BEATING OUT THE SKAL.
“Now the hunting train is ready. Hark, away! By dale and height
Horns are sounding,—hawks ascending up to Odin’s halls of light.
Terror-struck, the wild-wood creatures seek their dens ’mid woods and
reeds;
While, with spear advanced pursuing, she, the air Valkyria speeds.”
_Frithi of Tegner._
“Hillo, Moodie! what news?” said the Captain; “have a cup of coffee and
a—a—chop,” as that individual strode down the pass from the side farthest
removed from the skal looking—as, indeed, was very nearly the case—as if
he had neither trimmed his beard nor washed his face since the beginning
of the campaign.
“Why, the news is, that you had better look out sharp, if you mean to
do credit to my recommendation. I had a message from Bjornstjerna last
night, that he meant to get the dref in motion an hour before sunrise, so
as to beat out, and give the men time to get home before evening; they
must have been advancing for these two hours; our people have heard their
shouts distinctly enough, and I only wonder we have had no game yet.
Capital mutton chops, these,” he added; “who is your butcher?”
“O, we are pretty good foragers,” said the Captain, carelessly, but at
the same time casting an anxious glance round the encampment, to see
whether there were any tell-tale horns or hoofs lurking about. “Terrible
weather yesterday, was not it?”
“Upon my word, it was as much as I could do to keep the men at their
posts; I have got one or two skulkers down in the Länsman’s books, but
I do not think I can have the conscience to inflict the fine; I had
half a mind to skulk myself;—we must do it, though, in justice to the
honest fellows who braved the weather. I think the best man I have is
a woman; she did more service in shaming the men and keeping them to
their duty than a dozen of us. I had occasion to degrade a skalfogde
for drunkenness, and I promoted her into the vacancy on the spot. How
the men laughed: they call her some Swedish equivalent to the ‘Dashing
White Serjeant,’—and I only wish I had a dozen white serjeants instead
of one. But what have you done here in the shooting way? I heard a good
deal of firing last night from your post; you have made yourselves pretty
comfortable, at all events.”
“It is a way we have in the army,” said the Parson. “There is our
_spoliarium_, however,” pointing to a group of carcasses that were
hanging to the lower branches of a fir,—“one bear, two wolves,
five foxes, a lot of hares, and”—here the Captain plucked his
sleeve,—“and—that is all, besides a young bear which I killed in the
fjeld as I came along.”
“Oh come! that is not so bad; and that bear is a glorious fellow! who
killed him?”
“Why, we cannot justly say,” replied the Captain, sheepishly: “the fact
is, he made a charge upon the picket, and it took a good many hands
to quiet him,—you may see that by the gashes; I am afraid the skin is
terribly injured.”
“What a mercenary dog you are; these are honourable scars, which, while
they impair the beauty, only enhance the value;—every cut is the memorial
of a gallant deed.”
Whether the Captain,—who was vehemently anxious to kill a bear to his own
hand, and whose conscience upbraided him bitterly for his last night’s
dereliction of duty,—coincided in this sentiment, might be doubted;
at all events, he made no attempt to remove the doubt by indiscreet
confessions, and was only too glad to shift the subject, lest any
untimely observation from his companions or attendants might reveal the
true state of the case.
“What have you done yourself?” said he; “I am sure your people must
have fired twenty shots for our one; I thought you were having a mock
skirmish, at one time.”
“O, those people fire at anything or nothing, just for the sake of making
a noise. We have got a good many wolves and foxes, though, and a rascally
lynx or two; but we have not been so fortunate as you with the bears;
though I am clear we saw two or three during the night. I am sorry to
say that there were three or four stags killed, and I do not know what
to do about it. There was a herd last night very restless; it had tried
our line at several points. I had given strict orders to let them pass,
but they always got headed back, somehow,—in fact, the men fired at them,
that is the truth of it, and the skalfogdar say they could not prevent
them. This morning, as many as three were brought in dead, and I am sure
I do not see how I am to identify the men who fired; they were firing all
night, and every skalfogde stoutly denies that his party had anything to
do with it.”
“Oh! how were the people to distinguish one beast from another in the
dark?” said the Captain; “you may be thankful they have not shot one
another, and that you have not had three or four peasants brought in this
morning, instead of three or four deer.”
“Upon my word, there would have been less said if it had been so.
