AN ALL-DAY SITTING
Another all-day sitting with the seals. From the edge of the cliffs in
the morning, and in the same pool by which I had sat all yesterday, I
saw a creature which I at first thought was a seal of the common kind,
then--for it began to look larger--that it was the bottle-nosed one, but
which soon proved to be neither the one nor the other. In size it looked
equal to Bottle-nose, if not even larger, but it had a magnificent skin,
the whole of the undersurface, as well as the sides, being blotched and
spotted black and white, like a leopard's or jaguar's, except that the
markings are larger. In heaven's name, now, what creature is this? Can it
be the sea-leopard that I have often read about, but of whose habitat,
etc., I know nothing till I can look it up again?--the state of many a
naturalist in regard to many a species, sometimes, perhaps, but shortly
before he writes a treatise upon it. Upon coming down, now, and watching
it closely, I see that in shape and general appearance--except for its
wonderful skin--it is very like the bottle-nosed seal. Its body, however,
is not so cylindrical, but bulges out into a greater roundness below the
neck and shoulders, so that its weight may be somewhat greater. Its nose
looks broader, and nearly, if not quite, as long. I think, indeed, it
is the larger animal of the two. I can make these comparisons, for both
are here together now, and they continue for hour after hour to haunt the
pool; but whilst he of the bottle-nose rises always at his long intervals
and soon goes down, the knight of the leopard comes up at as short, or
even shorter ones than the common seal does, and sometimes stays for a
longer time, as witness these twelve successive appearances, with their
corresponding disappearances, which I timed, partly to know, and partly
to feel scientific: from 11.44 to 11.48; from 11.50¼ to 11.53¾; from
11.55 to 12; from 12.1¼ to 12.5½; from 12.7¾ to 12.11; from 12.14 to
12.17¾; from 12.20 to 12.24; from 12.25¾ to 12.30¼; from 12.32 to 12.37½;
from 12.44 to 12.49; from 12.50¾ to 12.55.
Also, though he often pegtops it, he has never yet pointed his nose
straight up into the sky, which my bottle-nosed seal invariably does.
Generally he soon adopts the horizontal attitude, and continues in it
for the rest of the time he is up. When he goes down, he rolls round, as
well as over--by which I mean both like a porpoise and like a barrel--and
then his spotted, or rather blotched, belly makes a splendid mosaic
under the water, for it is not only itself, which were enough of beauty,
but the most lovely glaucous green is flung upon it, through which, all
glorified, the pattern appears. A magnificent sight! "The very phenix!"
Poor Bottle-nose is quite eclipsed.
This great beauty of the skin--which, strange to say, instead of being
invisible was most conspicuously apparent--can only, I think, have been
gained through sexual selection, and its being confined to the belly and
sides may bear some relation to the habits of the animal. Suppose that
this one is the male, then does his leopardess look up at him as he rolls
in blubberly grace and barrel-like symmetry above her, or, since he swims
with equal ease upon his back or belly, has the fair, portly expanse of
the latter made it the principal area of decoration? Does he offer it as
a carpet to her when she goes abroad, saying "Swim upon me," or display
it over her as a banner, crying "Be these thy colours!" or, in swift
circumvolution, does he enmesh and entwine her with it, playing about her
like a stout coruscation, as the two swim together through grots, and
caves, and pebbled halls, and cool groves of golden-brown seaweed? All
this is the secret of the deep; but there is the belly, and it fires the
imagination.
I am now sure that it was this great and glorious sea-leopard, and not
the other large seal, that I first saw lying on the seaweed, and I had
hoped it might have done so again as the tide went out. But I was again
disappointed. As before, little of this deep-growing seaweed was exposed
by the tide, nor did either of the two lie on the rock itself, or on any
other one. Neither did the common seal come this time, whereas, in the
adjoining cove, there was the accustomed complement. This one seems the
haunt _par excellence_ of these two superior creatures, but, very unlike
the common seal, they are always in the water.
