first I was on the point of springing across the creek and taking
it from him. I would have done so had he been only half his size,
but I was afraid of the strong, queer-looking creature. His body was
very long, his legs short but massive, and his tail, which tapered
to a point, stretched across the mud and just touched the water. He
had no ears--at least, nothing worth the name; his eyes were small,
his whiskers very long and white, and his jaws so heavy that they
frightened me. How he enjoyed the mallard, the rascal! How his beady
eyes gleamed until he saw me back out of my ambush; and then what
an evil look rose to them! That was enough to scare me without the
frightful grimace and hissing that accompanied it.
I lost no time in getting out of sight of such a horror. I crossed
the pool, dreading at every stroke that the fearsome beast would
seize me from beneath, as he had seized the mallard, pull me under,
and--disgusting thought!--perhaps eat me. I looked back on landing,
and again when I reached the reeds; then, as I saw no trace of him and
had dry land in front, I cursed him to my heart's content. I had been
deprived of my supper in the last watch of the night, and it would
take me all my time to reach the earth before dawn, even by way of the
quaking bog. I gnashed my strong teeth as I hurried across the fen,
swearing that I would be avenged on that thief if chance threw me in
his way again; and though a fox may not be able to choose place and
time, he generally gets his wrongs righted in the end. I own that for
the moment the sight of the strong, fierce brute must have unnerved
me; why else should the rustling of a vole on the bank of our own
stream scare me so and cause me to run home in breathless haste?
When I reached the earth the vixen and my sisters were lying near the
entrance, looking as happy and contented as mother and whelps can
look. With misfortune written on my crestfallen face, I stood before
them bedraggled and panting, as complete a picture of misery as can
well be imagined. My mother looked me up and down with sympathetic
eyes that told her thoughts, and though she never said a word I read
in their varying expressions: "You are miserable and discomfited, my
cub; you are evidently paying dear for your freedom. Nevertheless I
admire your independence and, for all your wayward spirit, I am proud
of you."
Crimson streaks marked the low sky to the east before I followed the
others to the den for, rather than retire supperless, I stayed outside
to crunch a few dry bones. It had been a most unsatisfactory night's
hunting, and, though I tried hard to get the evil-looking brute with
the webbed feet out of my mind, I seemed, even till I fell asleep, to
be watching that rascally otter lying his full length and holding in
his fore-paws the fattest mallard I had ever seen.
Despite my disappointment and fear, I resolved to visit the fen again
a few nights later, and it vexed me greatly when the vixen objected
and insisted that I should join her and my sisters in an expedition
to the hill beyond it. I was sulky at the start, and lagged behind
the others all the way across the marshland, but I closed up when
we breasted the hill, and shook off the last traces of ill-temper on
seeing the vixen steal towards an enclosed field some little distance
down from the crest. I watched her closely whilst she reconnoitered at
a gap in the rude stone wall, and, from the fixity of her gaze, felt
almost sure that she espied game. All doubt was dispelled when, with
the stealthiest of movements, she came back to me and, as if I was the
most amiable cub in the world and worthy of the post of honor, led me
round to the meuse through which the game had entered the field, and
left me to watch it.
As I lay there, within a spring of the scent-tainted run that recalled
a trail I had once followed on the fen, I became uncontrollably
curious to see the animal that had but shortly before passed along
it. I felt sure the creature was in the field, and no sooner had the
vixen disappeared round the corner of the long wall than I left my
hiding-place, crawled up the face of the enclosure as quietly as a
fly, and peeped through a break in the top whence a stone had fallen.
Ah! there he was, for all the world like an immense rabbit, nibbling
the clover right out in the middle of the square field. Of course I
ought to have returned to my ambush at once, but curiosity held me to
the spot, and whilst I was taking a last look, I caught sight of the
vixen stealing over the wall on the further side into the tangle that
filled the corner and, in fact, grew all round the field at the foot
of the wall. In this she was lost to view, till presently her mask
appeared again between some seeding thistles about thirty yards from
the unsuspicious hare.
