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THE GIRL'S OWN PAPER
VOL. VIII.--NO. 355.
OCTOBER 16, 1886.
PRICE ONE PENNY.
THE BROOK AND ITS BANKS.
BY THE REV. J. G. WOOD, M.A., Author of "The Handy Natural History."
"Whyles owre a linn the burnie plays,
As through the glen it dimpl't;
Whyles round a rocky scaur it strays;
Whyles in a weil it dimpl't;
Whyles glittered to the nightly rays,
Wi' bickering, dancing dazzle;
Whyles cookit underneath the braes
Below the spreading hazel."
_Burns: "Halloween."_
[Illustration: THE BROOK AND ITS BANKS.]
CHAPTER I.
The many aspects of a brook--The eye sees only that which it is capable
of seeing--Individuality of brooks and their banks--The rippling
"burnie" of the hills--The gently-flowing brooks of low-lying
districts--Individualities even of such brooks--The fresh-water brooks
of Oxford and the tidal brooks of the Kentish marshes--The swarming life
in which they abound--An afternoon's walk--Ditches versus hedges and
walls--A brook in Cannock Chase--Its sudden changes of aspect--The
brooks of the Wiltshire Downs and of Derbyshire.
A brook has many points of view.
In the first place, scarcely any two spectators see it in the same
light.
To the rustic it is seldom more than a convenient water-tank, or, at
most, as affording some sport to boys in fishing. To its picturesque
beauties his eyes are blind, and to him the brook is, like Peter Bell's
primrose, a brook and nothing more.
Then there are some who only view a brook as affording variety to the
pursuit of the fox, and who pride themselves on their knowledge of the
spots at which it can be most successfully leaped.
Others, again, who are of a geographical turn of mind, can only see in a
brook a necessary portion of the water-shed of the district.
To children it is for a time dear as a playground, possessing the
inestimable advantage of enabling them to fall into it and wet their
clothes from head to foot.
Then there are some who are keenly alive to its changing beauties, and
are gifted with artistic spirit and power of appreciation, even if they
should not have been able to cultivate the technical skill which would
enable them to transfer to paper or canvas the scene which pleased them.
Yet they can only see the surface, and take little, if any, heed of the
wealth of animated life with which the brook and its banks are peopled,
or of the sounds with which the air is filled.
Happy are those in whom are fortunately combined the appreciation of art
and the gift (for it is a gift as much as an eye for art or an ear for
music) of observing animal life. To them the brook is all that it is to
others, and much besides. To them the tiniest brook is a perpetual joy,
and of such a nature I hope are those who read these pages.
Not only does a brook assume different aspects, according to the
individuality of the spectator, but every brook has its individuality,
and so have its banks.
Often the brook "plays many parts," as in Burns' delightful stanza,
which seems to have rippled from the poet's brain as spontaneously as
its subject.
Sometimes, however, as near Oxford, it flows silently onwards with
scarcely a dimple on its unruffled surface. Over its still waters the
gnats rise and fall in their ceaseless dance. The swift-winged
dragon-flies, blue, green, and red, swoop upon them like so many falcons
on their prey; or, in the earlier year, the mayflies flutter above the
stream, leaving their shed skins, like ghostly images of themselves,
sticking on every tree trunk near the brook.
On the surface of the brook are seen the shadow-like water-gnats,
drifting with apparent aimlessness over the surface, but having in view
a definite and deadly purpose, as many a half drowned insect will find
to its cost.
Under the shade of the willows that overhang its banks the whirligig
beetles will gather, sociably circling round and round in their mazy
dance, bumping against each other in their swift course, but glancing
off unhurt from the collision, protected from injury by the stout coats
of mail which they wear.
They really look like unskilful dancers practising their "figures" for
the first time. They, however, are not engaged in mere amusement, but,
like the water-gnats, are absorbed in the business of life. The
naturalist knows, when he sees these creatures, that they do not form
the hundredth part of those which are hidden from human eyes below the
surface of the little brook, and that the whole of the stream is as
instinct with life, as if it had been haunted by the Nipens, the
Undines, and the host of fairy beings with whom the old legends peopled
every river and its tributaries.
They are just as wonderful, though clad in material forms, as any water
spirit that ever was evolved from the poet's brain, and have the
inestimable merit of being always within reach whenever we need them.
I will venture to assert that no fairy tales, not even excepting those
of the "Arabian Nights," can surpass in marvel the true life-history of
the mayfly, the frog, the newt, and the dragon-fly, as will be narrated
in the course of these pages. I may go even farther, and assert that
there is no inhabitant of the brook and its banks whose biography and
structure are not full of absorbing interest, and will not occupy the
longest life, if only an attempt be made to study them thoroughly.
