beyond, but the heat of the sun was beginning to tell on me before
I reached the wide belt of rushes near the mere. When I had crossed
it the hounds had greatly reduced the distance between us; I was
beginning to flag, and the sanctuary I sought was nearly two miles
away. The going was heavy over the marshland, where never a breath
stirred, but I struggled on as best I could towards the islet of my
favorite pool, spreading terror amongst grebe and hern along the
silent ways I threaded.
At length I gained the pool, and as I left the finger of land jutting
towards the islet and took to the water, I felt I was near an asylum
at last. Vain hope! When I was barely half-way across an accursed
magpie espied me, and came and hovered just over my head, making
a loud chattering noise that the hounds must have heard. I looked
straight before my muzzle, pretending to take no notice of the
plague, and as soon as I landed, lay down in my old ambush that half
concealed me from the exasperating bird. "The pest will surely hold
his tongue now that I am in lair," thought I. But no; he chattered
louder than ever, as if it delighted him to betray me to the pack,
whose whimpering I could now hear. In my exhausted condition I was
very loth to move, but, seeing that to remain there was certain death,
I left my hiding-place and plunged into the water on the further side
of the islet. My tormentor came with me, and never shall I forget his
harsh, jeering cries whilst I swam to the nearest alders, and even
whilst I made my slow way through the sparse thorns that ran up to
the furze about the earth. Under the close brake I was free from the
traitor, and it cheered me to be so near the sett and a safe refuge.
As I followed the beaten track leading to it I was indifferent to my
pursuers, for I felt sure that the badger must long ere this have
opened a way in.
Alas! it had proved beyond his powers. The ground about the faggots
was littered with the bits he had chopped off, but he had failed to
effect an entry. Realizing my desperate position, I almost gave myself
up for lost. Fortunately, in my extremity--and a fox's brain is never
clearer than then--I wondered where the badger had bestowed himself.
Where he could get I could get, and if I could only trace him I might,
despite the stiffness of my limbs and the nearness of the hounds, even
yet escape with my life.
Picking up his trail, I followed it along the base of the hill to
a thicket, dense and matted as bramble, blackthorn and furze could
make it. Through this I passed until I reached a small cave at the
foot of a sheer wall of rock. The trail led inwards, and at the very
back I came on my friend. He looked most vicious at first; but when
he recognized the bedraggled cub before him, the expression of his
venerable face quickly changed to one of compassion, and then again
to hate as he heard the hounds, now running mute, crash through the
undergrowth. It was an awful moment. It behoved me to find, and that
instantly, some secure position out of reach of the infuriated pack.
The leading hounds were at the mouth of the cave when, by a last
effort, I gained a scanty ledge, almost too narrow for foothold, a
little way above the badger's head. I was never in a more desperate
position, but fear glued me to the spot; and better vantage-ground for
viewing the fight that followed could not have been. "Keep cool," I
shouted to my old friend as well as I could for panting; and before I
could repeat my warning, the hounds were on him.
There are things which seem incredible unless witnessed; and I
would not now submit the evidence of my own eyes did I not feel it
my bounden duty to record the facts which redound to the fame of
the badger and to the glory of the wild. But how is it possible to
describe what happened so the picture presented may approach in
vividness the savage scene I looked upon? I have seen the waves dash
and dash again into a cavern, only to be as often rolled back till the
tide had spent its force and left the cave as silent as at first. The
inrush of the pack was like the on-coming of an irresistible wave; but
the badger, with his back to the low arch, was not to be overwhelmed
whilst he could keep his feet and ply jaw and claw. Only three hounds
could get at him at a time; and when it came to deadly fang work,
what were these soft creatures of the kennel to the most formidable
beast of the brake? As fast as the badger could deal with them, hound
after hound withdrew howling, till there was scarcely one of the
twenty couple composing the pack on whom his terrible jaws had not
closed.
