acquaintances. She is on good, but not affectionate terms with her
widowed brothers-in-law, Mr Langton Larkspur and Mr Septimus Allerton.
She once a year invites her man of business, Mr John Bones, of Cook’s
Court, to dine with her and them in Grosvenor Street; and she is civil
to the rector of her parish, and to the medical man whom she would
call in to attend her in case of illness. Yet Mr Larkspur once told Mr
Allerton that this feminine dragon had had a violent love-affair when
she was nineteen; and Mr Allerton—whose connection with the Marrable
family is of much more recent date than that of Lucy’s father—actually
declared that he could well believe it. If, however, Miss Marrable did
have a love-affair in her youth, I am not inclined at this time of day
to cast it as a reproach in her teeth. Boys will be boys; and girls, I
suppose, will be girls, though they may live to see the error of their
ways, and be none the worse for their follies. One thing is certain,
and that is, that at the present time, and for at least five-and-twenty
years past, Miss Martha Marrable has ceased to dream of the tender
passion. She still occasionally talks vaguely of going up the Nile,
or of visiting the Yellowstone Region, ere she dies; but she never
contemplates the possibility of getting married; and I believe that she
would as soon think of allowing a man to believe that she regarded him
with anything but polite aversion, as she would think of going into
business as a steeple-jack, and learning to stand on one leg on the top
of the cross at the summit of St Paul’s Cathedral.
And yet Miss Martha Marrable was last year the heroine of a terrible
scandal; and many of her misanthropic female friends have never since
been able to completely believe her professions of hatred of man.
The affair gave rise to many whispers, and was even, I understand,
guardedly alluded to, with just and virtuous deprecation, in the
columns of the _Woman’s Suffrage Journal_, as a terrible but happily
rare instance of womanly weakness and frivolity; and since the true
story has never been told, I feel that it is only fair to tell it, and
by telling it, to defend Miss Marrable from the dastardly charges that
have been made against her established reputation for good sense and
unflinching contempt of the rougher sex.
Towards the end of August, Miss Marrable and her two nieces left
London for North Wales, and after a long and tiresome journey, reached
Abermaw, in Merionethshire, and took rooms at the _Cors-y-Gedol Hotel_.
They were accompanied, as usual, by the two maids and the green parrot;
but the courier and the man-servant, being males, and their services
not being imperatively required, they were left behind in London.
Lucy had just celebrated her twenty-third birthday, and Amy was just
about to celebrate her twenty-first; and—although I am sorry to have
to record it—I am by no means astonished that they were both in love.
Lucy, during the whole of the previous season, had been determinedly
flirting with a designing young artist named Robert Rhodes; and Amy,
younger and less experienced than her cousin, had been carrying on,
even more sentimentally, with Mr Vivian Jellicoe, who, being heir to a
baronetcy, found that position so arduous and fatiguing, that he was
quite unfitted for any active occupation of a laborious character. Of
course Miss Marrable knew nothing of these affairs. Had she suspected
them, she would perhaps have not taken her nieces with her to Abermaw;
for it happened that at that very watering-place, Sir Thomas Jellicoe
and his son Vivian were staying when the three ladies, the two maids,
and the green parrot arrived. But no foresight on Miss Marrable’s part
could have prevented Mr Robert Rhodes from following Lucy to North
Wales. That adventurous artist had made up his mind to spend the autumn
in Miss Larkspur’s neighbourhood; and even if Miss Marrable had carried
off her elder niece to Timbuctoo or the Society Islands, Mr Rhodes
would have gone after the pair by the next train, steamboat, diligence,
or caravan available.
Upon the morning, therefore, after Miss Marrable’s arrival at Abermaw,
she and her nieces were comfortably installed at the _Cors-y-Gedol
Hotel_; while at the _Red Goat_, close by, Sir Thomas Jellicoe and
Vivian occupied rooms on the first floor, and Mr Rhodes had a bedroom
on the third.
In the course of that afternoon, Miss Martha Marrable, accompanied by
her nieces, and followed at a respectful distance by the two maids,
walked in the sunshine upon the hard sands that stretch, for I do not
know how many hundred yards at low water, between the rocky hills
behind the little town and the margin of Cardigan Bay. The weather was
hot and sultry, and the unrippled sea looked like molten lead in the
glare. Much exercise was therefore out of the question; and ere long,
the three ladies sat down on the seaward side of a rush-grown sandhill
to read, leaving the two maids to stroll farther if they chose to do
so, and to explore at their leisure the unaccustomed wonders of the
seashore.
