BAMBI
_A Life in the Woods_
By FELIX SALTEN
FOREWORD BY
JOHN GALSWORTHY
SIMON AND SCHUSTER
NEW YORK
1928
COPYRIGHT, 1928, BY
SIMON AND SCHUSTER, INC.
37 WEST 57 ST., NEW YORK
_all rights reserved_
_First Printing in America, July 1928_
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BY
ABBOTT PRESS & MORTIMER-WALLING, INC., NEW YORK, N.Y.
TRANSLATED BY
WHITTAKER CHAMBERS
ILLUSTRATIONS BY
KURT WIESE
[Illustration: _Bambi saw two fawns standing side by side._]
FOREWORD
BAMBI is a delicious book. For delicacy of perception and essential
truth I hardly know any story of animals that can stand beside this
life study of a forest deer. Felix Salten is a poet. He feels nature
deeply, and he loves animals. I do not, as a rule, like the method
which places human words in the mouths of dumb creatures, and it is the
triumph of this book that, behind the conversation, one feels the real
sensations of the creatures who speak. Clear and illuminating, and in
places very moving, it is a little masterpiece.
I read it in galley proof on the way from Paris to Calais, before a
channel crossing. As I finished each sheet I handed it to my wife, who
read, and handed it to my nephew’s wife, who read, and handed it to my
nephew. For three hours the four of us read thus in silent absorption.
Those who know what it is to read books in galley proof, and have
experienced channel crossings, will realize that few books will stand
such a test. BAMBI is one of them. I particularly recommend it to
sportsmen.
_March 16th, 1928_ JOHN GALSWORTHY
Illustrations
Bambi saw two fawns standing side by side.
He stood there, swaying unsteadily on his thin legs.
Overhead two jays were quarreling. “What vulgarity!” he chattered,
“what vulgarity!”
The leaves fall slowly.
There sat the Hare looking like a very honest creature.
The squirrel sat up, balancing himself with his handsome upright
tail.
It took Bambi’s breath away to see them.
The old stag kept gazing at him.
“Have I changed much?” asked the second leaf, shyly but
determinedly.
Bambi had to paw the snow away with endless labor before he could
find one withered little blade of grass.
Bambi was hardly aware that he had begun to run again.
“Excuse me,” said the woodpecker, “but I always have to laugh when
I see you deer acting like that.”
At last Bambi caught up with her and barred the way.
The stag immediately lifted his head and looked at him.
The old stag advanced slowly and Bambi followed him.
“Faline, sister, you knew me anyway.” Gobo went to her and kissed
her mouth.
The dogs found me.”
Marena was quiet and serious and gentler than any of the others.
“Did I frighten you?” asked the owl.
Gobo would stand with perfect peace of mind in the bright sunshine
on the meadow.
The ducks talked endlessly to one another in a friendly, serious,
capable way.
Bambi lay on the warm earth with the mouldering bark of the fallen
tree above him.
“My beautiful old oak, do you remember it? It was awful. He chopped
it down!”
The fox came springing, crouching and slinking. A little,
short-legged hound was after him.
The pheasants, swooping down from their roosts, would stand in one
spot.
Two fawns were standing side by side, in their little red coats.
BAMBI
CHAPTER 1
He came into the world in the middle of the thicket, in one of those
little, hidden forest glades which seem to be entirely open, but are
really screened in on all sides. There was very little room in it,
scarcely enough for him and his mother.
He stood there, swaying unsteadily on his thin legs and staring vaguely
in front of him with clouded eyes which saw nothing. He hung his head,
trembled a great deal, and was still completely stunned.
[Illustration: _He stood there, swaying unsteadily on his thin legs._]
“What a beautiful child,” cried the magpie.
She had flown past, attracted by the deep groans the mother uttered in
her labor. The magpie perched on a neighboring branch. “What a beautiful
child,” she kept repeating. Receiving no answer, she went on
talkatively, “How amazing to think that he should be able to get right
up and walk! How interesting! I’ve never seen the like of it before in
all my born days. Of course, I’m still young, only a year out of the
nest, you might say. But I think it’s wonderful. A child like that,
hardly a minute in this world, and beginning to walk already! I call
that remarkable. Really, I find that everything you deer do is
remarkable. Can he run, too?”
“Of course,” replied the mother softly. “But you must pardon me if I
don’t talk with you now. I have so much to do, and I still feel a little
faint.”
“Don’t put yourself out on my account,” said the magpie. “I have very
little time myself. But you don’t see a sight like this every day. Think
what a care and bother such things mean to us. The children can’t stir
once they are out of the egg but lie helpless in the nest and require an
attention, an attention, I repeat, of which you simply can’t have any
comprehension. What a labor it is to feed them, what a trouble to watch
them. Just think for a moment what a strain it is to hunt food for the
children and to have to be eternally on guard lest something happen to
them. They are helpless if you are not with them. Isn’t it the truth?
And how long it is before they can move, how long it is before they get
their feathers and look like anything at all.”
“Pardon,” replied the mother, “I wasn’t listening.”
The magpie flew off. “A stupid soul,” she thought to herself, “very
nice, but stupid.”
The mother scarcely noticed that she was gone. She continued zealously
washing her newly-born. She washed him with her tongue, fondling and
caressing his body in a sort of warm massage.
The slight thing staggered a little. Under the strokes of her tongue,
which softly touched him here and there, he drew himself together and
stood still. His little red coat, that was still somewhat tousled, bore
fine white spots, and on his vague baby face there was still a deep,
sleepy expression.
Round about grew hazel bushes, dogwoods, black-thorns and young elders.
Tall maples, beeches and oaks wove a green roof over the thicket and
from the firm, dark-brown earth sprang fern fronds, wood-vetch and sage.
Underneath, the leaves of the violets, which had already bloomed, and of
the strawberries, which were just beginning, clung to the ground.
Through the thick foliage, the early sunlight filtered in a golden web.
The whole forest resounded with myriad voices, was penetrated by them in
a joyous agitation. The wood-thrush rejoiced incessantly, the doves
cooed without stopping, the blackbirds whistled, finches warbled, the
tit-mice chirped. Through the midst of these songs the jay flew,
uttering its quarrelsome cry, the magpie mocked them, and the pheasants
cackled loud and high. At times the shrill exulting of a woodpecker rose
above all the other voices. The call of the falcon shrilled, light and
piercing, over the tree-tops, and the hoarse crow chorus was heard
continuously.
The little fawn understood not one of the many songs and calls, not a
word of the conversations. He did not even listen to them. Nor did he
heed any of the odors which blew through the woods. He only heard the
soft licking against his coat that washed him and warmed him and kissed
him. And he smelled nothing but his mother’s body near him. She smelled
good to him and, snuggling closer to her, he hunted eagerly around and
found nourishment for his life.
While he suckled, the mother continued to caress her little one.
“Bambi,” she whispered. Every little while she raised her head and,
listening, snuffed the wind. Then she kissed her fawn again, reassured
and happy.
“Bambi,” she repeated. “My little Bambi.”