Now began one of the most thrilling stalks I ever witnessed, though,
owing to the astonishing way the vixen hid herself, I could see little
of her but her ears. To have rendered herself so inconspicuous she
must have grovelled along on her belly in some slight hollow of the
ground not visible to me; for the clover was not more than an inch
high and of itself afforded very little concealment. The nearer she
got the more excited I became; and for the life of me I could not
understand--even now I cannot understand--why the hare, of all animals
the timidest and most watchful, neither saw, heard, nor scented her.
Inch by inch the clever little stalker wound her way until nearer
approach without discovery must have been impossible. I was wondering
why she delayed making one of her lightning-like rushes, when, with
a tremendous bound, the hare started off in a direction wide of my
station. The vixen, who was in swift pursuit, made a desperate effort
to turn him; but in this she would have failed, despite her wonderful
fleetness, had not my little sister, whether by accident or design I
do not know, suddenly showed herself at the gate for which the hare
was heading. This had the effect of sending him towards the meuse I
had been set to watch and of reminding me of my duty.
The hare was yet some thirty yards down the hill but coming like the
wind, when I dropped quietly into my ambush and gathered my legs
under me. What a row he made as he dashed through the brambles and
came through the hole at the foot of the wall! Never shall I forget
the excitement of the moment when, with his ears thrown back on his
shoulders, he came in sight. I made my spring as he flashed by, and
though I only knocked him over, I was on him and bore him down before
he could recover himself. The vixen, who came up the next moment, was
delighted to find me standing over my first hare; and when in response
to her call my sisters joined us, she distributed the portions into
which she had broken it up. There was much chattering over the
feast--the contented chattering that attends good hunting.
Thus did our mother teach us to act in concert--the method sometimes
employed by dog and vixen if hares are scarce and wild, but more
commonly adopted when driving rabbits from a brake where there are no
holes in which they can get to ground.
Our supper over, the vixen led us along the crest of the hill to a
small clump of wind-clipt pines, which are still standing, whence can
be obtained a view of the fen on the one side and of the sand-hills
on the other. This was my first sight of the dunes and of the
farm-buildings on the edge of them. Whilst we stood there a loud bark,
thrice repeated, came from within the trees about the buildings.
"What is that?" I asked, somewhat alarmed.
"That is the voice of a dog--the voice of an enemy."
Then she warned us never under any circumstances to go near the place,
"for," said she, "danger lurks there, and perhaps death."
Wise little mother, if I had only heeded thy warning, what anguish and
degradation I might have been spared!
Day was already dawning, and I wondered that she so long delayed
returning to the earth. To jog her memory I kept glancing first at her
and at the eastern sky, but to my surprise she took no notice. Her
face was very sad, and she seemed lost in thought. I believe she was
thinking of the time, now close at hand, when we must separate from
her and face the dangers of life alone.
But it was not her intention to go back to the cairn, for on reaching
the foot of the hill she turned aside and brought us to another earth,
before which lay an enormous heap of yellowish soil. This, as it
proved, was to be our new home; and from the fresh trail that led to
it, I judged that at least one animal would share it with us.
A little way inside the entrance, which was a large one, the tunnel
divided; and when the vixen and my sisters disappeared in the branch
leading to the left, I, curious to see our new neighbor, followed
the trail along the other. On and on I stole through a low winding
passage, which penetrated so far that I thought I should never reach
the object of my search.
At last I came on his lair at a spot where the tunnel suddenly
widened, and the sight of it made me stand agape. Instead of the
bare ground, which is a fox's couch, and on which I expected to see
the creature curled up, before me rose a great heap of dried grass
that filled the chamber from side to side, and reached almost to the
roof. So effectually did it conceal its occupant that not a hair of
him could I see. The slight rustling of the bed would have told me
he was there, even had my nostrils not given undeniable proof of his
presence; and as my curiosity, now thoroughly aroused, would not let
me retire before I had had at least a glimpse of the creature, I drew
near with the utmost caution, craned my neck over the broad edge, and
looked down on him.
My eye! he was a monster. It surprised me to see how big he was; but
what really took me aback was his very pale color, which showed even
in the darkness of the den. I had expected to see a gray creature,
like the badger on the cliffs, and not a white one nearly twice his
size. My first impulse was to retreat, but on regaining my composure,
I resolved to stay and have a good look at him.