However, I must report it to Bjornstjerna, and leave him to do what he
pleases. I strongly suspect my dashing white serjeant of being one of the
murderers. Give me another chop,—that mutton of yours is the very best
thing I have eaten since we left Gäddebäck,—and then you really must get
to your posts; we shall have the dref down upon us before we know where
we are. Several hares had been showing themselves, and trying to pass the
line before I came up, and they will not do that by daytime, unless they
are driven. You had better break up the encampment as soon as you have
done breakfast: let Jacob stow everything ready for moving, and then send
him off to have the carioles harnessed. The skal will break up before
noon, and then there will be such a rush of fellows wanting to get home,
that the chances are we shall have a Flemish account of our horses, if
we do not look sharp after them now. People are in no ways particular on
these occasions; there are so many of them, that it is difficult to fix
the blame anywhere, and all roguery goes down to the account of mistake
and confusion.”
“Very well,” said the Captain, jumping up and carefully loading the rifle
which Tom had just been cleaning from the effects of the night’s dews
and rain, while the shot-gun had been doing duty in its place by the
Captain’s side,—“then here goes; I am going to the foot of the pass, and
shall not want Tom this half hour, so he may help Jacob. Birger is going
to the look-out place, and he will not want his man either. What will you
do, Parson?”
“Why, I think I will take a turn with Moodie down the hållet, when he
goes back to inspect his posts. I shall want Torkel to carry my rifle, as
I may not come back here; but your two men will be enough to help Jacob.
How are we to carry these great beasts?”
“Oh, that is Bjornstjerna’s business. I dare say he has given orders for
a sufficient number of carts, or, at all events, we shall have men enough
to carry them when the skal breaks up. These are public property,—you
need not trouble yourselves about them; what we have to think about is
our own little belongings.”
“Public property!” said the Captain; “I did not bargain for that; I want
the skins to hang up in my paternal halls, as trophies of the battle.”
“Then you must buy them,” said Moodie; “there will be an auction up the
village as soon as the skal breaks up, and by offering a little more
than the market price, you may secure anything that you want. It really
is a very fair regulation,” he added, observing a shade of discontent
on the Captain’s brow. “You shot them, no doubt; but you could not have
got a shot at them at all if it had not been for these people driving
them. Properly speaking, they belong to Bjornstjerna, but I understand
he has given up his right to the men, if so, they will all be converted
into brandy before night-fall, you may be quite sure. However, come
along,—that last volley was from the dref, and it sounded quite close.”
Moodie’s path was by no means either easy or safe, for he carefully
avoided the straight road which would have led him across the shooting
line, and contriving to make a circuit and scramble down the face of the
cliff at a small fissure, which lay a quarter of a mile to the north
of the pass, he attained the rear of the hållet without disturbing
or tainting the ground. It may be observed, that there was no such
extreme necessity for all this precaution; but Moodie was, after all,
an Englishman, and a hunter of but four years’ standing, and, if he
was the least bit in the world a martinet, he was not altogether
without excuse,—and really his position was, it must be confessed, very
scientifically occupied.
At the time that he and the Parson came on the ground, the hållet was
just relieving guard, in order to give the morning watch an opportunity
of breakfasting before the general turn out; and the scene was extremely
picturesque.
The breakfast was an extempore affair enough, except among those parties
who had been so fortunate as to knock a hare on the head, or to secure a
joint of what Moodie turned his face away from, and the Captain persisted
in calling mutton. A little rye meal, mixed up cold, or in special cases,
when kettles could be had, made into stirabout, was very nearly the whole
of it. An older commander would have closed his eyes to the sight of
brandy, and his nose to the smell of aniseed, but Moodie was young, and
faithful to his trust.
Groups of men and women were collected round the fires for cooking,
some rubbing up firearms, some snapping and oiling obstinate locks and
picking touchholes which the wet had damaged, and drying powder which
either would not go off at all or else flashed in the eyes and singed
the hair and eyebrows of the operators. Gradually, however, they all
began to straggle into their line, for the sounds of the dref were more
and more audible, and now and then some scared and crouching beast would
show itself on the side of the hill, and after drawing upon itself the
fire of all who were within a quarter of mile of it, would shrink timidly
back into cover, nine times in ten absolutely unharmed. Now would come,
high over head, and altogether free from the chance of shot, a gallant
blackcock or a tjäder, who, having run or flitted under cover for miles,
had at last taken heart of grace, looked his danger in the face, and
dashed across the line with that success which bravery deserves. Hares
would from time to time race along the brow, unable to make up their mind
which way they would head, and sometimes would draw a fruitless shot or
two from a young and over-ardent sportsman, followed by the grave rebuke
of his steadier skalfogde.
