Appearance of the _Mare_ in the morning--Forest etiquette--Mode of
obtaining possession of the best _Mare_--Every subterfuge fair--The
jocose sportsman--The quarrel--Reveries in the hut--Comparison
between meeting a lady and watching for a wolf.
The _Mares_ on the borders of which these scenes of strife and carnage
take place, are found by the morning sun surrounded by a crimson circle,
and all the horrid details of the battle-field--proof that the weak have
been slaughtered and overcome by the strong; a humiliating sight! for
the desolation created by the bad passions of man is far too like it.
Sometimes these _Mares_ are from two to three hundred feet in
circumference, and these may be truly termed the diamonds of the forest.
The _Mare_ No. 1., fed by small but always flowing springs, is full,
when others are dried up, and is frequented by troops of animals, savage
and meek, which thirst and heat drive there from all points of the
compass. These _Mares_, but little known, few in number, much sought
after--become, more especially at the period of the dog-days, very
difficult to find. Considered always as the property of the first comer,
the poacher, who is better acquainted than any other sportsman with the
localities in which they are to be found, generally takes up his
quarters near them late at night, and installs himself; sleeps there,
sups there, and, determined not to leave it under any pretext, laughs in
the face of the unfortunate wight who arrives after him, in the happy
delusion that he has anticipated every one else. For it is a forest law,
and acknowledged by all, that two sportsmen cannot, without disturbing
one another, sit down at the same _Mare_; possession is in this not only
nine but ten points of the law; and, if a mere lad, with a
fowling-piece, happens to place himself first on its banks, no giant
seven feet high would think of using his superior strength to expel him.
Such is the law--such is the custom--to act in defiance of it would
expose the culprit to the chance of receiving a charge of No. 3 in his
jacket; and as each _Mare_ has its wooden hut, in successive summers,
constructed by you, embellished by me, knocked in, cut about, injured by
some one else, and repaired by all--the first man who puts the stock of
his gun on the floor of the cabin becomes immediately and incontestibly
the lucky proprietor of it for that night.
And how shall I explain to you the thousand cunning tricks, the
diabolical, the ingenious finesses, the Philipistic and Machiavellian
diplomacy, which sportsmen employ one towards the other to obtain
possession? Two friends, for instance, meet by accident on the same
road; with what perfect and impudent lies do they entertain each
other!--with what gusto do they try and take one another in!--what
cheating doubts do they not mutually endeavour to raise, in their desire
to induce each other to take the wrong road! With the effrontery of a
_diplomate_, with the assurance of a secretary of legation,--one
affirms, his hand on his heart, and looking towards heaven, that he is
going to the left, when it is his positive intention, well-considered
beforehand, to go to the right. No, France and England, Bresson and
Bulwer, playing their game of chess of the Spanish marriages on the
green cloth of political rascality,--never said anything comparable to
the devices of these lying chevaliers of the forest.
Everything is permitted--every stratagem is fair, so long as either is
endeavouring to triumph over his adversary; and then, when they have
gone so far as to be able to wish one another good afternoon, and each
has convinced himself that he has put the other on the wrong road--that,
thank the stars, his rival is off, that he is far off, that he cannot
see him--what haste! what strides and leaps to get speedily to the spot,
and make himself safe! The running of the celebrated Greek, who, with
his breast laid open by a ghastly wound, ran eighty miles in ten hours
to announce to the impatient Athenians the victory of Marathon, was the
pace of a tortoise compared with the demon-racing of these _chasseurs_.
And, after all this anxiety and rapid locomotion,--after turning and
winding in and out of the wood, and round the wood to avoid the
open--across the brook to avoid the bridge--through the brambles and
thick underwood to avoid the open path--when you think you have cheated,
or, at any rate, distanced your enemy,--when you perceive in front of
you the object of your hopes,--the well-known and much-desired hut which
seems to invite you to repose after your long day's walk--why, at that
interesting moment, even your own, your very own brother would be a
veritable Bedouin in your eyes, a man to be put out of the way any how,
if he attempted to stop you.
At such a crisis, if a real sportsman were to hear that his house was on
fire, that his banker was off to America, taking with him his wife and
his money, he would not, I say, in such a moment turn his head round to
see which way they went;--Imagine, then, when in order to succeed you
have made yourself out a cheat of the first water, and employed every
possible subterfuge,--conceive what would be the extent of your anger
and indignation, what your disgust,--when on arriving at your coveted
_Mare_, at your oasis, at your paradise, at the spot for which you have
toiled and invented such lies, to find the hut--occupied!