His broad side rose and fell with his slow, heavy breathing; his
eye--I could see but one--was closed, and there was no sign of
vigilance about the small limp ears. To all appearance he was in a
deep sleep, which I believed, as well I might, that had done nothing
to disturb. For if my approach had been as noiseless as the incoming
of the fresh air that sweetens the close atmosphere of our dens, not
less so was my examination of the formidable creature, though it was
made with breathless wonderment.
Yet before I could bark in his ear and run away, as I was tempted to
do, he sprang suddenly to his feet with a loud snarl, which nearly
frightened me out of my skin. Fortunately, he did not snap at me as I
drew back, or pursue me as I bolted at full speed along the tunnel;
indeed, judging from his subsequent conduct, I should say that his
venerable face was one grin from ear to ear when he discovered it was
a chit of a fox cub that had scared him.
My mother, whom the loud snarl had brought in hot haste to my side,
was very angry with me for trespassing on the badger's private
quarters instead of following her into the part of the sett she had
appropriated. No doubt it was a foolish thing to intrude on the
privacy of so powerful an animal; but I had no occasion to regret my
misconduct, for the badger, far from resenting it, became my best
friend. Every morning after that I used to peep at him; but instead
of creeping in stealthily, as I had done at first, I walked in as if
I were going to my own den, and to apprise him of my approach gave a
stifled bark on reaching the turn by the rock, beyond which a short
length of straight tunnel led to his lair. Though I seldom neglected
to warn him of my coming I believe it was unnecessary, as he got
to know my light footstep so well that he did not take the trouble
to raise his head on the rare occasions when I forgot to signal my
approach. Sleepy though he always was after his night's round, he
never failed to wink at me with the eye that was uppermost. Sometimes
he would wink twice; but beyond that he never got.
He must have been a good fellow, this distinguished member of the
oldest family amongst animals, to put up with these dawn visits of a
fox who was still under the partial tutelage of his mother. I have
often wondered why he did so, but never been quite sure. If I may
give my reason--and be it understood that it involves no slur on the
badger's fame--I should say it was because of his friendless state.
I say, "friendless," inasmuch as he was never seen in company with
the only other badger in the countryside, the one that dwelt on the
cliffs; and he kept quite aloof from the other creatures of the wild.
I have always felt proud that he should have thought me worthy of the
least consideration; but this did not make me blind to his faults. I
don't refer to his living on beetles and wasp-grubs, nor do I mean
the trick of sleeping with one paw in his mouth, or the queer way he
had of running back-wards into the earth, at which little game I once
surprised him; no, I am thinking of a bad habit from which we suffered
much annoyance, and which I am very loth to mention, much less dwell
on. But it must be stated, and at some length, on account of my story;
it was this: he could not keep his claws from digging.
What made his offence ten times worse in our ears was that as far
as our vulpine wits could enlighten us--and we discussed the matter
again and again--there was no necessity for his self-imposed labor.
Any reasonable creature would have thought the sett was more than
complete, inasmuch as the part of the hill it tunnelled in all
directions was like a vast honey-comb. It held quarters for a whole
swarm of badgers; and yet the old fellow must needs keep burrowing
farther and farther in, opening out more chambers and galleries, as
if it were not commodious enough for his individual requirements. Of
course he was free to add to the accommodation of the sett, whether
he really did feel cramped for room or only imagined that he did;
nevertheless we foxes accounted it a grievance to have to put up with
the din he made in digging, which, as it reverberated along the hollow
ways, resembled the rumbling of thunder more than any other sound, and
prevented us from getting a wink of sleep in the long, dragging hours
during which it lasted.
This was only the first stage of the annoyance. A more serious trouble
was the way the great heap kept on increasing with the excavated
soil that he fetched out by the barrow-load about once a week on the
average, generally in the small hours of the morning when we were away
foraging. The enormous mound made us hang our heads in shame every
time we passed in and out. And as if this were not enough to betray us
to our enemies, on our return home one morning we found his great bed
lying atop of the pile, which now looked like a haycock in the midst
of the brake. At the sight of this my mother lost her temper, and
heaped such unrestrained abuse on the badger that I could not keep my
jaws closed. It pains me to this day to remember that I dared reply to
her; but how, when my old friend was attacked in such bitter terms,
could I honorably keep silence? That day I had to be content with the
draughty corner of the den, apart from my mother and sisters, who
edged away from me as if I were mangy. I spent miserable hours lying
there; but about noon the vixen walked over to me, licked my face with
her hot tongue, and curled up by my side. These tender attentions
soothed my injured feelings, and I soon fell into a peaceful sleep.
