"FLAP" THE GULL--SURGICAL OPERATION--THE GULL WHO REFUSED TO
DIE--TAXIDERMY EXTRAORDINARY--FEATHERED FRIENDS--SNAKES.
Every part of the island swarmed with rabbits, in fact, it was a perfect
warren, and must have contained thousands of them. I had therefore to
devise some means of keeping them down, or they would so have multiplied
as to eat up everything that to a rodent was toothsome, and that is
_nearly_ everything green, even to the furze bushes. I had only four
tooth-traps with me, and these were not nearly adequate for the number I
wanted to kill, so I had recourse to wire gins. These I soon became an
adept in setting, and discovered that by placing the thin wire noose
close to the ground I could catch the wee rabbits, while by keeping the
lower part of the noose about four inches above the turf I could secure
the large ones. By practice and observation I soon learned not only the
best "runs," but could tell just where they would place their feet, as
they bounded up or down the steep acclivities.
At times I had seventy or eighty gins set, and caught perhaps a hundred
a week in the season, which I regret to say were nearly all thrown into
the sea. This destruction of good food I was very sorry to cause, as it
would have fed a dozen poor families; but it was a case of kill the
rabbits, or starve my own animals. I chose the latter alternative, and
thus had plump animals and plump rabbits too. Those I retained formed
food for myself, dog, pigs, and a gull I kept.
The gull I must say a little about, as he became a constant companion to
me when I was within the wall which surrounded the homestead. "Flap,"
for so I christened him, was a large grey and white gull which I secured
soon after coming to the island, by breaking his wing at a long shot. He
tried, poor fellow, to scramble down to the sea, and swim away, but
"Begum" was too quick for him, and pounced upon him before he could get
over the rocks. I examined the bird and found the wing bone to be
broken, but otherwise the bird was not at all hurt. It then came into my
mind to perform a surgical operation, and this I quickly carried out. I
trimmed away all the feathers from about the wound, and then with one
draw of my sharp knife cut through the flesh between the smashed bone,
and quickly amputated the wing.
"Flap" was so fierce, and had such a formidable bill, that I had to
fasten him to a post to do all this, or he might have given me a deep
wound. I then bathed the stump of the wing with warm water, and bound it
up in a lump of lard, and the operation was complete.
I placed him in the stable and fed him with bits of fish, rabbit, and
vegetable for about a week, by which time he was fairly tame; so then I
took him out and fastened a leather strap round his leg, and tethered
him on the grass plot in front of my house, as one would a cow, feeding
him several times daily on animal food or fish. After a week of this he
was so tame that he would try to get away from his peg to meet me in the
morning. Seeing this, I decided to release him from his stake. I did so,
and the poor bird followed me about like a dog; in fact, I believe
"Begum" was jealous of him, for when I petted the gull he would come and
thrust his great black nose into my hand, and look up to my eyes, as
much as to say,
"Don't forget me, master!"
At the end of about three weeks I ventured to take the bandage off
"Flap's" wing-stump, when I found, to my surprise, that it was so nearly
healed as not to require further treatment from me, Harry Nilford, M.D.
"Flap's" domain was the homestead, about which he would hop and flap
with his one wing in a most comical manner. If I threw down half a
rabbit and called him, he would dash across the lawn at a gait that
would defy description, while his voracity was wonderful to behold. He
would take down half a rabbit in two or three fierce gulps, skin, bones,
and flesh; and I have known him, when very hungry, to eat a whole one at
a meal, which would only take a couple of minutes for him to discuss. It
was simply a matter of Hey Presto! and his meal was consumed. If a man
could eat in the same proportion, half a sheep would make a meal, while
a goose or turkey would only be a snack. Thank goodness, our appetites
are less keen, or a fat bullock would only serve a large family for
dinner, with the odds and ends left for supper.
"Begum" and "Flap" were fast friends, and the dog would allow the bird
to take many liberties with him, such as taking quietly some pretty
sharp pecks if he attempted to eat a bit of "Flap's" food; but on the
other hand, "Flap" would take "Begum's" food from under his very nose
without a protest of any kind from the dog, except a look out of the
corner of his eye, as if he thought "What impudence!"
