AFTER DUCKS ON LADOGA
Once upon a time when Autumn was holding sway, and Winter was within
hail, a Russian friend, knowing my weakness for making acquaintance
with every kind of creature to be seen in the Land of the Tsars, very
kindly proposed to me to journey with him up the Neva to
Schlüsselburg, or near it, where he owned a large house and much land;
and there to embark in his steam-launch for a duck-shooting cruise on
Lake Ladoga.
Duck-shooting from a steam-launch! This would be quite a novel
experience to me, and I jumped gladly at the proposal. But how were we
going to get within range of ducks in a puffing and smoking
steam-launch? I asked. Were they tame ducks?
"Tame ducks!" repeated my outraged host; "no, indeed; on the contrary,
the ducks on Ladoga are the very wildest things in creation."
"Then how are we going to get at them in the open?" I persisted, with
true British pertinacity. But my host only said, "Wait and see." His
manner was full of conviction; it was impossible to doubt his good
faith; clearly he was the proprietor of a secret, which, in time, I
too should learn! Delightful! I am for it; I shall see that there is
something new under heaven!
My friend Prohoroff is a capital fellow and a good sportsman. I have
shot with him over moor and forest more than once, and found him
possessed of a chivalrous generosity and sportsmanlike nature rare
among the so-called sportsmen of his country. Prohoroff has a soul
above family pot-shots at young coveys huddled beneath their mother's
wing; he would scorn to break the egg of a grey hen in order to add
its unfledged contents to that of his game-bag; that is not
Prohoroff's style, which is robust, and broad, and British. He lets
his birds fly, does Prohoroff, and misses them like a man; moreover,
he does not encourage his dog to catch the young game. Prohoroff has
rubbed shoulders with Britishers, and has eaten of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil in matters appertaining to fair dealing
between man and the brute creation. I shall be quite safe in
Prohoroff's hands.
From St. Petersburg to Schlüsselburg, up the Neva, is a trip of some
six or seven hours by the deliberate steamer in which the journey is
made; it is, after all, the whole length of the Neva, from source to
sea. And a beautiful river it is, as far as the stream itself is
concerned. But the banks are the reverse of interesting. Flat and
dull, with here a belt of pine forest, and there a tumble-down
village--all Russian villages present a tumble-down appearance--and
stubble and potatoes and waste land: there is not much to look at, and
no towns of any size and importance are passed. But the water is
beautiful--clear and white, and, at this season--early October--well
stocked with salmon on the wander between lake and sea. These may be
caught, rarely, with a minnow, _one_ has been taken with a fly, I
have heard, but only one in the memory of man. For the rest, the
fishermen who ply for them with big nets worked by a windlass from
wooden jetties, appear to make good hauls, and the quality of the fish
is excellent. I should dearly love to stop and have a cast or two for
one of them; but this is impossible. Prohoroff tells me that one of
the favourite pastimes of St. Petersburgers, with a taste for gentle
gambling, is to be conveyed out to one of these fishing stations, and
to speculate in "hauls" before the event. The cost of a "haul" about
to be made and of course absolutely fortuitous as to its results, is
from three to five roubles--six to ten shillings. The speculator may
find himself possessor of salmon enough, as the result of but one
cast, to feed a regiment for a week, or--if not one of the favoured of
Fortune--may purchase a dozen "hauls" of the net and go away
empty-handed. If so, he is sure to see, as he floats dejectedly away,
a vast quantity of fish landed at the very next haul after his
departure; he will see their silver sides gleaming in the sun from a
distance, and he will give his opinion as to the reliability of the
goddess who holds the scales.
But here we are at Schlüsselburg, and here is Prohoroff's house--a
huge, rambling structure with bedrooms like barracks, but unprovided
with the commonest of comforts, excepting beds, and having no
apparatus for washing. Russians are quite free from that insular
faddiness as to cold water which is a characteristic of us Britishers;
they see no necessity for, and no virtue in, a washing-stand. As for
a cold bath--_proh pudor_! What a dirty race they must be, think
the Muscovites, who require a bath every morning! There was once a
_savant_ who gave the following definition of water: "A colourless
liquid which turns black when the human hands are placed in it." Was
this learned man a joker? I cannot think a _savant_ would so demean
himself; he must have been of Russian extraction and perfectly
serious. However, I have lived long enough to learn the virtue of the
saying, "_À la guerre, comme à la guerre!_" Therefore, in a foreign
land, and in a strange house, when there are no facilities for
washing, I philosophically go unwashed until an opportunity offers to
repair the omission. So I went to bed and wished for day.
In the morning a servant brought in a brown pudding dish and a tumbler
of water. I sat down, in order to reflect calmly upon the possible
uses of these articles. Was I expected to seat myself in the dish and
pour the contents of the tumbler over me? I rejected the idea.