I do not reproach the badger for changing his bed, I cannot reproach
him for his cleanliness, and I have no wish to disparage his great
industry; my object is to set down the truth, and I think that this
corpulent creature had to make work to keep his fat down and, even in
times of famine, to dig willy-nilly to prevent his claws growing into
his flesh.
Of course, had the matter of digging by day, in which lay the sting
of the underground annoyance, been brought to an issue, we foxes had
not a shadow of right on our side; because we knew that the earth
belonged to the badger by right of excavation, and that we were there
on sufferance only as long as he found us tolerant and agreeable.
We did well to endure what we could not cure, for, had it come to a
quarrel, to a conflict with tooth and claw, the badger could have
made mincemeat of our whole party without sustaining a scratch. So we
prudently refrained from making any comment in his hearing, and, as he
could read nothing from my looks, he had not the faintest suspicion of
the grumbling to which I had to listen, or of the difficult part I had
to play to keep on good terms with my family.
So things went on until a common trouble befell both the badger and
ourselves, and immediately following it, calamities so dire as almost
to dwarf into nothingness the annoyances of which so much had been
made.
We had frequented the sett for perhaps a month, when, on returning
early one morning from hunting on the moors, we found, to our
astonishment, the entrances to the earth blocked and the badger shut
out. Thought I, "This misfortune to himself and to us is the result
of his misdoings," and I fully expected to see the vixen pour out the
vials of her wrath; but, to my surprise, all she did was to cruise up
and down in a fever of anxiety, with a watchful eye on the desperate
efforts the badger was making to remove the faggots jammed into the
hole. Failing to remove them by tugging, he began to bite through the
thick, tough stems as though they were reeds; and in my inexperience
I thought he would soon succeed in chopping a way in. But whoever had
placed the faggots there had done his work too well for the entry to
be hurriedly effected, so that gray dawn found the badger but little
advanced with his stubborn task and us cubs roaming restlessly about,
eyeing him at his work.
The only time I got in his way he turned his nervous face and snarled
at me as though I were a stranger. Seeing what deadly earnest he was
in, I gave him a wide berth, and sat on the top of the heap with my
brush to him, blinking at the sky that was now all read as if the
cliffs were a-fire far, far away beyond the fen. Every now and again,
when the vixen came my way, I caught her casting uneasy glances
towards the east, and the instant the glaring rim of the sun showed,
she stole away and we in her train, leaving my old friend biting and
pounding in his apparently hopeless toil.
If his efforts looked hopeless, the journey before us was certainly
disagreeable. I shall not soon forget that crossing of the fen, which,
as bad luck would have it, was as free from mist as the gilded crests
of the tor that seemed to stare at us belated creatures of the night,
abroad at such an uncanny hour. The vixen took advantage of every bit
of cover within easy reach of the bee-line to the cairn earth, for
which she was making; but for all that, there were many exposed places
that could not be avoided, and there the cruel sun had us at his
mercy, and blinded us with his naked rays. Nor were we alone in our
misfortune. Half-way over, at a spot where the glittering pools lay
thickest, we met a vixen and four cubs heading straight for our sett.
She, too, was all anxiety; and seeing this, I began to wonder why the
stopping of an earth should occasion such widespread consternation.
My mother traversed the mossy spaces between the pools at the utmost
speed of the weakly cub by her side, whilst my sister and I followed
a little to one side, so as to avoid treading on the long, terrifying
shadows they cast. On coming within sight of the earth she stopped
suddenly in her stride, and as she did so my astonished eyes lighted
on the object which had arrested her steps. It was the enemy--it was
man. I recognized him at first sight, unlike though he was to the
being I had vaguely imagined. There is no reason for surprise that I
did. For what beast of the field or wild stands erect with such ease
on his hind-feet, or has face, fore-paws and ears as bare of fur as
is the skin of a mangy fox? Moreover, I caught his scent; and it was
the same scent as had tainted the stone on the cliff, that tainted the
faggots--evidence hardly less convincing than the steady gaze of his
eyes and the shout he raised. At the awful sound we turned tail and
melted into the brake.