I found sea fowl of all kinds to be very tenacious of life, especially
the common large gull. One case of this occurs to me as I write. I fired
at a gull and brought it down on the rocks; but it was only winged, and
picking it up, I wrung its neck, and flung it down, thinking it was
dead, but in a couple of minutes it gave such signs of returning
animation that I put the butt of my gun on its neck, which was upon the
hard pathway, and pressed with all my might. But the thing would _not_
die, so I got cross with both it and myself, with the bird for not dying
and myself for causing it so much unnecessary pain. Thinking to kill the
bird instantaneously, I took out my penknife, and ran it (or supposed I
was in the right spot) quite through the brain, so that the blade
projected half an inch on the other side. Just then some more gulls came
within shot, and I threw the bird on the ground, and made an onslaught
on the others. I dropped one, and scrambled down the cliffs for it, and
at length having secured it, climbed laboriously up the steep rocks
again. Judge of my surprise when, purring and blowing from my exertions,
just as my head rose above the ledge of the pathway where I had left the
transfixed bird, I saw it rise to its feet, give a loud Quah! and before
I could prevent it, away it went, half flying and flopping, half running
and scrambling, with my knife still in its skull, and was quickly out of
sight.
The different kinds of gulls visiting Jethou are very numerous, and some
of them very pretty. One of the finest being the swift sea swallow, with
its lovely grey feathers, forked tail, and long graceful wings. Another
is the sea-pie, a very shapely black and white gull, which makes a noise
quite peculiar to itself when hunting among the rocky inlets for its
food, thus betraying its presence.
Whenever I killed a bird of which I did not know the name, I would
fasten it up to some sticks in as life-like manner as possible, and make
a water colour drawing of it, taking great care to shew every detail, so
that in time I had over thirty drawings, each of which took me half a
day to execute. These are now in the writer's possession, and form a
pretty memento of his Crusoe days.
I took to making these drawings, because my attempts at taxidermy were
grotesquely ludicrous; to put it plainly, they were unmitigated
failures. These remarks apply to my very early attempts, for I would not
have the readers think me incapable after long practice of turning out a
shapely bird or a fish fair to behold. I must own that my early
struggles at skinning and stuffing were certainly funny, as except from
the colour of the feathers one could not tell a tern from a Kentish crow
after I had mangled it about for a few hours. They were wonders of
natural history these specimens of mine, not altogether from my
unskilfulness in handling them, but from the fact that I lacked
materials to work with. During the long nights of autumn, I, to a
certain extent, perfected myself in setting up specimens, but found they
would not keep, as I had no arsenic to work with, using in its place a
disinfectant which was not a preservative, consequently my specimens
began to get mouldy and to smell high, and this prevailing mustiness
brought them to an untimely end, or at least the greater portion of
them. Thinking a day in the sunshine and fresh air might improve them, I
took them all out of the house, and carried them a few at a time down to
the small lawn, as it was nice and open, placing them promiscuously down
on the green sward; and a funny lot they looked. Fish of all kinds,
condition, and colors, and birds in all positions, natural and
unnatural; the Chamber of Horrors at Madame Tussaud's Waxworks was a
pleasant sight in comparison to my collection, at least that was the
impression I gleaned from "Begum" and "Flap," both of whom seemed
perfectly mad at seeing such an array of scarecrows on their favourite
playground.
It was a lovely mild day, and I spent best part of it at La Fauconnaire,
rabbit and gull shooting, bringing home for my day's sport as many as I
could fairly carry. Leaving them in the storehouse I fed "Eddy," and
proceeded to perform the same office for the goat and pigs, but they
were nowhere to be seen. After a fair amount of searching I gave them up
for the time, and proceeded to take in my stuffed wonders, but alas, the
pigs and goat had been before me, for in the morning I had not properly
latched the lawn gate, and they had got in and created awful havoc. Many
of my specimens the pigs had actually eaten, others they had disjointed
and mangled in such a manner as to be perfectly useless, while what they
had not fallen foul of my Quixotic goat had, by spiking them with her
single horn, till she had had the satisfaction of knocking the stuffing
out of them. What was left of my most magnificent collection now looked
as if a charge of dynamite had played havoc with it. Thus my friends and
the world in general were prevented from gazing upon one of the most
curious collections of birds, beasts, and fishes that have ever been
stuffed (with whatever was handiest) since the art of taxidermy was
introduced.