Miss Martha having arranged her sunshade to her satisfaction, opened
a little volume on _The Rights of the Slaves of England_, while Lucy
devoted herself to one of Ouida’s novels, and Amy plunged deep into
Keats. In five minutes _The Rights of the Slaves of England_ fell
heavily to the sand; and in three minutes more, Miss Marrable was
emitting sounds which, but that I know her to be a woman who has no
weakness, I should call snores. From that moment, Lucy and Amy, as if
by common consent, read no more.
‘Lucy,’ said Amy mysteriously to her cousin, ‘I have seen him.’
‘So have I,’ said Lucy.
‘What a curious coincidence!’
‘Not at all. He told me that he intended to follow us.’
‘What! Vivian told you?’
‘O no! Bother Vivian! You are always thinking of Vivian. I mean Robert.’
‘He here too!’ exclaimed Amy. ‘I meant Vivian. I saw him half an hour
ago, with his father.’
‘Well, I advise you not to let Aunt Martha know too much,’ said Lucy.
‘If she suspects anything, she will take us back to London this
afternoon.’
Miss Marrable murmured uneasily in her sleep. A fly had settled on her
chin.
‘Hush!’ exclaimed the girls in unison, and then they were silent.
Not long afterwards, they caught sight of two young men who were
walking arm-in-arm along the sand, a couple of hundred yards away.
‘Look! There they are!’ whispered Lucy. ‘Aunt must not see them. We
must go and warn them.’ And, stealthily accompanied by her cousin, she
crept away from Miss Marrable, and ran towards the approaching figures.
I need not describe the greetings that ensued. Such things are the
commonplaces of seaside encounters between young men and young women
who have likings for each other, and they have been described a
thousand times. Suffice it to say that, a few minutes later, Lucy and
Robert were sitting together under the shadow of a bathing-machine,
while Amy and Vivian were confidentially talking nonsense a dozen yards
off. More than half an hour elapsed ere the girls returned to Miss
Marrable; but fortunately the excellent spinster was still murmuring
sleepily at the fly on her chin; and when she awoke, she had no
suspicion that she had been deserted by her charges. As she walked back
with them to the hotel, nevertheless, as if with a strange intuitive
comprehension of danger in the air, she held forth to them upon her
favourite topic—the unfathomable baseness of man; and gravely warned
them against ever allowing themselves even for a single moment to
entertain any feeling, save one of polite aversion to the hated sex.
Thus matters went on for a week or more, Lucy and Amy meeting their
lovers every day in secret, and Miss Marrable suspecting nothing.
Although she knew Sir Thomas Jellicoe and his son, she treated them,
whenever she encountered them, with such freezing courtesy, that they
did not seek her society. As for Robert Rhodes, she did not know him;
and he therefore escaped her lofty slights.
But in due time a crisis arrived; and in order that the full bearings
of the situation may be properly understood, I must briefly explain the
characters of Miss Martha Marrable’s undutiful nieces.
Lucy Larkspur has but little romance in her composition; she has strong
feelings, but not much sentiment; and she is one of those girls who are
perfectly open with their hearts. She loved Robert Rhodes, and, as she
knew quite well that he also loved her, she made no secret to him of
her affection for him. Amy Allerton, on the other hand, is, and always
has been, sentimentally inclined. She believes, rightly or wrongly,
that it is a very charming thing to
Let concealment, like a worm i’ the bud,
Feed on her damask cheek;
and she would as soon have thought of permitting Vivian Jellicoe to
think that she loved him, as of attempting to win and woo the Sultan
of Turkey. The consequence was that Miss Marrable, who fondly imagined
that she knew all the thoughts of her elder niece, trusted her much
more than she trusted her younger. She regarded Lucy as an open book
that might be easily read, and Amy as a kind of oracular voice that,
while saying or appearing to say one thing, might mean exactly the
opposite. Miss Marrable was destined to discover that she was to
some extent wrong in her estimate, so far, at all events, as Lucy
was concerned; and her discovery of her error was, I grieve to say,
accompanied by a good deal of pain and mortification.