While the fray was at its height the badger was at times partly hidden
under his assailants, and thus arose no small danger to myself. One
big brute of a hound there was who espied me where I stood, still as
if carved in stone, save for my heaving flank and lolling tongue. This
must have caught his eye, and time after time he leapt at me from the
backs of the writhing mass below; but for want of steady foothold,
he failed as often to reach me. The last time he fell he slipped
between two hounds, and the badger had him at his mercy. It did my
ears good to hear him howl; and no sooner did the badger let him go
than he retreated over the backs of the hounds behind with a celerity
which did credit even to his long legs. Through the creeper that half
curtained the mouth of the cave I saw him take up his station amongst
the rearmost ranks of those hounds who were baying their loudest from
the brambles.
Shortly after this, one of two mounted men, whose progress was
arrested by the thicket, jumped from his horse and plunged into the
tangle. Only his hot face and bald head showed above the brake as he
came slowly along, cracking his whip as best he could for the briers
that reached to his neck and clung to his red sleeve. Whilst he fought
his way through, the other kept screaming at the top of his voice:
"Whip 'em off! The brute'll murder my best hounds!" The huntsmen had
no difficulty in whipping off the crew of howlers outside; but it was
no easy task to call off the staunch hounds that, despite the terrible
punishment they were receiving, would have carried on the fight until
they dropped from exhaustion. At last he succeeded, remounted his
horse, and rode away with the other.
In the silence that ensued my position appeared to me still most
unenviable. Would the badger, on whom I had brought all this trouble,
avenge himself on me for the wrong I had done him? I tried to read his
intentions, but he gave no sign. Presently he looked up at me, and in
fear and trembling I returned his gaze. A wild light blazed in his
black eyes, but no trace of rage against myself. Then I took courage,
though obliged to look away from his blood-stained face, so horrible
was the sight it presented. His must have been a noble nature to bear
such punishment without resentment, and I am glad he never guessed my
fears.
How I wronged this chivalrous old aristocrat in thinking it possible
he could use his giant strength to crush the life out of a helpless
cub! The old fellow was as friendly as though nothing had happened
when, at last, falling rather than leaping, I came down from my perch
to try to find relief from the cramp that was knotting my muscles.
His awful panting had by that time somewhat subsided; but I was truly
sorry to see him in such a deplorable state, and I suppose I showed it
in my face, for he said: "Do not grieve on my account, little brother.
I shall soon recover from my scratches."
My legs were too stiff to let me lie down, so I stood by his side
whilst he licked his wounds and smoothed his ruffled coat, and at
nightfall, when he left, I staggered after him as best I could. After
drinking at a spring on the way, we came to the earth, from the mouth
of which, as I rejoiced to see, the faggots had been removed. There
the badger left me and went up the hill toward the farm-land over
which he wandered nearly every night in search of food. At what time
he returned I do not know, as I did not awake till late the following
afternoon, when I was aroused from my deep sleep by the noise he made
on resuming his excavations.
There are some things which I would gladly be silent about, but which
are necessary to the completeness of my story.
Chief of these are the grievous losses on that day's cub hunting.
My little sister and--sadder still--my dear mother were killed by
the hounds. It was best they should die together, for the cub was so
dependent on the vixen, and the vixen so inseparable from the cub,
that I am sure they could not have lived happily apart. Our common
trouble drew my surviving sister and myself closer to each other, and
for a few weeks we lived together in the earth, though we went our
several ways at night, and very seldom hunted in concert.
The close of this period is marked by an event of great moment to
myself, which, though it does not redound to my credit, must be told
in some detail.
It is necessary first to state that for some reason the hounds gave
up coming to our country, and that in their place a murderous
gang of ruffians infested the district, and by traps, by poisoned
carcasses, by terriers, by digging and by filling the earths with
smoke, succeeded in destroying nearly every fox in the countryside.
Fortunately our earth proved impregnable to the spade and proof
against smoke; whilst the badger made such havoc with the dogs that
were sent against us that, after two determined but futile assaults,
we were left in peace. For a time we had to exercise the utmost
caution in avoiding the numerous traps, which were artfully concealed
in the runs leading from the earth; but afterwards these were removed,
and we might roam without molestation over our desolate wilds.