The stormy petrel during rough weather used to be a frequent visitor to
the Perchée Channel, skimming just above the dark waves so close to the
surface, as to appear to walk up a wave, rise above its crest, and then
walk down into the valley of water on the opposite side. I shot several
specimens, two of which I stuffed, but they were both eaten by those
horrid pigs.
Oyster-pickers were quite plentiful, and I quickly discovered that they
might also aptly be termed limpet-pickers, for they seemed to take these
shell fish as their staple food. The _modus operandi_ of feeding is to
pounce down upon a rock which the receding tide has left bare, and with
a single sharp blow with its beak, detach a limpet, and turning it mouth
upward, pick out the fish at its leisure. If it failed to detach the
limpet at once it would go on to another, knowing that when once
disturbed the limpet requires great force to detach it. Oysters lie in
deep waters where they are inaccessible to these birds, so whence is
their name derived?
Then there were various kinds of divers, the principal of which class
was the cormorant, greatly resembling a half-starved black swan, that
is, it had a longer and thinner and less graceful body; but in many
points it was superior to the swan, especially in its flying and diving
powers, and in its quickness of action. Its head appears never to be
still, but constantly bobbing and turning from side to side, as if
saying, "Did you ever catch a cormorant asleep?" Knowing that the
Chinese train these birds to catch fish, I endeavoured to induce one to
come to me, and serve his apprenticeship as a fisherman, but to no
purpose. It was just as well I could not catch one, for I find they must
be trained from their young days to the art, as they are intractable in
their grown-up wildness, and I was thus spared a great deal of
unnecessary trouble and irritability of temper.
Although I had a store of simple medicines with me, I scarcely ever
required to open the case. Once and once only, I felt poorly for a whole
week, but that I fancy was attributable to fruit and the heat. Although
not well, I thoroughly enjoyed a whole lazy week, most of which I spent
by the side of my fish pool, studying the habits of my finny comrades
in captivity. Some of the rock fish became so tame that they would rise
to the surface when I dropped crumbs of biscuits on the water, and I
verily believe if I had had the patience, I might have taught them to
feed from my fingers. Sometimes for a treat I would bring "Flap" and
place him near the water, and he seemed to enjoy looking at the
denizens; but they were all too big for him to gobble, or he would have
made an Aldermanic dinner of some of them.
I occasionally saw a snake, but always of the harmless, blindworm
variety. Of this species I caught two and admired them, but I did not
make pets of them as I did of nearly everything else I could lay hands
on.
One big fellow nearly two feet long I threw into the sea, thinking to
rid the island of at least one snake; but to my surprise he swam ashore
on the surface of the water as quickly as he could have progressed on
dry land. He was a veritable sea-serpent, although a small specimen.
There were also two kinds of lizards of which I do not know the name,
but they were only small fellows, and may be what are called "efts."
They would sun themselves on the warm rocks, and on being disturbed dart
into some cranny till danger was past. They ran up and down rocks which
were nearly perpendicular, and were very amusing in their rapid
movements.
I often thought as I lay in my hammock how I should have liked a
squirrel or two to be climbing about the branches above me; but one is
never contented with what is allotted them. Probably had I possessed a
squirrel or two, I should have longed for a few monkeys, and having
them, should have wished for something else.
Altogether I was perfectly contented with my lot, especially after the
melancholy of the first week had worn off, except just now and again a
particularly dismal feeling would assert itself, which I could not shake
off; but I simply attributed this to dull weather or over exertion. It
was nothing worth mentioning.
My spirits are like a barometer; when the sun shines and the weather is
warm I am up; when it is wet and dull I am down, and I think this is the
case with many persons; in fact, I believe weather has a greater
influence on our lives than we are aware of. Statistics go to prove
this; for instance, more marriages take place during the five months,
June to September, than in the other seven colder months. From gaiety to
despair,--more suicides take place at the fall of the year than at any
other period. Rodent slaughter commenced this chapter and suicide ends
it; this puts me in mind of the Marriage Service, which commences
"Dearly" and ends with "amazement."
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