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LIVES OF THE FUR FOLK
LIVES _of the_ FUR FOLK
_BY M.D. HAVILAND_
_illustrated by E. CALDWELL_
_LONGMANS, GREEN & COMPANY_
_39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
NEW YORK, BOMBAY & CALCUTTA_
.1910.
TO
E. B. S.
PREFACE
The following, to a certain extent, are composite histories--at
present our knowledge of the life of the individual wild animal is too
limited to admit of anything else; but the incidents related are all
founded on fact, and Redpad, Grimalkin, and the rest actually lived,
although here they are sometimes credited with adventures which in
reality befell others of their race.
It may be thought that I have gone too far in endowing wild animals
with the primitive elements of superstition, self-sacrifice, &c.; but
although the majority are certainly guided to a very great extent by
pure instinct, here and there we find one whose actions cannot be
altogether explained thus; and it must not be forgotten that it is
from similar exceptions, who lived and died in long past ages, that
our own powers of reason and reflection, our morality, sense of
religion, our artists, heroes and saints have evolved.
For deciding some knotty points in the natural history of the badger,
I am indebted to an excellent article on the animal by Mr. Douglas
English. The rest of my information is entirely derived from personal
observation, or from that of gamekeepers, 'earthstoppers,' huntsmen
and others, whose calling has brought them into close contact with
wild animals. To all these my thanks are due.
M. D. HAVILAND.
COURTOWN HARBOUR,
CO. WEXFORD.
CONTENTS
_THE STORY OF REDPAD THE FOX_
I. THE SPRING RAINS
II. THE HUNTERS
III. FIRST BLOOD
IV. HOW THE DEBT WAS PAID
V. THE SHEEP SLAYER
VI. FROM KILMANAGH TO KNOCKDANE
_THE STORY OF FLUFF-BUTTON THE RABBIT_
I. HOW FLUFF-BUTTON CRIED QUITS
II. THE SPRING LONGING
III. THE INVASION OF GARRY'S HILL
IV. THE FEAR THAT WAS IN THE WAY
V. UNDER THE MOON
_STORIES FROM THE LIFE OF GRIMALKIN THE CAT_
I. THE FIRST HUNTING
II. THE STEALTHY DEATH
III. THE COLLARED BUCK
IV. ZOE
V. WHERE THE BATTLE IS TO THE STRONG
_THE BIOGRAPHY OF STUBBS THE BADGER_
I. THE TWILIGHT HUNTERS
II. BORRIGAN'S BAITING
III. THE LARCH HILL 'EARTH'
LIST OF PLATES
LONELINESS AND LONGING
FLUFF-BUTTON WAS SEATED ON THE OTHER BANK TAKING A TONIC
GRIMALKIN
HOMEWARD BOUND
THE STORY OF REDPAD THE FOX
[Illustration: THE STORY OF REDPAD THE FOX]
CHAPTER I
THE SPRING RAINS
Vix found the old drain at the beginning of March. It was warm and
roomy, and ran under the gate of the Plantation Field. Once upon a
time, before the reservoir was built further up the hill, the stream
which rose under St. Bridget's Tower had emptied itself through this
drain into the bog; but that was many years ago, and now the moss and
ferns grew thickly round the opening, and the grating at the further
end was choked with rubbish. Nevertheless, because it was dry and
lonely it suited Vix exactly, and the four cubs were born there
towards the end of the month. They were blind, red, squealing
creatures who groped and fought in the hot darkness to reach Vix and
nuzzle at her side, and at first she spent most of the twenty-four
hours among them; but as they grew bigger and needed more food she
was forced to spend much time on hunting excursions. Fortunately,
however, as rabbits were to be had for the picking up in Knockdane
Woods over the hill, and mice and rats were plentiful in the bog, the
neighbouring poultry yards were not too severely taxed and Vix's
nursery remained undiscovered.
April was ushered in by a cool dark evening after heavy rain. The
sunset was pale and stormy, blotted out by ragged clouds, and as Vix
trotted home she heard the 'rail' singing up the river. The 'rail' is
the name which the Fur Folk have given to the sound which is heard at
night before a storm, and it is one of the most mysterious noises of
the whole countryside. There may be no wind stirring at the time, but
the Wild Folk hear the strange whining far away over the woods and
bogs, and know that there is a gale blowing up from the sea.