Round and round the great furze cover we stole, until I thought that
the vixen would never come to a standstill; but at last she chose for
sanctuary a tangled corner near a runnel, and there, amidst the russet
bracken, my weary sisters curled themselves up and fell asleep.
Whether the vixen slept at all I cannot say, but I do not think
she did, for she was wide awake when I dropped off, and she was
all eyes and ears when I was startled out of my sleep by three
noisy wood-pigeons overhead. As we looked at one another across the
tiny stream, a strange sound reached me from the direction of the
wood below the tor, or, it might be, from the tor itself. It was a
high-pitched note, very penetrating, and a little like a cock's crow,
though differing from it even more than a curlew's whistle does from
an otter's. The instant I heard it I knew that it came from no bird's
throat, but whence it came I could not tell.
What a simpleton I was at that time! The toot of the horn is as
familiar to me now as the clatter of shod horses. I know, too, now
what it portends; but at that moment, though fear was mingled with my
curiosity, I should not have been very uneasy, save for the obvious
anxiety of my mother. Not that she fussed about as if flurried, but
I could see her alarm in her unusual alertness. When a cock-pheasant
flew past and skimmed the brake that mantled the steep slope below us,
her eyes followed it with an eagerness that seemed to demand from it
the secret of its startled flight.
Again the horn sounded, this time from the neighborhood of the
withered oak between us and the tor. Then I heard a horse galloping
and saw a flash of scarlet at the foot of the slope where the pheasant
had dropped in. What did it all mean? Were we foxes in any way
concerned in the unwonted proceedings that were disturbing the great
silence that had till then brooded over the cover? The suspense, the
uncertainty, which the vixen's evident distress intensified, the vague
sense of danger, were painful; but all doubts were soon dispelled,
"Eloo in! Hi, Forester! Eloo in!" The rasping yell with which this was
uttered betokened some sinister happening, though we looked in vain to
the vixen, round whom my sisters gathered, to enlighten us as to its
nature.
At this point my recollection is blurred, save for two things, the
crashing noise in the brake and the flight of the vixen and my sisters
along the watercourse, with the pack in pursuit. I shall always hear
the one and see the other. If ever I was terrified in my life it was
then; and between the clamor of the hounds and the thundering tread
of a hundred galloping horses I was so bewildered that I knew not
where to turn. But as the noise died away my nerves steadied, and,
rising from my crouching attitude, I peeped through the furze to try
to discover what was happening. For a long time I could see nothing in
the deserted valley below; but, continuing my watch, I perceived the
vixen and my little sister coming along the open bank of the stream,
with the leading hounds in close pursuit and apparently gaining at
every stride.
I am too old now to feel strongly as I did then, but still I am
affected at the recollection of the vixen striving to save my sister
by devices such as a partridge will employ to divert an enemy from its
young. How the chase ended I could not see; but the sudden ceasing of
the clamor made me fear the worst.
In the silence that succeeded I made for the cairn earth, expecting to
get in there; but that, too, was stopped. Whilst I was debating what
to do, I heard the huntsman's voice, and had scarcely regained my old
station by the watercourse when the hounds opened on my line. They
were coming towards me at a great pace. Without an instant's delay I
was off, and, stealing down the long slope, reached the edge of the
cover, where I checked my steps to look out and see that the coast was
clear. Except the blazing sunlight, there was nothing in the bottom or
on the bare slope beyond to scare me, and as the hounds were half-way
down the hill, I committed myself to the open.
I had not got far when there was a scream, a human scream, fit to
wake the dead. It startled me horribly, but did not cause me to
deviate a hair's-breadth from the direction in which I had set my
head. Near the brow I stopped and looked back at the crowd of dogs
and horsemen. It puzzled me then, it puzzles me yet, to know why they
should wish to kill me, but I had not a doubt that was their object.
The clamor did not greatly terrify me at that stage of the chase, as I
felt sure I should be able to elude my pursuers in the fen for which I
was making.