I have now satisfied myself that the young guillemot is petted,
sometimes, by birds that are not its parents. The facts are as follows:
having watched the seals till past five, I determined to explore a
little, and walked out along the promontory which forms the opposite
side of this little Shetland fiord, and the end of which, except for the
outlying stacks, must be about the most northern point of that portion
of the British Empire which imperialists care least about--I mean the
British Isles. Here I found some more guillemot and kittiwake ledges, and
on one of these were some half a dozen of the former birds, one being a
young one. The latter was with its parents, on a place which, though it
seemed to project but a hair's breadth, was yet the safest part of the
ledge, which was very narrow and dangerous-looking. Here I left him for a
very short time, to get further down the rocks, but on my return I found
he had left this comparatively secure place and was now right away, on
what, but for a very slight slanting slope, with a giddy projection here
and there, looked like the sheer face of the precipice. No bird was with
it: the chick was evidently in distress, and now, for the first time,
I heard a little sharp note proceeding from it, which really did sound
something like the word "guill," or "guilly." Some feet above where the
chick was, but separated from it by a fearfully steep and dangerous face
of rock, another guillemot sat on a ridge, which it almost covered. The
chick made several efforts to scale this _mauvais pas_, failed as many
times, but at last, with manifest danger to its poor little life, got up
it, and stood by this bird, on the tiny ridge. The latter immediately
stood up also, and bent over it, _jodel_-ing, and cossetting it with its
beak. Here, then, it seemed evident, was one of the parents. But now
there appeared, pressing forward amongst others, on that part of the
cliff where the chick had been, an eye-marked bird who seemed to be much
excited. She made her way along to near the place from which the chick
had scrambled up, and, as one may say, called it down to her, though I
heard no cry, for it followed her back along that fearfully steep and
dangerous place, having now always to climb down instead of up, until, at
last, it was back on the ledge where it had, at first, been sitting, and
which, compared to where it had strayed to, looked almost safe.
[Illustration: A PERILOUS JOURNEY]
Could I give all the details of this fearful journey, it would make
interesting reading, but I sat in rain and wind, and my hands were so
numbed with cold that I found it difficult to use the glasses, and quite
impossible to take notes. All that I can say now--this same evening--is
that once, in getting down to its mother, who waited for it at different
stages, it did actually fall and roll head over heels down the rock.
I thought all was over, but it recovered itself on a tiny projection,
seeming none the worse, and, shortly after, arrived with its mother on
the ledge. Here there were some three or four more birds, and the chick,
as I noticed, now, and several times afterwards, seemed glad to go to any
of them. One it ran up to, and this bird behaved exactly as the first one
had done, _jodel_-ing over it, and caressing it with its bill. Now, if
this last bird was the chick's parent, the one that had a little before
done the same thing, and still sat in the same place on another part of
the rock, could not also be, for that the eyed bird who had fetched it
away must have been either its father or mother, is a thing indubitable,
not only by reason of that one act, but also on account of its general
conduct both before and afterwards. One, therefore, of the two birds
that caressed the chick must have been a stranger to it, but the fact is
that both were, for whilst the last that had done so was still on the
ledge, and but shortly afterwards, in flew a bird from the sea with a
fish in his bill, and fed the chick. Now, I cannot, as far as eyesight
goes, affirm that this bird was not the one that the chick had first
gone to, and by whom it had been kindly received; but that one of a pair
of guillemots should sit for a long time, not only by itself, but far
removed from the chick and the other one, and that afterwards, when the
chick had gone to it, this other one, its own mate, should excitedly
fetch it away, is a thing quite out of accordance with all I have yet
seen of the domestic relations of these birds. It is true that, in this
case, a motive can be imagined for the chick's excursion, but whilst
my later observations have shown me that, as the chick gets older, it
does move about, I have never known it trouble about an absent parent
whilst it had one by it. I have never, that I remember, seen the chick
seek to be fed before one or other of its dams had flown in with a fish,
and I attribute the anxiety which this one showed to reach the bird in
question, to its distress at finding itself in so precarious a situation.