Sometimes you may find in the possessor a _chasseur_, who likes to amuse
himself at your expense,--a jocose fellow, who, hearing you at a
distance working your way through the underwood, and seeing you through
the leaves advancing with eager and rapid steps to the spot, conceals
himself behind the entrance, and as you are just on the point of
entering the hut, your foot just on the step, the droll sportsman puts
his ugly head out of the window, as a yellow tortoise would his out of
his shell, asking you, in most polite terms, what o'clock it is; or if
it should chance to be raining a deluge at the time, remark in
compassionate accents, "Why, sir, you seem rather damp!"
Job was never so unfortunate as to arrive at a _Mare_ already occupied;
had he done so, it is not by any means clear to me that he would have
been able to contain his wrath. For my own part, I have frequently been
beside myself with vexation, and on one occasion was very nearly having
a quarrel to the death with my best friend. We had accidentally met in
the forest, as described, and had deceived each other, as two Greeks of
Pera would, when making a bargain. After our _rencontre_, my friend went
to the right, I to the left; he on the sly, turning and twisting by
footpath and wood to conceal himself from observation; I, on the
contrary, went directly to the spot, and striding away as fast as I
could go, arrived at the _Mare_ about three minutes before him, scarlet
and streaming with exertion, and quite out of breath. My friend who was
equally heated, but, in addition, disappointed and in a furious rage,
addressed me in most insulting language, declaring between the hiccup,
which his want of breath and want of coolness had produced, that I was
a Jesuit, a hypocrite; and many other affectionate epithets did he apply
to me with the utmost volubility.
If I had not been the fortunate occupant of the hut, which gratifying
fact was as honey to my lips and oil to my bones, and had a most
soothing influence on my temper, I should naturally have revolted at
such conduct; but this constrained me, and I remained perfectly quiet,
determined to allow my lungs to regain their composure before I replied.
Seeing this, his rage increased tenfold, and he proposed a duel with our
fowling-pieces, hunting-knives, or two large sticks; he offered me,
also, an aquatic duel of a most novel character,--namely, for both of us
to undress and endeavour to drown each other in the _Mare_! In short, he
continued for at least a quarter of an hour to rave and rail without
ceasing.
But of all this abuse I took not the slightest notice, remaining
perfectly calm, sitting in my hut like Solomon on his throne, and
fanning my heated countenance with the brim of my broad hat, as if I had
been in a glass-house. It is true I laughed in my sleeve, looked
vacantly at the blue heavens, and whistled the chorus or snatches of a
hunting song. Finding therefore, it was impossible to move me, my
adversary finished by getting tired of roaring and abusing; and having
rubbed the perspiration from his distorted face with a force which
seemed as if he would rub his nose off, he turned on his heel with the
grace of a wild boar that had received a brace of balls in his
haunches,--looking me fiercely in the face, and pouring forth as a last
broadside, a dozen of oaths in the true _argot_ style, which seemed to
dry up the very plants near him, and silenced the frogs that were
croaking in the _Mare_.
Such, however, is the force of habit and of this rule; and so truly does
every one feel that on the strict observance of it depends the
tranquillity of all, that the law of first possession is never violated;
although it is but simply acknowledged by the justice and good sense of
every sportsman, it is quite as well established in their manners and
customs as if it were written on tables of iron. The consequence is,
that however enraged a person may be, he sees, and generally at the
outset, that his best course is to give way; he may fume and strut, look
big and villify, but he bows his head and is off with as embarrassed a
face as yours, gentle reader, would certainly be, if a friend whom you
knew to be ruined came and asked you to lend him twenty thousand francs.
But also, by St. Hubert, if you remain the lord and master of this
_Mare_, how your heart leaps, how all fatigue is forgotten! and when the
twilight approaches, what a fever there is in your veins!--what anxiety!
I have heard of the delirious and suffocating emotions of a lover
waiting for his mistress at the rendezvous. Fiddlesticks! I say, gruel
and iced-water. The most volcanic Romeo that ever penned a letter or
scaled a wall, is to the sportsman waiting amidst the howling storm on a
dark night for the wolves, what a cup of cream is to a bottle of
vitriol. As for myself, I would give,--yes, ladies, I am wolf enough to
say,--that I would willingly give up the delightful emotions of ninety
rendezvous, with the loveliest women in the world, black or white, for
twelve with a boar or a wolf. In return for this bad taste, I shall
probably be devoured some day or other,--a fate no doubt duly merited.