Ten days had passed; and the two pair of lovers had made considerable
progress. Amy, it is true, had not declared herself to Vivian, who,
being a bashful young man, had, perhaps, not pressed her sufficiently;
but Lucy and Robert understood one another completely, and were
secretly engaged to get married at the earliest opportunity. Vivian’s
bashfulness could not, however, endure for an unlimited time. One
morning, he and Amy found themselves together on the rocks behind the
town, and the opportunity being favourable, he screwed up his courage,
told her that he had never loved any one but her; and obtained a coyly
given promise that she would be his.
Natures like Amy’s, when they once take fire, often burn rapidly. On
Monday, she became engaged to Vivian Jellicoe; on Tuesday, Vivian
begged her to name a day for the wedding, and she refused; and on
Wednesday, Vivian, knowing the peculiar sentiments of Miss Martha
Marrable, and doubtful also, perhaps, whether his father would not
throw impediments in the way of his early marriage, proposed an
elopement; and Amy, with some hesitation, consented.
When she returned from her secret meeting with her lover, she of course
confided her plan to her cousin. ‘How foolish you are,’ said Lucy; ‘you
know that your father would not have you do that for the world; and you
will make an enemy of Aunt Martha, who is like a mother to us girls.’
‘But she would never agree to our marrying, if we consulted her,’
objected Amy; ‘and if she knew anything of our plans, I am sure that
she would manage to frustrate them. She is a dear old thing, but——
Well, she is peculiar on those points.’
‘I have told you what I think,’ said Lucy, with an assumption of wisdom
that was perhaps warranted by her superior age. ‘Don’t be foolish.’
But Amy was already beyond the influence of counsel. She persisted in
her intention, and even claimed Lucy’s sympathy and assistance, which,
of course, Lucy could not ultimately withhold.
Ere an elopement can be successfully carried out, in the face
especially of the jealous watchfulness of a man-hating spinster lady
of middle age, numerous preparations have to be made; and, in the
case of Vivian and Amy, the making of these preparations involved
correspondence. Amy, therefore, bribed one of her aunt’s maids to act
as a go-between; and the maid in question, with a fidelity that is
rare, and at the same time a treachery that, I fear, is common in her
kind, promptly carried Vivian’s first letter to her mistress.
Miss Martha Marrable without scruple tore open the envelope and
angrily perused its contents. ‘MY OWN AMY,’ ran the audacious
communication—‘Let us settle, then, to go on Wednesday. At nine o’clock
in the evening, a carriage-and-pair shall be ready to take us to
Harlech, where you can stay for the night with the Joneses, who are
old friends of ours; and on Thursday by mid-day we shall be married,
and, I trust, never afterwards parted again. We can arrange the details
between this and then. But write, and tell me that you agree.—Your ever
devoted
VIVIAN.’
A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE POLECAT.
Of the several interesting animals which constitute the weasel tribe
in the British Isles, not the least noteworthy is the polecat. It
is at once the largest and most predaceous of the three most common
_mustelidæ_, and one of the greatest natural enemies of game with which
preservers have to contend, and at the same time a most persevering
and successful poultry-yard thief. It is, notwithstanding all these
unfavourable traits in its character, but scantily known as far as its
appearance and general mode of existence are concerned; gamekeepers,
for obvious reasons, not wholly unconnected with the animal’s bodily
discomfort, seeming to possess almost a monopoly of information
concerning the natural characteristics and habits of this somewhat
sturdy varmint.
The polecat is popularly supposed to be, as far as outward form goes,
a larger type of stoat, while actually it is a very different-looking
animal, although possessing the peculiar formation of body and
litheness of limb so typical of the weasel tribe. In several details
it offers some not inconsiderable difference from the generality of
weasels. The somewhat more thickly set head and the bushy tail are the
most prominent divergences. But taken as a whole, its appearance imbues
one with the idea that it might form a very satisfactory connecting
link between the _mustelidæ_ and the _felidæ_—the weasels and the cats.
Hence, probably, its name. In colour, polecats vary to some extent, on
account of the nature of their furry covering. This consists of two
lengths of fur; the one—which lies close to the skin—being thick and
woolly, of a pale yellowish brown; and the other, long and of more
hair-like texture, a bright deep brown, darkening into a shiny black.
As these two furs do not grow and are not shed simultaneously, but are
regulated in this respect by the seasons, it is sufficiently obvious
that superficial observation of these animals at different times of
the year might lead one to suppose that polecats were of various and
irregular colouring.
The polecat is yearly becoming rarer and rarer in the more cultivated
districts of the country; while its numbers are also slowly but
seemingly very surely diminishing in those parts which the hand of man
has permitted to remain in a state congenial to its tastes and habits.