In this, however, I may be wrong, but since it is beyond doubt that one
stranger bird caressed the chick, it is not very essential to prove
that another did. The likelihood is that one would be as willing to as
another, and I did, indeed, notice that all the birds on the ledge to
which the chick was brought back, seemed to take a kindly interest in it,
especially another white-eyed one, which the mother several times drove
away from it--being jealous, as I suppose. The state of affairs appeared
to me to be this, that all the birds had a tender feeling towards the
chick, that the chick, if left to itself, was inclined to go to any one
of them, and that whatever one it did go to was ready to _jodel_ over it,
and caress it. Not having been able to note down every little thing at
the time, I cannot now give the general evidence on which this impression
was founded, but I have recounted the special incidents.
An interesting question arises here--at least it seems interesting to me.
Is the conduct that we have been considering the result of mistake or
confusion on the part of either the grown birds or the chick--or of both
of them--or does it spring from an extension of sympathy in the one, and
of _Kinderliebe_, or cupboard-love, in the other? Personally, I believe
that both of these two latter brain-processes have to do in producing
the result in question, but that the first--a tenderness, namely, on the
part of the old birds--is the preponderating influence. We must remember
that all these childless birds upon the ledges--and when I first came the
ledges were crowded--must have had children with them only a short time
ago. When, therefore, a chick runs suddenly up to them, just as their
own chick used to, I can understand a train of recent memories being so
strongly revived as to cause them to act as they do. I did, in fact, to
my own senses, notice something in the manner of these non-parent birds
thus acting parentally--in a certain degree, that is to say--which was
different to that of the true parents. A certain surprise, I thought,
was exhibited at first, and then the bird seemed to fall into the old
train of things. If, indeed, as I am much inclined to believe, the mere
bringing of a fish to the ledge may raise, for a time, in the mind of the
bird that brings it, the hallucinatory image or impression of a chick
that is not there, it is not wonderful that the actual running up to it
of a chick not its own, should cause it to feel and act as though it were
the true parent.
What, then, has been the origin of sympathy? Even amongst ourselves, to
feel with a person ([Greek: syn pathos]) is to feel very much as though
one were that person, and the effort of reason which assures us to the
contrary might well be beyond the power of an animal. Indeed, when we
think of what all children can _pretend_, and what many grown-up people
believe, we should not expect too much of birds. The guillemot, we will
say, upon seeing a young bird which, by calling up memories, takes the
place of its own, becomes, in imagination, its parent--so that the
sympathy it shows for it is not wider than that between parent and child.
In other cases the feelings aroused in an animal when it sees, let us
say, one of its fellows subjected to suffering or danger which it has
been accustomed, itself, to fear and shun, may relate to itself only,
so that any apparently sympathetic actions arising out of them would be
due to that failure to distinguish between what is in the mind and what
is outside of it (subjective and objective) that has often been remarked
in savages--or, if not remarked, is at least attributed to them. Of
this hypothesis I have given one illustration, and others may be easily
imagined.
