sees a mole-hill in this part of Cheshire. One day, however, in
December, 1899, we noticed that a bed of parsley had withered in a
mysterious way, and when we came to look, the ground was quite
undermined with mole-runs. These were very shallow, and there was no
sign of a hillock above. Many of the roots of the parsley had been
entirely eaten off, and we saw that nearly all that remained in the bed
were full of grubs. These grubs it must have been, I suppose, that
attracted the mole, but it is curious that such an exceptional
condition of the roots should have been discovered, considering how
seldom there is any sign of a mole in the neighbourhood. We noticed
that the root of a strong raspberry cane on one side of the parsley bed
had been eaten off in the same way, but it is not very likely that this
would have had grubs in it.
Hedgehogs are not uncommon and we sometimes see them in broad daylight.
In July one year (1900) every evening for about a week we used to see a
large hedgehog running along a broad gravel walk close to the windows
of the house. It came always at the same time, "just at the edge of
dark," as they say here, and it always took the same route and
disappeared at the same place.
Later on in the month we found a young one, a most delightful little
animal, as friendly and tame as possible. We used to feed him with milk
every day as long as he stayed here, which was about a week, and once
when we expected some boys in the garden we brought him into the house
and put him in a box. He strongly objected to the imprisonment, loudly
protesting all the time in a voice like the squeaking of a rat, and it
was surprising to see how nearly he managed to get out, though the
sides of the box were almost two feet high.
Stoats, commonly called weasels with us, were fairly common when we had
more rats and rabbits, but we do not often see one now (1912). We had a
white terrier that killed several, though I had an idea that dogs
looked on stoats as a kind of ferret and did not hurt them.
We can count a fox among our occasional visitors. I have watched one
for some time that was smelling about among the shrubs just opposite to
the front door about eight o'clock on a Sunday morning.
We are out of the regular beat of the Cheshire Hounds here, and I fancy
the secret slaying of a fox is not accounted a very heinous crime,
certainly the foxes that are often reported soon disappear. In 1899 a
fox had its "earth" in the Abbey Croft, a field next to the garden, and
we used to like to hear him barking in the still summer evenings. In
the end, however, the keepers were too many for him, and he had to
shift his quarters or else it may have been his lease of life ran out.
We suffered very much at one time from the plague of rats. They
infested the out-buildings and the house itself, and for a long while
we were in despair about them. We tried poison, with the result that
dead rats made the kitchen uninhabitable and entailed the expense and
nuisance of taking up the floor, and still they came. We tried every
kind of trap, we had the whole of the outside walls examined, and every
possible entrance hole stopped, so at least we thought, but still they
came. At last we found that the simple expedient of doing away with the
ashpit deprived the premises of their chief attraction in a rat's eyes,
for then we had to burn on the kitchen fire all the vegetable and other
refuse that formerly found its way to the ashpit, and provided such
abundant and appetizing food. Certain it is that since we did this,
more than twelve years ago now (1912), we never have had a rat in the
house.
I have heard of large young fowls being killed by rats at farms not far
away, but I do not remember that they ever took one of our chickens;
indeed, at a time when we used to see many rats there, a hen sat in the
stable and safely hatched her chicks. I recollect an old rat that used
to come every day to feed with the fowls without any objection to his
presence on their part.
Rabbits were another great nuisance. They had burrows among the
tree-roots on the river bank and no one seemed able to get them out or
to shoot them, so between what they ate and what they dug up, we
hadn't much pleasure in the garden. At last we cut off so much of the
garden as we could surround with wire netting and left the rest to take
its chance. No sooner had we done this than, for what reason I cannot
tell, the rabbits disappeared completely, and for two or three years we
hardly ever saw one on our own ground, though they seemed to be as
plentiful as usual elsewhere.
We have sometimes caught long-tailed field-mice that were eating the
peas, and the cats seemed to find voles and shrews pretty often.
I must confess to rather a weakness for common mice; they are pretty to
look at and amusing in their ways. To give an instance of their
ingenuity and enterprise, I remember some time in the summer of 1899,
when we used to have a basin of sugar left in our room at night, a
certain mouse appeared to think that it was placed there for his own
special benefit, at any rate he was accustomed to help himself very
freely to it. We could hear him working away to get a lump over the
side of the basin, then rolling it along to the edge of the table and
letting it fall to the floor, along which he would again roll it to a
hole under the skirting-board. Sometimes he would take in this way as
many as three or four lumps of sugar in one night. Besides the sugar
there was often bread and butter left in the room between two plates,
and one morning when I took the top one off out jumped the mouse. I
cannot imagine how it got in. It certainly couldn't make its way out
again, which one should have thought a far easier thing to do. The
plates seemed to be exactly as I had left them the night before, and I
could not see that any of the bread and butter had been eaten.