Vix's path lay by the reservoir, and here, startled perhaps by some
night noise among the rushes, she paused. The reservoir had been built
many years ago when Paddy Magragh's father had plenty of money, and
much stock which required water. He caught the little brook which
trickled through Vix's drain from St. Bridget's Tower to the bog, and
turned its course into the big cement basin, leading off the water by
a sluice into a new channel. But the farm had fallen on evil days at
the hands of Paddy Magragh, and the reservoir was choked with cresses
and duckweed. Much rain had fallen this spring, and the basin was
dangerously full. The sluice was shut fast, but the brown water
squirted through the chinks and danced down the hill. The stream, all
wild with joy of the great rains, brought down leaves and twigs in its
rush, and waltzed them round and round in the plaited current until it
heaped them against the ever-growing scum and debris at the sluice. By
and by the branch of a tree came rolling along, and stuck fast. The
leaves were driven against it until a high barricade was raised, and
the water could only trickle through the sluice. Then Vix went home to
her cubs, but the stream still poured into the basin from which it
could find no outlet. There was only one flaw in the cement, and that
quite a little one, patched with clay and willow withies, but the
water--the brown, treacherous water--found it out, and worked silently
and steadily all night. O a mad, merry miner is the water!
Hard after the 'rail' came the wind and the rain. Safe and warm below
ground, the foxes heard the howling of the gale in the Plantation, and
the steady splash of rain drops on the sodden ground; but the brick
walls of the drain were still strong and water-tight. Paddy Magragh in
his cabin also heard the storm roaring outside, and remembered that he
had left the sluice of the reservoir closed; but he dismissed the
thought with a characteristic 'time enough to-morrow.'
Vix was astir at daybreak the next morning. The wind still moaned in
fitful gusts and brief rain-storms drove across the sky. There was a
watery gleam in the east which told of the sunrise to be, and the
fields were flooded. Vix reached the reservoir. It was full of turbid
water which lipped to the very brim, and the clay which dammed up the
broken wall was sodden and dripping.
As Vix watched, a strange thing happened. A lump crumbled outwards and
a ripple of water ran down the slope towards the fence. It swelled a
little as the hole grew larger, until it became quite a broad stream.
It sang a merry little song to itself as it ran--so merry that a
number of brother ripples hastened to join it. They crowded into the
hole in such numbers, struggling to pass through, that suddenly the
whole earthwork tottered and crumbled away, and the coffee-coloured
flood leaped through the gap down the hill in the wake of the first
ripple. Brawling, tumbling, spreading into shallow pools and splashing
cascades, it raced down the field. The hedge barred its way for a
moment, but urged by the rush behind, it rose, and crept between the
hawthorns into the ditch on the further side. It was many a year since
the stream had found its way down that ditch. It poured into its old
bed joyously, and kissed the primroses with foam kisses before it
drowned them in its cold ripples.
Not until the flood had entered the Plantation Field did Vix realise
what it meant. Then she ran, faster than when the hounds were at her
brush, straight to the drain where her four ruddy cubs lay in the
torrent's path. The stream was perilously near them. It had carved a
way for itself among the grass and brambles which choked the ditch,
and sang to itself lustily on the way to the bog. Vix dashed
underground, and, seizing the first of the warm whining creatures
which she stumbled over in the darkness, she turned to fly. Too late!
She was caught in a trap. The water burst into the drain, and surging
to and fro to find an exit, it filled the tunnel to the roof. Vix,
half drowned but still clinging to the cub, was battered to and fro.
Something which was not driftwood was driven against her in the
darkness; but though her mother-love was great she could not hold two,
and it slipped past her. Twice she fought her head above water, and
twice she was washed off her feet. The third time, gasping and
choking, she gained the opening, struggled to land, and laid the
dripping cub on the bank. But there were three more down there. Vix
looked at the flood which plunged through the drain and into the field
through the further opening, and that good instinct which bids the
Wild Folk care first for that which is nearest conquered. She picked
up the half-drowned cub, and galloped up the hill towards Knockdane.
When, three hours later, Paddy Magragh strolled by, the flood had
subsided, and only a trickle filtered through the drain, which was
half choked with rubbish. On the bank lay three little red bodies, and
there were marks on the wet earth where strong frenzied pads had
striven to dig down to the treasures hidden below.
That was all that Paddy Magragh ever knew, but that spring an old fox
cared for her one remaining cub in the woods of Knockdane. And that
cub was Redpad.