We need not be at any pains to enumerate the districts throughout the
United Kingdom where it is still to be found, because, when the nature
of the haunts which it loves are presently set forth, such districts
will naturally suggest themselves. The stoat and the weasel are both to
some extent gregarious; but the polecat seems to prefer a more solitary
mode of existence; and it rarely happens that if some few of them are
found to frequent any particular spot, many more of their kind have
taken up their abode in the near neighbourhood. The polecat chiefly
haunts small dark fir-woods, where the surface is rough and broken, and
much overgrown with tangled and inhospitable brake. If such a clump
of trees be situated at the corner of a field or along some irregular
farm-road, it has additional recommendations. In the hilly uncultivated
parts, the streams invariably pursue a troubled course through rough
and broken ground, where large boulders and low thickly bristling brake
alternate with gorse and bracken-covered level ground. Here the polecat
also finds a congenial haunt, away from the abodes of man, and in a
situation where provender, in the shape of rabbits and hares and winged
game, is likely to be plentiful and easily obtained. When nothing else
will grow on the steep and barren hillside, large areas of oak are
often planted, not to grow into large spreading trees, but only into
oak-coppice, which may afford oak-bark for the tanner, and firewood
for the dwellers in the country. Amongst this copse the polecat has
many inducements to form its lair, and there it will find many animals
and birds upon which to prey. In fact, it is not particular as to its
haunts, if it can only be situated in rough and tree-grown parts, where
it may obtain that security from observation and molestation which
seems a necessity of its existence.
The actual lair of the animal may be anywhere—in any crevice of a rock,
in a hollow tree or hole in the ground; but the place where its young
are born and reared, is chosen after seemingly greater deliberation,
and with an evident object. It prefers for this important purpose a
burrow in the soil, and as a rule, adapts to its use and occupation
that of some departed rabbit. Failing this, it will be at evident
pains to scoop out a burrow for itself; though this is but a poor
affair beside the convenient and more secure subterranean dwelling
usually formed by the ubiquitous and nimble rodent in question. But if
rabbit-burrows be scarce, and the polecat disinclined for burrowing, it
will perforce seek out some warm, secure nook amongst the interstices
of some boulders, or beneath some irregular heap of large stones
collected by the industrious agriculturist, and set about forming its
lair in that. This lair resembles to some extent the breeding-place
formed by the rabbit, but is usually distinguishable from that by the
greater regularity and evenness with which the dry leaves, dry grass,
moss, and the like are formed and worked together to afford a suitable
receptacle for the young when born. These are usually five or six in
number, occasionally more, not unfrequently less. The months of May and
June seem to be about the time when they are brought forth; but they
rarely make their appearance above ground till some time after they are
born. It is uncertain whether, while the young are being reared, the
male becomes the sole provider of food; but we fancy not, and that when
the female can snatch an occasion, she exercises her predatory desires
in common with her mate.
Polecats are not by any means night-hunters, although, no doubt, they
filch a good deal of their prey under cover of the darkness. Their
favourite time for hunting seems to be the early morning; and as soon
as they leave the shelter of their domain they, as a rule, set off for
some rabbit-burrow—whether tenanted or not is immaterial—and indulge
in a run through its winding tunnels. After this, they will get to
some hedgerow, and hunt it down. If there be any old palings or a
gate adjacent, they are sure to stop and rub themselves against the
woodwork; and if several of the varmint be together, they may throw
off their sober exterior, and indulge in a little play; and then they
set off in serious fashion to obtain their food, which they draw, as a
rule, in small portions from many victims. Like all the weasel tribe,
the polecat seems to possess an extreme and bloodthirsty rapacity. It
is never content to capture and kill sufficient for its own immediate
use, but will destroy often as many birds and animals in one day as
would serve it for a week, nay, ofttimes for a month’s sustenance.
Hence the large amount of damage this predaceously inclined little
creature will commit. The catalogue of what is to its taste in the
shape of birds and animals is a long one—all kinds of furred and
feathered game, poultry even, to turkeys; rats and some kinds of mice;
frogs, eels, and fish. The rabbit, where plentiful, is its most common
victim, for it finds bunny a somewhat easy capture in its burrow,
where, lying probably unconscious of impending danger, it may suddenly
find the enemy at its throat, whence in a few seconds the marauder will
have sucked its life-blood.