Hares had been all but exterminated, and rabbits and wild-fowl so
shot down and thinned that it was hard to get a living, and at last
my necessities tempted me to that most perilous of undertakings, a
raid on the poultry of the neighboring farm. Besides the everlasting
crowing of the cocks, I had heard the noise made by the flocks of
housed turkeys, geese, and ducks, as I returned at dawn from the empty
warren on the dunes; and this had set me longing for them.
I did not enter lightly on this my first foray, which I knew to be
fraught with danger. My plans were laid with the fullest deliberation,
and in the deep silence of my den I carefully thought out every step
in my expedition. One of the strong points of a fox is attention to
details. We go over and over every turn, we weigh every chance, and
try to foresee every contingency. Indecision and flurry are not in our
nature; we know what we are going to do, and we go coolly through with
it. Our best-laid schemes may and do miscarry at times; nevertheless,
with the overconfidence of cubhood, I really thought that the
precautions I meant to take excluded all risks to my skin. Why, I had
mapped out in my brain every inch of the incursion; I had selected the
best way of approach; I was prepared with the safest line of retreat;
and, what is of no small moment, I had arranged for the disposal of
the kill, which was likely to be a big one.
Eager as I was to realize my sanguine expectations, I twice postponed
my visit, hoping for the cover of a storm that threatened; but on
the third night, though the weather had cleared, I resolved to defer
the raid no longer. The crescent moon was just above the hill when
I stretched myself at the mouth of the earth and set out to put
well-matured plans into execution. I walked up the rugged hillside
with all the circumspection and gravity becoming a great undertaking,
and stayed awhile on the crest to reconnoitre the scene of my
operations. The farm-house, the outbuildings, the yards, were all
silent. No foot stirred, no bark of dog broke the stillness which
brooded over the rugged slope, the smooth fields, and the endless
waste of sand beyond.
Satisfied that the coast was clear, I made my way down the hill
by a path my pads had laid--for I was on my trail leading to the
dunes--and, keeping to the shelter of a hedge of blackthorns, reached
the wall under the elms. Over it I crawled to the lower yard where
the big pool is. Its muddy edge was white with stranded feathers, and
so was the track leading past the mowhay, where rats were rustling in
the straw. But I left them behind, and with stealthy stride reached
the scene of action. A cock, unsuspicious of my presence, crowed in
the first house I came to, but the door was a new one, and a weasel
could not have got under it; so I passed in disgust to the next shed,
which contained the turkeys. But if the hen-house was effectually
closed, the turkey-house was hermetically sealed, and I thought that
the farmer must be a cruel brute not to give the poor birds better
ventilation.
"They would be but dry eating, even if I could get them," said I, as
I crossed the deeply-rutted road to the big house where my nose told
me the geese were shut up. This building boasted a tall chimney, which
made it look quite lofty; but it was on a small hole in the bottom of
the door, from which came the goodliest of smells, that I fixed my
attention, and without a moment's delay I set about enlarging it. The
wood round it was very rotten, but I could not make the opening as big
as I wished, on account of a piece of iron which was fastened across
the door on the inside, some five or six inches above the level of
the ground. Whilst I was at work the cackling inside was deafening;
and when, by a furious effort, I squeezed my way in, I found myself
in a veritable pandemonium. I really think that geese take their
troubles more noisily than any birds in the world, except, perhaps,
guinea-fowls; and I, who love quiet, would have left them severely
alone if I could have got at the fowls or the turkeys. Their clumsy
wings, too, can make you see stars if they catch you fairly across
the eyes, as theirs caught me more than once before my work was done.
Now it is one thing to slay in hot blood, another to tell at your
ease what happened. I will merely say that the lust for slaughter was
strong in me, and that in a short time all the flock but one lay dead
on the stone floor.
Not an instant did I waste before setting about the next step in my
projected night's work, the removal of the biggest bird to the dune I
had chosen for my cache. I hoped to take all--it could be done--but
I would make sure of the best. My grandest victim was the gander. I
had pulled him out from under two geese, and was bearing him over the
bodies of the flock towards the door, when, to my horror, I saw that
the hole had been stopped from the outside.