Do we become more, or less, sympathetic as we get more civilised? Two
people who think and feel alike are said to be in sympathy, and the more
primitive and uniform the conditions of life are, the more must those who
live together under them think and feel alike. The process of advance
may be a process of the more complete separation and realisation of
one's own distinctive personality, and though reason and self-interest
produce a higher power and degree of combination amongst civilised men
than the state of animals, or the savage state of man, permits of,
yet we must ask ourselves if, where it can and does exist amongst the
latter, it is not of a more spontaneous and vigorous character, and if
there is not more real sympathy attached to it. Where, for instance,
can such perfect combination be found as amongst social insects--bees,
wasps, ants, etc.--the conditions of whose existence are far simpler
and more uniform than ours? And in what deep feelings of sympathy--or,
as we may say, oneness--must blood-feuds have had their origin? If it
is true that the sympathies of some civilised men have become widened
so as to embrace humanity at large, and even the lower animals, is it
not equally true that _all_ civilised men stand more cut off from their
immediate neighbours than do savages, because, owing to an increased
diversity of individual character, consequent upon more diverse and
complex conditions, they less resemble them? If so, though in one sense
man may be said to sympathise more and more as he advances in culture,
in another sense, and perhaps the truer one, he does so less and less;
for as the river has widened it has become less deep, and the current
less strong. Heine makes this same comparison in some interesting remarks
upon the inhabitants of the Isle of Nordeney, which, as they exactly and
felicitously express my meaning, I will here quote, albeit in a clumsy
translation: "What links these men so fastly and inwardly together is not
so much a mystic bond of love, as habit, the daily necessary living in
each other's life, a common shared simplicity. The same spiritual width,
or rather narrowness, issues in the same strivings and longings, whilst
unity of ideas and experience makes mutual sympathy an easy matter. So
they sit cosily by the fire in their little cabins, drawn close together
against the cold, and, as they turn to speak, see their own thoughts
in each other's eyes, read their own words, before they speak them,
on each other's lips. Every life-memory, every life-experience, is a
common possession, and with a tone, a look, a gesture, a silent motion,
as much of joy, sorrow, or reflection is aroused in their bosoms as we
can bring about through long expositions and spluttering declamations.
For we live, in great part, mentally alone. Owing to different lines of
education, to a different choice of reading--often accidentally stumbled
on--difference, rather than sameness, of character has been developed
amongst us. Each one of us, with masked spirit, thinks, feels, and
strives in a lonely atmosphere of his own, and miscomprehensions are
so many, and at-oneness, even in one household, is so rare, and we are
everywhere cramped, everywhere repulsed, and everywhere strangers to each
other."
This is just my idea, and though I had read Heine before I watched
guillemots, I yet believe that my watching them has suggested it to me
quite independently, for the passage quoted never came into my head till
afterwards. Let us not, therefore, be too proud, for though there may,
here and there among us, be a philosopher who feels himself able to
sympathise with, say the Chinese--or a Chinese one with us--yet neither
such philosophers, nor any of us, have that pleasant feeling of almost
_being_ one another which these islanders of Nordeney, or any tribe of
simple-lived savages, or even, perhaps, some social animals, enjoy. So
far from civilisation being altruistic in its tendencies, it appears to
me (just at this moment) that by making the units more and more unlike
each other, it fosters egotism and makes real sympathy harder.
I have as yet only speculated upon the feelings of the grown guillemots
when they _fête_ a chick that is not their own. Those of the chick are, I
think, easier to understand. Its love for its parents is cupboard love;
it is equally ready to be looked after by any other bird, and, if hungry
and not fed, it will apply elsewhere. With what degree of accuracy it
distinguishes its parents from the other birds on the ledge, I have not
yet made up my mind; but I think it much depends upon the efforts of the
parents themselves.
Besides the incidents which I have related, I noticed some other
interesting points. Both the chick and the parents seemed ill at ease.
The former did not seek to go to sleep, nor did the latter offer the
wing. Often it struck me that one of the parents was on the point of
doing something in regard to the chick, and, what was more curious, it
also struck me that the other birds were restless, too, and that they,
too, had designs upon, or, at least, felt an unusual interest in, the
chick. In especial a second white-eyed bird came several times up to it
with an important air, but also with a curious, hesitating action, and
an expression as though in doubt what to do. The other white-eyed one
would then bustle up in much the same way, causing the first to retreat;
but after a little while, the two being exactly alike, I became quite
bewildered, and could not possibly say which was and which was not the
parent--a good evidence, I think, of the similarity of their behaviour.
All this, and many other little things which struck me at the time, but
which I could not then note down, and have now forgotten, convinced
me that the flight from the ledge would not be long delayed. Though
miserably uncomfortable, therefore, I waited and waited, in hopes to see
it; but it grew late, the sun had sunk, and as I had a steep ascent to
make, with some amount of climbing even before I came to it, it would
not do to stay longer. Cliffs like these are not to be ascended in the
dark--at least, not by me. To-morrow I feel quite certain that the birds
will be gone.