I remember what seems to me an extraordinary instance of a mouse's
power of smelling out food. In the new parish church here (consecrated
in 1885) the vestry is in the tower, and its ceiling, which is the
floor of the bellringing-room, must be nearly 20 ft. from the ground.
Just under this ceiling were suspended at one time three very long
texts; they were drawn up by pulleys with a rope that was fastened off
about six feet from the floor. One of these texts was used at harvest
festivals, and a fringe of corn had been left round the border, but all
three were elaborately done up together in brown paper, so that none of
the corn could be seen. Happening to be at the church one day I found
the caretaker had brought out these texts into the churchyard, because
he had seen, he said, a mouse running up to them by the suspending
cord. Sure enough, when he undid the wrapping the poor little thing was
there, and I am sorry to say was promptly killed. I thought its
wonderful cleverness deserved a better fate. The church was newly
built with concrete floors, and there was no regular food supply to
attract mice, so this particular mouse must have come in casually on
the mere chance of picking up something, and it must from the floor,
nearly 20 ft. below, have found out that there was corn in one of the
bundles of texts behind the brown paper that covered them, and I think
more wonderful still, it must have discovered the only way of reaching
it, along the suspending cord.
There used to be an old piano in the Parish Room close to the new
church. This was not often used and one day when we lifted the cover
from the back part of the keyboard we found snugly placed in a corner
of the bass notes an empty mouse's nest, quite round like a bird's, and
beautifully made of dried bits of grass and coloured worsted. It seems
strange that a mouse should have found such a place for its nest, and
stranger still that in a new large bare room, with a solid wood-block
floor, it should have been able unobserved to go in and out continually
to fetch the materials for it. This it must have done, since none came
from the room itself.
The long broad garden walk by the side of the house seems to be a
favourite thoroughfare for hares; we constantly see them passing at all
times of the year. I wish myself there were not quite so many hares in
Warburton as there are. We could do very well with fewer in the gardens
and orchards, and there would then be less inducement to hold such
frequent public coursing meetings, which, in my opinion, we could do
very well without. Some years before 1900 a large number were imported
and turned down. These were at first a great annoyance to everybody,
and did much damage to fruit trees even in mild open weather; it was
almost unbelievable the height to which they could reach, gnawing off
every bit of bark all the way round. They were, besides, far too thick
upon the ground for their own comfort. I was told by a man who worked
on the estate that he often came across bucks fighting together; they
fought so savagely, he said, that they would hardly get out of his way,
and almost knocked up against him. They begin fighting, it appears from
his account, by giving slaps with their forefeet, but in the end they
go on to worry at one another like dogs.
XI.
DOGS AND CATS.
It is hard to say which is the most wonderful, to see how a dog's
intelligence can be developed by companionship with man or to look at a
Great Dane and a toy terrier together, and to remember that both breeds
have by man's agency been produced from the same original stock.
Cats, on the other hand, have never left their wild nature far behind,
and can easily return to it, as indeed they often do. Dogs are almost
entirely dependent on their human friends, but most cats do something
for their living, and some without going wild will find all their own
food. I remember one cat in particular that did this; she was an old
cat when first I came, and lived on with me for more than fourteen
years. As long as she was strong and able to hunt she never came into
the house and never asked for food (she was tame enough when she met us
out of doors) it was only when she got to be old and feeble that she
turned to us and learnt to value the warmth of a fireside. She must
have been 20, and may well have been nearer 25 when she died, and her
great age showed itself plainly by every outward sign. In her prime she
was a large, handsome animal, but she dwindled down to absolute skin
and bone literally; her face lost all its roundness and got to be quite
small and her voice died almost completely away. Towards the last she
spent her days on one particular stool by the fire, eating very little,
but apparently content and even happy, and responding as best as she
could to any attention. I do not remember her ever lying down at that
time, she was always sitting and always on the same spot, which was
worn quite shiny in consequence. At last one day she failed to appear,
and we never found her body.
The oddest cat we ever had was a black one that came to us of her own
accord in 1881. She had such a vile temper and was altogether so
uncanny that she might well have been possessed by an evil spirit.