Meanwhile the Captain had advanced along into the shooting line, and
building himself up a screen of branches, where he could fully command
the passage, waited patiently for what luck would send him; absolutely
despising the smaller game that occasionally stole across the line and
sheltered themselves in fancied security in the skalplatz, and not
greatly disturbed by the occasional double-shots from Birger’s look-out
place on the cliff above, though this was not unfrequently followed by a
rattle of the twigs, or a soft _thud_, as his victim came tumbling to the
earth.
Birger’s post, indeed, had proved an excellent position for winged game,
for the grouse, though by no means plentiful anywhere in Sweden, had been
collected from twenty miles of country by the continued driving. Many, of
course, had taken wing, and dashing over the heights, had found security
in the higher fjeld, or across the river. But the grouse, especially the
old cock, is a running bird, and numbers of them had continued toddling
away by short and startled runs, a mile or so in advance of the dref, and
now, hearing the noises in front as well as in the rear, and beginning
to comprehend the precise dangers of their position, were, one after
another, taking wing. Many of these followed the line of the cliffs,
unwilling, perhaps unable to face them, but coasting their inequalities,
and looking out for a lower point; these would come exactly on a level
with Birger’s stand, and very seldom passed it unharmed.
All this the Captain left unheeded; his soul was above black game; and,
burning to wash away the disgrace of the preceding night, he kept his eye
resolutely fixed on the shooting line; something moves—it is a bear—no—a
rascally wolf, in that nonchalant style which no amount of danger will
induce him to put off, slouches across—not across, for he is worthy of
the Captain’s rifle; a shot reaches him, and he rolls over and over to
the very foot of the shelter he had sought. Not a stir is heard from the
Captain’s screen, and when the little puff of white smoke is dissipated
into air, no one would have told where the fatal shot had come from.
There goes a real full-grown bear, in downright earnest, and followed
by two half-grown cubs, crouching and squatting, and making themselves
as small as possible, like so many rabbits stealing out of cover; but
confound them, they are three hundred yards down the line, the Captain
will not risk wounding or missing them, and they disappear into the trees
of the skalplatz to be headed back by the hållet when too late to return.
And now the shouts and cries began to come louder and louder; and the
hares, which had lingered as long as possible on the edge of the wood,
began to creep, or steal, or race, or bound across the line, and among
them several specimens of better game; the men were actually beginning
to show themselves here and there in what, from the closing in of the
ranks, had now become close order, so that nothing could have passed
their line, when a gallant bear, with head erect and mouth open, dashed
into the opening at full gallop, and came straight upon the Captain’s
hiding-place, as if he knew where his enemy was lying, and meant, at all
events, not to die without vengeance.
The Captain fired deliberately,—paused for a moment to see the effect
of his shot—then fired his second barrel; both took effect on the broad
chest exposed to him, though without checking, for a moment, the rush of
the bear. On he came!—the screen went down like reeds before him; but
the Captain had thrown himself flat on the ground, and, covered by the
branches, had escaped the view of his adversary, who plunged over them,
dashed at the opposite cover, and disappeared from view.
“Upon my word, that was a near thing,” said Bjornstjerna, who cantered
up to the spot on his pony; “but a miss is as good as a mile,—not that
you missed that rascal; I saw both shots strike as plainly as ever I
saw anything in my life. Never mind, my boy, you have not lost him; he
will not go far, for all his gallant bearing. Larssen!” he shouted,
“Larssen! come here and take my pony. We must ride the Apostle’s
horse[59] now;” and, leaping off, he proceeded to arrange his army,
causing each skalfogde to muster his own men, as they came up, on the
edge of the shooting line. Soiled, and wet, and dirty they looked: a
Swede is rather a picturesque animal, when you are far enough off not
to see his dirt, particularly when there is any general muster of them,
for as each parish weaves its own wadmaal, or coarse cloth, and each
wears it of a particular colour or pattern, the commencement of a skal
looks, at a little distance, like a muster of regular troops, in regular,
though rather eccentric uniforms: but the rains, and the dirt, and the
mud-stains had reduced this to a very general average,—a sort of forest
uniform of neutral tint.