An almost typical example of slow-flowing brooks is to be found in the
remarkable channels which intersect the country between Minster and
Sandwich, and which, on the ordnance map, look almost like the threads
of a spider's web. In that flat district, the fields are not divided by
hedges, as in most parts of England, or by stone walls--"dykes," as they
are termed in Ireland--such as are employed in Derbyshire and several
other stony localities, but by channels, which have a strong
individuality of their own.
Even the smallest of these brooks is influenced by the tide, so that at
the two periods of slack water there is no perceptible stream.
Yesterday afternoon, having an hour or so to spare at Minster, I
examined slightly several of these streams and their banks. The contrast
between them and the corresponding brooklets of Oxford, also a low-lying
district, was very strongly marked.
In the first place, the willow, which forms so characteristic an
ornament of the brooks and rivers of Oxford, is wholly absent. Most of
the streamlets are entirely destitute of even a bush by which their
course can be marked; so that when, as is often the case, a heavy white
fog overhangs the entire district, looking from a distance as if the
land had been sunk in an ocean of milk, no one who is not familiarly
acquainted with every yard of ground could make his way over the fields
without falling into the watery boundaries which surround them.
Some of them, however, are distinguished by hawthorns, which take the
place of the willows, and thrive so luxuriantly that they may lay claim
to the title of forest trees. Blackberries, too, are exuberant in their
growth, and in many spots the hawthorn and blackberry on opposite sides
of the brook have intertwined their branches across it and have
completely hidden the water from sight. On these blackberries, the fruit
of which was in its green state, the drone-flies and hawk-flies simply
swarmed, telling the naturalist of their multitudinous successors, who
at present are in the preliminary stages of their existence.
Among the blackberries the scarlet fruit of the woody nightshade (a
first cousin of the potato) hung in tempting clusters, and I could not
help wondering whether they would endanger the health of the young
Minsterians.
In some places the common frog-bit had grown with such luxuriance that
it had completely hidden the water, the leaves overlapping each other as
if the overcrowded plants were trying to shoulder each other out of the
way.
In most of these streamlets the conspicuous bur-reed (_Spargánium
ramósum_) grew thickly, its singular fruit being here and there visible
among the sword-like leaves. I cannot but think that the mediæval weapon
called the "morning star" (or "morgen-stern") was derived from the
globular, spiked fruit-cluster of the bur-reed.
A few of the streams were full of the fine plant which is popularly
known by the name of bull-rush, or bulrush (_Typha latifólia_), but
which ought by rights to be called the "cat's-tail" or "reed-mace." Of
this plant it is said that a little girl, on seeing it growing,
exclaimed that she never knew before that sausages grew on sticks. The
teasel (_Dipsacus_) was abundant, as were also several of the true
thistles.
In some places one of these streams becomes too deep for the bur-reed,
and its surface is only diversified by the half-floating leaves of one
or two aquatic plants.
On approaching one of these places, I find the water to be apparently
without inmates. They had only been alarmed by my approach, which, as I
had but little time to spare, was not as cautious as it ought to have
been. However, I remained perfectly still, and presently a little fish
appeared from below. It was soon followed by a second and a third, and
before long a whole shoal of fish were floating almost on the surface,
looking out for insects which had fallen into the water.
The day being hot, and with scarcely a breath of wind, the fish soon
became quite bold. They did not move beyond the small spot in which they
had appeared, but they all had their tails in slight movement, and their
heads in one direction, thus showing that although the water appeared to
be perfectly motionless, there must be a current of some sort, fish
always lying with their heads up the stream, so as to allow the water to
enter their mouths and pass over their gills.
If then these sluggish streams were unlike those of Oxford, where the
ground is low, and nearly level, how utterly distinct must they be from
those of hilly and especially of rocky localities!
In the earlier part of the present year I was cursorily examining a
brook in Cannock Chase, in Staffordshire. Unfortunately, the day was
singularly inauspicious, as the sun was invisible, the atmosphere murky,
and a fierce north-east wind was blowing, a wind which affects animals,
etc., especially the insect races, even more severely than it does man.
Even the birds remain under shelter as long as they can, and not an
insect will show itself. Neither, in consequence, will the fish be "on
the feed."
On a previous visit, we had been more fortunate, trout, crayfish, etc.,
testifying to the prolific character of the brook, which in one place is
only four or five feet in width, and yet, within fifty yards, it has
formed itself into a wide and treacherous marsh, which can only be
crossed by jumping from one tussock of grass to another; and yet, again,
it suddenly spreads out into a broad and shallow torrent, the water
leaping and rippling over the stony bed. Scarcely a bush marks its
course, and within a few yards it is quite invisible.
As we shall presently see, the brooks of the chalk downs of Wiltshire,
and of the regular mixture of rock and level ground, which are
characteristic of Derbyshire, have also their own separate
individualities.
We shall, however, find many allusions to them in the course of the
work, and we will therefore suppose ourselves to be approaching the bank
of any brook that is but little disturbed by man. What will be likely to
happen to us will be told in the following chapters.