Eventually I placed the pudding dish upon a chair, armed myself with
the tumbler--and, by rigid economy, and the exercise of superhuman
patience, succeeded in getting my face and neck wet and the palms of
both hands damp. Enough; I am washed--now for breakfast and the ducks
of Ladoga!
When we sallied forth to embark upon the steam-launch and arrived at
the water's edge, I did not see the vessel, and inquired of Prohoroff
where it was. This was my good host's moment of triumph. "Why, there,
just in front of your nose!" he said, laughing loudly and delightedly;
"can't you see it?" He pointed to what I had imagined was a grove of
young pine cover fringing a small island or promontory. Then I
understood the mystery, and was glad that good-natured Prohoroff had
succeeded so well in bringing off his great surprise. It was indeed
the steam-launch; but so covered and hidden by pine boughs, and small
pine trees fastened to the boat's side upright from the water's edge,
that it really looked, as I have intimated, for all the world like a
pine-grown island. Undoubtedly it was well done, and the ducks might
easily be deluded by it, even as I had been.
The skipper and the engineer were both aboard, grinning with delight
from behind the cover. My host's successful deception was regarded by
them as a compliment to themselves, for they had built up the
fir-grove; consequently their joy was unfeigned. These good fellows
were armed with old muzzle-loading English guns, always capped and at
full cock, and always held aimed, it seemed, at my head; Prohoroff and
I had our more modern weapons and lots of cartridges; the party meant
business!
Steam was up, however, and we must lose no more time, but be off
towards the lake. Past the old Swedish castle we glide and the English
cotton mills, and now we are in Ladoga, and hastening, a moving
island, towards the middle of the great lake, to the waters wherein
the big ducks most do congregate. Very soon Prohoroff sights the first
duck community--a hundred of them--peacefully floating and diving a
quarter of a mile away. "Ease her!" is the word; then, "Easy ahead;"
and slowly and cautiously we glide forward towards our hitherto
unsuspecting quarry. It is an exciting moment. I do not know the name
of this duck now before us; but he is a huge black fellow, a diver,
with white feathers in his wings. And now two hundred yards have been
covered, and still we creep on unobserved. Then a very old duck lifts
her head and looks at us. "My dears," says she, "did you notice an
island about here? I didn't." One or two younger members of the family
glance casually at us, their mouths full of food. One says the island
has been there all the time; the other rudely enquires who on earth
cares whether the old lady noticed the island or not; the island is
certainly there now!
After this, the old lady settles down to her usual morning avocations,
until the island is within a hundred yards, or less, of the party.
Then she gives us another and a longer look--her neck very straight
and long, and her face at right angles to our advance--the one eye
which is thus deputed to scan us looking concerned and agitated. "I'll
tell you what it is, my dears," says she, "I don't like that island;
the current is setting the other way, and yet we are nearer to it than
we were. I'm off, for one!" and in the twinkling of an eye her black
head has dipped beneath the surface; her white-flecked tail for an
instant shows itself, then disappears, and Grandmother Duck is next
seen fifty yards further away. Fortunately for us, her example is
followed by one or two very old stagers only--perhaps they have seen
this game played before; but the youngsters are not going to listen to
the fears and fancies of the old fogies. What youngster ever did?
Consequently, in another minute, judgment, swift and sure, has
overtaken them. Four barrelsful of flame and lead belch out upon them
as they float, two more as they rise, and seven or eight young
unbelievers are lying dead upon the water, or endeavouring madly,
broken winged and in touch with grim death, to dive out of range. All
are picked up, by degrees. Meanwhile, the community is wheeling around
over our heads high in air; they see us now, plainly enough, ensconced
behind our pine-tree ambuscade, and are forming their own conclusions
as to the morality of our proceedings. Having settled this point, and,
we trust, complimented the old lady, their grandmother, upon her
sagacity, they fly away, and are no more seen. They will exercise a
wise caution with regard to islands henceforth.
And so the day passes; with each duck community it is the same tale.
There are a few wise ducks and many unwise, and the deck of our launch
is strewn with the bodies of these latter; great northern divers--who
look as though no foolishness could possibly, under any circumstances,
find napping that stern wisdom which sits for ever in the expression
of their most serious countenances--and divers and ducks of every sort
and kind, and to which my unlearned pen can give no certain names.
Some of these proved very delicious when they afterwards made their
positively last appearance in public; some were very much the reverse,
though that sporting skipper and the cannonading engineer (who once
nearly blew my head off in the excitement of the chase!) liked them
all equally well. And so ended what was, to me, a novel and delightful
experience. It was one of many days to which my soul cries out
"encore!" and cries in vain, for Destiny says, "Oh no! your cake is
eaten! you must wait your chance at next baking day!"