Possessed of powers of scent far keener than any hound, the polecat
can and will track hares long distances in their wanderings, and
eventually effect their capture. Upon the little nut-brown partridge
or the more sober-looking grouse it will steal in the early dawn or
at ‘even’s stilly hour;’ and sometimes, before the former is aware of
the polecat’s presence, it will have, by a sharp irresistible bite
into its brains, transferred it and perhaps several others beyond the
reach of the sportsman’s gun. Being at need a strong and rapid swimmer,
the polecat has often been known to take eels and other fish from the
streams; but unless other food be scarce, it usually refrains from
entering the unstable element in search of food. Amongst poultry,
its operations are often wholesale, and must be disheartening to a
degree to the industrious henwife; for, as we said before, it does not
confine itself to supplying its actual wants, but, given the chance
of some wholesale killing, it indulges its cruel instincts apparently
more for the pleasure than for the necessity of the thing. It is this
habit, common to all the animals and birds coming under the definition
‘vermin,’ which renders them so extremely destructive. One thing may be
said in the polecat’s favour, which is, that it is a very determined
enemy of the rat, although the latter’s fierceness often prevents the
former from bringing to a successful conclusion any crusade it may have
opened against it. But the polecat is all the same a most courageous
little animal; and its fierceness when attacked, the pluck with which
it will fight against superior odds, and the wonderful amount of
activity it can bring to bear, prove it to be no mean enemy for a
terrier of two or three times its size. Moreover, it does not disdain
when ‘cornered,’ or when its progeny are threatened, to attack human
beings. Under the circumstances, it is a dangerous creature to deal
with, its bite being very painful and lasting.
In addition to these qualities for attack, the polecat is possessed of
a peculiar and very disagreeable means of defence. This consists in
the secretion of a liquid substance of disgustingly fetid odour, which
the animal has the power of emitting at will. This it uses in case of
attack chiefly by men or dogs; and as we fancy it is as objectionable
and intolerable to its canine as to its human enemies, the benefit it
derives from this possession may be better imagined than described.
Owing doubtless to this habit, the animal frequently goes by the name
of foulemart in England, and foumart in Scotland.
No one who has any actual knowledge of the habits of the polecat
can come to any other conclusion than that it is a most destructive
animal, and one whose presence is not to be tolerated, much less
desired, either in the game preserve or in the neighbourhood of the
poultry-yard; and yet one of the most ridiculous of superstitions
obtains amongst many farmers and country-people as to this animal.
It is said to be capable of appreciating hospitality, and acting in
accordance with the unwritten laws of such, so that if one encourage
the animal and afford it shelter, it will refrain from destroying
the live-stock of the person who so amiably entertains it. This
is, one must admit, a very pretty little piece of nonsense. But,
notwithstanding this, polecats are unmistakably becoming fewer and
fewer every year, and we shall soon see it a very rare animal.
AN OLD, OLD STORY.
A casual meeting—one of merest chance;
An introduction—bows, a smile, a dance.
’Twas thus we met; and little dreamed I then
He would be more to me than other men.
Of course I thought him handsome, bright, and gay;
But so were others—he not more than they.
My heart, that might the future have revealed,
Was stilled and sleeping, all its secrets sealed.
To meet so coolly seems a mystery now;
To part so gaily—ah, I wonder how!
To clasp his hand, to lean upon his arm,
Yet no soft flutterings fill me with alarm;
To stand beside him, close beside his heart,
Nor dream that of my own it formed a part—
’Twas all so natural! Oh, we little knew
What fate was shaping out betwixt us two;
What each to each, what heart to heart might be,
What I should be to him—what he to me.
* * * * *
A moment when I first had dared to feel
Emotions which my pride would fain conceal,
When sudden thoughts across my mind were cast,
And sudden flutterings made my heart beat fast;
When fancies strange as sweet, and sweet as strange,
Sought shy admittance, through my heart to range.
O timid hopes, soft doubts, and tender fear!
O coy concealment from the one most dear!
O burning blushes that unbidden rise!
O faltering tongue, and traitorous tell-tale eyes!
O sweet anxiety, and pleasing pain,
To love—to love; and not to love in vain!
To watch his eye, and half in wonder see
’Twas always brightest when it fell on me;
To mark, when by my side, his tender tone,
His hand’s soft pressure when it held my own;
O thus to watch, and wait for him to tell,
What my heart whispered that it knew full well!
* * * * *