When she had been with us only a few days, I found her hanging on to
the wire-netting of an outhouse door, evidently trying to get some
pigeons that she could see behind it. Very soon afterwards another cat
was drowned for persistently taking pigeons, and it really seemed as if
Blacky understood, for never after that did she look at a pigeon with
evil intent; she would walk through a number of them as they fed on the
ground, and so little did they fear her that they hardly moved out of
her way.
We had a canary once (and we must have had him for more than 10 years),
whose noisy song was so distracting that we used sometimes to put him
down on a table and cover his cage with a cloth. One day we went out
and left him there, and must have forgotten to shut the room door, for
when we came back we found the cover off the cage and the cat curled up
fast asleep by the side of it. The canary was unharmed and didn't
appear to be even frightened; he was hopping about in his cage quite
content and at ease. That the cat should have pulled off the cover and
then have left the bird alone seemed the more astonishing, because she
was a hardened and incurable thief.
Blacky knew the time for afternoon tea, and was always there to the
minute. However, when something that came to her brought off all her
hair and made her a pitiable object, she seemed to know of herself that
she was not presentable, and though we did nothing to prevent her she
never came into the drawing-room again until her hair had grown; then
she appeared regularly as before.
There may be some truth in the old saying, "Dogs care for people and
cats for places," but individuals differ very much; great love of home
is often seen in dogs, and strong personal affection in cats.
A cat was born here in 1897 and lived with us for two years like any
other cat. She was indeed rather more intelligent than many. She had
evidently observed the manner of opening a door, for when she wanted to
get into a room she used to rattle at the handle. One day she came and
rattled at the door-handle of the study where I was sitting, but
instead of coming in when the door was opened, she led me to the
drawing-room, and standing up put her paw on the handle of the door: as
plainly as possible she had fetched me to let her in.
Now although this cat was made a great deal of with us and seemed to
have a strong personal affection for me, spending most of her time with
me, one fine day she took herself off and disappeared altogether.
As weeks went by and we heard nothing of her we concluded she had met
with the fate to which pitiless game preservation has consigned many
another cat. But after about three months I saw her in the garden, when
though she followed me she refused to be touched. For weeks again we
never set eyes on her, and we almost came to believe that it was her
wraith I had seen. At last I happened to notice her sitting outside a
cottage not 200 yards from this house, by which I passed almost every
day of my life, but though she looked up when I called her by name she
would not come to me. After a year or two she very frequently came into
the garden and was willing enough to be stroked, but she never entered
this house again until (in 1909) the old man at the cottage died, and
the home she had chosen for herself was broken up. Then of her own
accord she returned to us as a matter of course, and up to the day of
her death (in November, 1911) was as friendly and affectionate as
possible.
It is odd that a cat should thus deliberately have chosen to leave a
home that was her birthplace, and where she had been more than kindly
treated. We thought at the time that it might have been through
jealousy of her own kitten, that she often found in the study, but if
of so jealous a disposition, why should she go to be one of a family of
cats in which as the last-comer she could hardly hope to take the first
place?
The man she went to sometimes worked here, and as he was fond of cats
might have taken a fancy to this one, and possibly did something to
entice her away. If this was so, it is clear that a cat's affection is
not always for places rather than people.
The strangest part of it all is to me not that she should have left us
for the cottage, but that at the same time her whole behaviour towards
us should have so entirely changed that she wouldn't let us touch her,
and couldn't be induced to set foot in the house.
The old man to whom this cat betook herself was quite a character in
his way. He could neither read nor write, having been put to work on a
farm when he was eight years old, but he took a very intelligent
interest in things. His house was an asylum for stray cats and you
would find him on a winter's evening sitting in front of a good fire
with a circle of half a dozen cats round him, all staring like himself
at the grate. He used to have a fancy for clocks; there must have been
five or six of all sizes perpetually ticking away in his kitchen, not
to speak of others that were there but refused to tick any longer. He
was not content, like other cottagers, with a candle or cheap light,
but had hanging from the low ceiling a large paraffin lamp, which had
cost him at least fifteen shillings.
He was never married, and since his mother died, some thirty years ago,
he never had a woman in the house, and yet few women could have kept it
cleaner than he did himself.
A white terrier that we had for ten years from 1888 used to associate
words with ideas even when spoken in ordinary conversation and not
directly to him. For instance, if he was lying apparently asleep before
the fire, and we happened in talking without reference to him to
mention any words that he knew, such as "dog," or "carriage," or
"walk," he would look up or perhaps just wag his tail.