While the killing went on I had been deaf to everything, and I believe
that a wagon might have passed through the yard without my noticing
it. But now I became alive to every sound. I dropped the gander and
listened. At first I could hear nothing but the thumping of my own
heart, still affected by the speed of the kill; but presently the
silence was broken by the sound of a man's footsteps on the stones at
the back of the house. A few minutes later I heard the heavy tread on
the roof, whereat I fell into a state of abject terror, which caused
me to run round the walls like a rat in a trap.
My enemy did not remain long, and when he came down he made for the
farm-house, muttering as he went. Now, thought I, is the moment to
regain my freedom. Escape by the door seemed out of the question; a
small paneless window through which I could see a single star was
hopelessly beyond my reach; but a third outlet, the chimney, remained,
and by it I might find deliverance.
Here I met with an unexpected, but not insuperable, difficulty; for a
foot or so up, the flue was choked with old nests. I closed my eyes
whilst I pulled them down; but the suffocating dust, which there was
no draught to carry away, compelled me to return every now and again
to the floor to breathe. This inconvenience, however, was a mere
trifle, and after drawing a few breaths I returned to my work. It
cheered me to hear the debris falling, and to know that every stroke
of my fore-paws brought me nearer to my liberty. Imagine my dismay,
then, on discovering, after all my toil, that a flat stone capped the
chimney and prevented my escape. Though it smelt abominably, I made
frantic efforts to remove it. I pawed it, I bit it, I tried to raise
it with the top of my poll, with my arched back, but place myself
as I might, I could not find a position that enabled me to get good
purchase owing to the width of the chimney. Had it been half an inch
narrower, I might have managed to dislodge the stone, heavy though it
was, for I had felt it yield a little when I made my greatest effort.
But there was no result from what force I could use, and seeing that I
was only wasting time and strength, I scrambled down the flue to the
heap of fallen rubbish, which gave way under me and spread out over
the floor.
The geese lay as I had left them. It was a big kill, and no mistake.
The floor was white with birds, and in places they were two deep. As
became a dog-fox I had done my work well, and the birds were all dead
except one, which raised its head now and again in the far corner
under the window. I had not the least inclination to touch it again,
and though I must have been very hungry, I did not think of eating.
I was in a trap; I knew it, so did my enemy, and I knew that he knew
it. That he would return at daybreak I felt sure, and that he would
kill me I had little doubt. At the very thought I grovelled with
fear among the bodies of my victims, until the determination to live
aroused me to fresh exertions. In my desperation I tried to bite away
the nails that studded the sound wood about the hole by which I had
entered; I tried to dig my way under the door, but I did not succeed
in dislodging a single stone. Oh for half an hour of my friend the
badger! I made frantic, unavailing leaps at the open window; I cruised
round and round the walls until I must have travelled miles; time
after time I scrambled up the chimney, only in the end to resume my
aimless rounds. At length, weary with my endeavors, continued through
many hours, I lay down again, panting, amongst the geese.
The stillness of that dead-house was profound. Outside, too, all was
still, save for the soughing of the wind in the leafless elms. This
was the voice of an old friend, and it soothed me somewhat till it
brought back to my mind the picture of the reeds bending over the
rippled surface of my favorite pool. At the thought of my freedom
in the fen I jumped to my feet and tried again and again, without
success, each possible outlet, and then once more lay down with
heaving side and lolling tongue to wait for the end.
Presently a cock crowed; and at last dawn peeped through the window,
and found me a more pitiable object than the old goose who squinted
at me every time she raised her blood-stained head. It would be day
soon, but as yet the light was gray. It was the hour that had ofttimes
surprised me in the midst of my hunting, and hurried me across the
misty fen to my kennel in the brake; the hour when every carnivorous
creature of the night steals by hidden ways to his retreat, and
conceals himself from the cruel eye of day.