I will suppose, therefore, that the sportsman is squatting quietly in
his hut, like a serpent in a bush. With what ardour and nervous anxiety
does he not await the propitious and long-expected hour! He throws open
the ivory doors of his castle in the air,--his hopes are multiplied a
thousandfold. What shall I shoot?--what shall I not shoot? Will it be a
she-wolf, or a roebuck? No, I prefer a boar. Will he be a large one? But
if by chance I should kill a sow?--what a capital affair that would be;
the young ones never leave their mother; perhaps I should bag three or
four,--perhaps the whole fare. But then, how shall I carry them off?
Perhaps the wolves will save me the difficulty of contriving that, and
dispute my title to them,--perhaps they will attack me, eat me, the sow,
the pigs, and my sealskin cap.
How, I beseech you, is the following _monologue_ to stand comparison
with the fierce excitement of such anticipations? Will she come this
evening, the darling--will my sweetest be able to come?--shall I be
blessed with one kiss?--shall it be on the left cheek or the right, or
shall I press her lips to mine? Bah! there can be no comparison in the
hunter's mind; and then you barricade yourself in your hut as evening
approaches, strengthen the weak points, study the best positions, look
to your arms; the day seems as if it would never close,--nothing is
left for you to do but to muse in the interval, and think of the poor
maudlin lovers, who at this very hour are squatting under a wall like so
many young apes; or of him who, half concealed, stands on the watch at
the angle of a dirty street, waiting with a fluttering heart the arrival
of some sentimental little chit of a girl, who is nevertheless coquette
enough to keep him waiting for half an hour. And again, with what
disdain and contempt you regard such birds as pigeons, turtle-doves,
buzzards, wild duck, and teal; hares and foxes, too, which make their
appearance from time to time,--to kill these never enters your head.
What, not the fox, with his splendid bushy tail?
Why what do you take me for, good reader?--what can I possibly want with
that?--I, who am about to knock over two roebucks and three wolves?
Peace, peace, my friends; skip and skuttle about, young rabbits; nibble
away, middle-aged hares,--don't put yourselves the least out of the way,
you won't have any of my powder. Besides, to fire would be very
imprudent, and to a great extent compromise the sport; for at this
period the sun is sinking, the shadows are slowly lengthening, the
roebuck are on their way, and the she wolf in the neighbouring thicket
is raising her head and listening for the sounds which indicate that
her prey is not far off. And you listen also to catch the slightest
noise that comes on the wind,--for each and all are a vocabulary to the
huntsman,--a gust of wind, the note of a bird disturbed, a weasel
running across the path, a squirrel gnawing the bark, a breaking branch,
startles you, circulates your blood, and puts you anxiously alive to
what may follow. Everything that surrounds you at this still tour of
twilight courts your attention,--the waving branches speak to you,--the
hazel thicket, bending to the weight of some advancing animal, puts you
on your guard; the heart beats, not for the rustling of a silk gown, nor
for the hurried footfall of woman treading with fairy lightness on the
fallen leaves. The syren voice is not about to whisper softly in your
ear, "Are you there, violet of my heart!" nor are you about to reply,
"Angelic being, moss-rose of my soul, let me press your sweet lips?"
What you are waiting for are the wild beasts of the forest,--you are
listening for their distant and subdued tones, their bounding spring,
their near approach, their bodies as a mark for your rifle, their yells,
and cries, and death agony for your triumph.
Then the inexplicable charms of danger excite the sportsman's feelings;
his physical faculties, like those of the Indian, are doubled; he
grasps his rifle with a firmer clutch, and looks down the blade of his
hunting-knife with anxiety and yet with satisfaction. It grows dark, but
his eyes pierce the gloom--his life is at stake, but he forgets that it
is so; for the love of the chase, the wild pleasures of the huntsman,
have taken possession of his soul. Breathless, his heart thumping
against his chest, as if it would break its bounds, he listens, the
cloudy curtain rises, and with it the moon; the roebucks are heard in
the distance, then the stealthy steps of the wolves, afterwards the rush
of the boar: and now, gentlemen, the tragedy is about to
commence--choose your victims.