The same dog had a wonderful gift of reckoning time. He knew Sunday
perfectly well, and he knew it the first thing in the morning, before
anything had been done to mark it as different from other days.
Generally he would lie on the rug at breakfast time and be quite alert
afterwards and on the watch to go out with us, but on Sundays he went
straight to his basket when we came down and did not move or look up
when breakfast was over. From very early days he used to go with my
wife to afternoon Sunday School. He knew exactly the time when she
ought to get ready to start, and if then she didn't move he would get
up and go to her, and he gave her no peace until she went to dress.
When he arrived at the school he would curl himself up on an old shawl
in a corner of the room, and until the Lord's Prayer before the final
grace of the dismissal prayers he would not stir. Directly he heard the
Lord's Prayer, he would get up in readiness, but he never left his
corner until the prayers were finished. On one Sunday in the month
there was catechising in the Church, instead of Sunday school, and Snap
was wont to be shut up by himself in the schoolroom until the service
was over. This he didn't much care for, and often when he had started
joyously as usual for his walk to the school, three-quarters of a mile
away, as soon as he came near enough to hear the church bell ringing,
he quietly turned round and went home. When he had been with us for
about eight years we took him to London for several weeks. He made the
best of it, and seemed to enjoy himself in a way, but it was almost
pathetic to see the change directly we got out of the train on our way
back. We had to drive three miles in a fly, and though Snap's place was
at the bottom under our feet, as soon as we got within a mile of home,
he seemed to know the smell of the country and was all excitement, and
when he found himself really at home he was quite beside himself with
joy and did not rest until he had visited in turn every familiar nook
and corner in the garden, then he threw himself down on his own rug in
his own house with a sigh of relief and satisfaction.
I remember the same love of home in the case of another dog, a mongrel
long-haired terrier that I had from a puppy. When he was more than ten
years old he was taken to live in Hertfordshire. His friends there were
devoted to him and did all they could to make him happy, but his nature
quite changed, he lost his former boisterous spirits and seemed rather
to endure than to enjoy life. After he had been away four years I
brought him back; he was then, of course, old as dogs go, nearly 15,
but it seemed as though the intervening years had been a dream, and he
was himself again at once, just as joyous, noisy and
determined-spirited as he had ever been, and fell into all his old ways
of life, as if he had been absent only a day.
This same dog, Stumpy we called him, had one little practical joke that
showed a sense of humour. At a farm about half-a-mile away there was a
pond, or as we say here a "pit," separated only by a hedge from the
road. On this pit there were nearly always ducks and it was a favourite
amusement of Stumpy's to steal quietly up to the road side of the hedge
just above them, and suddenly give several loud barks. He did this for
the simple pleasure of seeing the startled ducks rush quacking and
flapping to the other side of the pond; for he ran on again afterwards
perfectly unconcerned, content and pleased with himself, and I never
knew him take the slightest notice of ducks or fowls at any other time.
I remember a rather wonderful instance of intelligence shown by
Stumpy's father when I had him with me at Oxford. He arrived there for
the first time late one evening; the next day I took him for a walk
with friends towards Godstow, and when nearly there we stood to watch
some men shooting. Sandy hated the sound of a gun, and when we
remembered him and looked round, he had gone. As he was quite strange
to the place I scarcely expected to see him again, but I found him
waiting for me outside the door in Holywell Street when I got home.
* * * * *
I may say in bringing these notes to a conclusion that they have in
substance been taken from a diary, and that I have not had to depend
upon my memory for what they contain, as I used to put down in this
diary at the moment any happenings connected with Natural History that
I noticed and wished to remember. When after several years I came to
look through the entries, the idea occurred to me that possibly some of
the matter might have an interest for others; I may very likely, of
course, be mistaken in this, all the more so, perhaps, because these
notes do represent what to me has been a source of very great interest.
I have had to live for many years an unexciting life, in an
out-of-the-way country place, with little society, and with few
opportunities of getting away for a holiday; and yet with the garden
itself, and the little world it embraces, in making the acquaintance of
its inhabitants and watching the doings of their daily life, I can
safely say I do not know what it is to be dull. Of course, I do not
pretend that Natural History has supplied all the interests I have had
outside my work, for I am thankful to say there is hardly anything in
the world that doesn't interest me, but it certainly is the case that
the tom-tits and the robins and the other birds have always been to me
as human friends, and have continually provided me with amusement and
pleasure.
INDEX.
