post as his +Owlhoot. + +The second letter is much farther from literary excellence than the +first. I fear this little boy plays truant from school as well as taking +apples which do not belong to him. It is high time that he learnt to +spell, and also to observe the difference between _meum_ and _tuum_. +From not being well grounded on these two points, many boys have lost +good situations in life when they grew up to be men. + +"deer mister howl,--as you say you see behind your bak i spose its you +told varmer jones of me for theres a tree with a whole in it just behind +the orchurd he wolloped I shameful and I'll have no more of his apples +they be a deal sowerer than yud think though they look so red, but do +you call yourself a childerns friend and tell tails i dont i can tell +you. + +"TOM TURNIP." + + + + +Richard Clay & Sons, Ltd., London & Bungay. + +The present Series of Mrs. Ewing's Works is the only authorized, +complete, and uniform Edition published. + +It will consist of 18 volumes, Small Crown 8vo, at 2s. 6d. per vol., +issued, as far as possible, in chronological order, and these will +appear at the rate of two volumes every two months, so that the Series +will be completed within 18 months. The device of the cover was +specially designed by a Friend of Mrs. Ewing. + +The following is a list of the books included in the Series-- + +1. MELCHIOR'S DREAM, AND OTHER TALES. + +2. MRS. OVERTHEWAY'S REMEMBRANCES. + +3. OLD-FASHIONED FAIRY TALES. + +4. A FLAT IRON FOR A FARTHING. + +5. THE BROWNIES, AND OTHER TALES. + +6. SIX TO SIXTEEN. + +7. LOB LIE-BY-THE-FIRE, AND OTHER TALES. + +8. JAN OF THE WINDMILL. + +9. VERSES FOR CHILDREN, AND SONGS. + +10. THE PEACE EGG--A CHRISTMAS MUMMING + PLAY--HINTS FOR PRIVATE + THEATRICALS, &c. + +11. A GREAT EMERGENCY, AND OTHER + TALES. + +12. BROTHERS OF PITY, AND OTHER TALES + OF BEASTS AND MEN. + +13. WE AND THE WORLD, Part I. + +14. WE AND THE WORLD, Part II. + +15. JACKANAPES--DADDY DARWIN'S DOVECOTE--THE + STORY OF A SHORT LIFE. + +16. MARY'S MEADOW, AND OTHER TALES + OF FIELDS AND FLOWERS. + +17. MISCELLANEA, including The Mystery of the + Bloody Hand--Wonder Stories--Tales of the + Khoja, and other translations. + +18. JULIANA HORATIA EWING AND HER + BOOKS, with a selection from Mrs. Ewing's + Letters. + + * * * * * + +S.P.C.K., NORTHUMBERLAND AVENUE, LONDON, W.C. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BROTHERS OF PITY AND OTHER TALES OF +BEASTS AND MEN*** + + +******* This file should be named 16121.txt or 16121.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/1/2/16121 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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