As the light grew stronger I found myself rising involuntarily to my
feet to return to the earth, but the strong walls compelled me to
stay and await my fate. Soon a pale, rosy light suffused the sky, and
presently the first beam of sunshine came in at my window and fell on
an old spider's web stretched over a hole in the wall of the chimney.
I envied the owner of the web: I envied the dead geese: I would at
that moment have been even the broken starling's egg lying there on
the waste-heap, or the skeleton of a fly dangling at the end of the
gossamer.
I heard a door slammed and the noise of footsteps. They were
deliberate, heavy, merciless, and they were approaching the door
behind which I stood listening. Just when I expected to see it
slightly opened, and was on the point of shamming dead, there was
a loud kick against it which upset my plan and made me rush up the
chimney.
Then the door was unbarred and opened.
"All dead, are 'ee?"
"Aye, all dead."
After a pause the newcomer added:
"You're as putty a lot ever I reared; in another month you'd have been
ready for market, and I looked to 'ee to pay part of the rent."
Then in a voice like thunder he bawled out:
"Where art thee, Master Reynard? Ah, thee scoundrel, thee needn't try
to get out by the chimbley! thee'rt wastin' thy precious time. I'll
help thy lordship through the front door in a minute. An'rew, bring
the sack here."
Presently I heard two men below, and the door closed behind them.
"He's up the chimbley and safe enuf. You hold the sack whilst I stir
him up with this eer pole."
Two awful thumps I endured without flinching, but the third knocked
my hind-legs from under me, and I fell all of a heap into the bag.
"So far, so good. Now we'll tie a stone to the sack and drop the lot
into the deep corner of the goslin' pool. The varmint must die. I'll
go and fetch a bit of rope."
Whilst the farmer was gone the man opened the mouth of the sack and
looked down on me. Not satisfied, apparently, with the half light
of the outhouse, he took me into the open and peered at me again. I
thought I recognized him the first time he inspected me; but now, with
the morning sun on his ruddy cheeks I was quite sure. He was the first
man I had seen, the man who was on the cairn the morning my mother was
killed by the pack; he was the man who, I felt certain, had stopped
the earths. I was calm now. I had gone through the agony of death, but
still I did not want to die. Life was sweet, very sweet. I was not
like a mangy old fox; I was in the pride of my cub-hood.
"What a beauty!" said the earth-stopper, as he continued to gaze at
me. "What a grand fox, to be sure! If An'rew can save 'ee, then thee
shan't die, now there." Saying this he let go his hold on the sack and
turned away. You can depend upon it I made a quick exit and sped off.
I hope no serious harm came to Andrew.
I sought a new home, looking therefor on the great moors. For a time
I had a life comparatively free from care, but though few of the
changes in the autumn life of the wild escaped me, I was slow to
interpret those signs that foretold the severe weather that was to
suddenly set in. It is, however, hardly matter for wonder that I was
blind to the warnings they conveyed, for the frosts of our peninsula
are, as a rule, so slight as to relax their feeble grip by noon-day;
even the smallest birds suffer little discomfort. Indeed, I have
sometimes thought that migratory birds flock to our shores because of
the mildness of the climate and the hospitality its feeding grounds
offer; but this is only the view of a fox, who welcomes these aliens,
and takes heavy toll of their number. Whatever the cause may be,
there is no doubt about the fact. This year, however, the flocks of
fieldfares, always the first to arrive, were earlier than was their
wont. I noted, too, that despite the normal mildness of the weather,
our few hibernating creatures suddenly withdrew into their winter
quarters; the hedge-hogs to the drifts of leaves and hollow holes of
dead trees, and the dormice to their nests in the low bushes. These
incidents did not seem to concern me; though I was surprised at the
abandonment of the fen by the otters, till presently I learnt that the
late salmon had already passed up the river. That seemed to explain
it; for the otters always follow the salmon, as every fox knows who
has had the luck to find a half-eaten fish on the bank.
I am convinced that all these creatures were conscious of approaching
hard weather; and when I discovered that the squirrels with which the
wood abounded, had sought their nests in the top-most branches of the
red pines, a sense of the evil times before us came to me, too.