Advantage was taken of the halt to clean and reload the fire-arms, most
of which had been rendered useless in the morning’s beat; for though the
sun was shining brightly, there had been no wind, and the rain-drops of
yesterday were glittering like diamonds on the branches, and pattering
down like a shower-bath on all who moved them.
In the mean time, the two chiefs having completed their junction, held
a short consultation, and it was determined to advance a strong party
from each side, close to the roots of the cliffs, sufficiently numerous
to allow each man to touch his neighbour, and then to beat the skalplatz
out to the river, which, not being quite so rapid or impassable as was
expected, was guarded by the boats.
This involved the abandonment of the Captain’s picket, which
reinforced the beating party, the _materiel_ being conveyed, under the
superintendence of Jacob, to the travelling-waggon which had been brought
as near to the scene of action as the forest roads permitted.
And now began the real dangers of the skal,—the difficulty of restraining
the men from firing indiscriminately into the skalplatz, and shooting
everything alike,—wolf, hare, fox, or beater.
Fortunately the men were sober, and the officers well aware of the
danger. Flags were sent into the forest to mark the advancing line;
strict injunctions were given that none should be permitted to advance
faster than his neighbours, and a trusty man on the outside of the
cover carried a white flag about five yards before the main body of the
beaters, followed by an _extempore_ provost marshal, with a party of
trusty men, who had orders to tie up and flog on the spot any man who
fired at anything whatever in the rear of the flags.
All these arrangements were completed in little more than half-an-hour,
and the bugles on both sides rang out the advance. The progress was very
slow, not only on account of the necessity of preserving the accurate
line, but because the beasts themselves required so much rousing; many of
the smaller game, and, on one occasion, even a wolf, absolutely refused
to move at all, and was knocked down or speared as it lay. In no case was
resistance made by any of the wild beasts, with the single exception of
the gallant fox, who, desperate but unsubdued, stood boldly at bay, and
bit furiously at everything within its reach, but in vain,—for as the
line soon became two or three deep, escape was next to an impossibility.
One of the bear cubs, a three-parts grown animal, was dispatched by a
blow of a hatchet, and the other was shot in the thick cover, by a man
who had almost stepped upon it without seeing it. The Captain’s bear, a
full-grown male, did not live ten minutes after it had gained the cover;
there was no faltering in its gait or symptom of injury, for no muscle
had been cut or bone broken by the shot, and its pluck and energy had
carried it on till it fell suffocated by internal bleeding.
And now the shouts rang out from the river-side; the she-bear had taken
the water, and was gallantly forcing her way across it at a point rather
higher than the boats had expected her. The stream was strong; the boats
were at some distance; the Swedes, who were never good at moving-shots,
had blazed away when she first dashed into the stream, and there was
every chance of her escape, for they are terribly awkward in loading
their terribly awkward firearms; the rowers were pulling away for life
and death, and the heavy boats were forcing their slow progress against
the stream, which was gradually bringing the bear down to them as she
swam across it, when a long-shot from Bjornstjerna took effect, she
rolled over, recovered herself, struck out again, but was carried down
among the boats, secured, and brought to land.
The game was then mustered,—so far, indeed, as it could be recovered, for
it was shrewdly suspected by some, that the whole was not forthcoming.
There were four full-grown bears and three cubs, seven wolves, two
lynxes, three or four badgers, and a queer nondescript animal of the
genus _canis_, which they called a filfras; foxes there were in some
numbers, and this a much more valuable description of animal than ours;
hares were numberless, and also squirrels,—many of both these last
species of game, too, had been stewed and eaten on the preceding days.
Whether any other description of larger game had been shot, did not
appear. Notwithstanding what Moodie had said about the herd of stags,
none were paraded at the muster, and as he did not, after all, make any
complaint to the Ofwer Jagmästere on the subject, it may be concluded
that the whole was a mistake or a dream of his own, and that no such
breach of forest law had been committed by any one,—a fact of which the
Captain loudly declared his complete conviction.
[Illustration: DEATH OF FEMALE BEAR.
p. 376.]