Aviary, Outdoor--at Warrington, 68.
Barn Owls, 82.
Bats in Old Church, 95.
Birds as friends, 11, 112.
Power of recognizing one another, 40, 41.
Blackbirds, 17, 22-25, 64, 65, 83, 84.
Blackcaps, 31.
Black Tern, 93.
"Blueback" Cheshire for Fieldfare, 22.
"Blue-cap" Cheshire for Tomtit, 38.
"Blue rock" local name for Stockdove, 94.
Bohemian Waxwing, 94.
Brambling, 67-68.
Bullfinch, 70.
Canary, 104.
Cat, changing its home, 106.
Extreme old age, 103.
Uncanny spirit, 104.
Chiffchaffs, 33.
Chaffinches, 64-67.
Coal-tits, 38, 41-43.
Contrivances for baffling sparrows on the Food-stand, 59-64.
"Coot" Cheshire for Waterhen, 90.
Corncrakes, 89.
Creeper, Tree-, 56.
Crossbills, 71.
Crows, Carrion-, 74.
Hooded-, 94.
Cuckoos, 81.
Dogs, their intelligence, their love of home, 108-110.
Dogs and cats compared, 103.
Earthquake and Pheasants, 89.
Eclipse, a bat flying about while it lasted, 95.
Fieldfares, 22.
Figs self-sown, 6.
Flycatchers, Spotted-, 48-51.
Pied-, 51.
Food for birds, 39.
Food receptacles, 40.
Food-stand, 59-64.
Fox, 97.
Frosts in spring, 3.
Garden-warbler, 34.
Golden-crested wrens, 32.
Golden plover, 91.
Goldfinches, 57.
"Goldfinch" Cheshire for Yellow-hammer, 71.
Greater Spotted woodpecker, 79.
Great Tits, 37, 38, 41.
Greenfinches, 57.
Gulls, 93.
Hares, 101.
Hawfinches, 58.
Hawks, Hobby, 94.
Kestrel, 84.
Sparrowhawk, 84.
Hedgehog, 96.
Hedgesparrows, 35.
Heron, 87.
Hobby, 94.
Holly berries sometimes left untouched, 14.
Hooded crow, 94.
House martins, 54.
House-sparrows, 58-66.
Jackdaws, 74.
Jays, 73.
"Jitty" Cheshire for Lesser Redpole, 68.
Kestrel, 84-87.
Kingfishers, 80.
"Kit" Cheshire for Redwing, 22.
Larks, 76.
Larks and Sparrow Hawk, 84.
Linnet, Green-, see Greenfinch.
Red-, Goldfinch.
"Longwings" Cheshire for Swift, 77.
Magpies, 73.
Marsh-tits, 41-43.
Martins, House-, 54.
Sand-, 55.
Meadow pipits, 47.
Missel Thrush, 13-16, 21, 86.
Mole, 95.
Mouse, Common-, 99-101.
Long-tailed, 99.
Nightjars, 78.
"Nicker" Cheshire for Goldfinch, 57.
"Old man" local name for Spotted flycatcher, 49.
Old man, lover of cats, 108
Owls, Barn or White-, 82.
Brown, Longeared, and Shorteared-, 84.
Partridges, 89.
Peewits, 91.
"Peggy Whitethroat" Cheshire for Willow-warbler, 33.
Pheasants, 88.
"Pied finch" Cheshire for Chaffinch, 67.
Pied flycatcher, 51.
Pied wagtails, 46, 65.
Pipits, Meadow-, 47.
Tree-, 48.
Plants introduced becoming weeds, 8.
Plover, Golden-, 91.
Peewits, 91.
Rabbits, 98.
Rats, 97.
"Red Linnet" Cheshire for Goldfinch, 57.
Redpoles, Lesser-, 68-70.
Redshanks, 92.
Redstart, 27.
Redwing, 21.
Reed-bunting, 71.
Robins, 18, 27-30, 60, 62, 63.
Rooks, 75.
Sand-martins, 55.
Sandpipers, 92.
Sedge-warblers, 34.
"Shercock" Cheshire for Missel Thrush, 13.
Shrews, 99.
Skylarks, 76.
Snails not found in the garden, 4.
Snipe, 92.
Song Thrush, 16-21, 64, 65.
Sparrow Hawks, 84-86.
Sparrow, House-, 58-66.
Sparrows and Owls, 83.
Spotted Flycatchers, 48.
Starlings, 72-73.
Starlings and sparrows, 65.
Stoats, 97.