Arizona and New Mexico, or the prairies of Manitoba, I have met with
Mittenusk, as the redmen call him. Like a big white stone perched on
some low mound he seems. But the wind makes cracks in it at places, and
then it moves--giving plain announcement to the world with eyes to see
that this is a Badger sunning himself. He seldom allows a near approach,
even in the Yellowstone, where he is safe, and is pretty sure to drop
down out of sight in his den long before one gets within camera range.
The Badger is such a subterranean, nocturnal creature at most times that
for long his home life escaped our observation, but at last a few
paragraphs, if not a chapter of it, have been secured, and we find that
this shy creature, in ill odour among cattlemen as noted, is a rare and
lovely character when permitted to unbend in a congenial group. Sturdy,
strong and dogged, and brave to the last ditch, the more we know of the
Badger the more we respect him.
Let us pass lightly over the facts that in makeup he is between a Bear
and a Weasel, and that he weighs about twenty pounds, and has a soft
coat of silvery gray and some label marks of black on his head.
He feeds chiefly on Ground-squirrels, which he digs out, but does not
scorn birds' eggs, or even fruit and grain at times. Except for an
occasional sun-bath, he spends the day in his den and travels about
mostly by night. He minds his own business, if let alone, but woe be to
the creature of the plains that tries to molest him, for he has the
heart of a bulldog, the claws of a Grizzly, and the jaws of a small
crocodile.
I shall never forget my first meeting with Old Silver-grizzle. It was on
the plains of the Souris, in 1882. I saw this broad, low, whitish
creature on the prairie, not far from the trail, and, impelled by the
hunter instinct so strong in all boys, I ran toward him. He dived into a
den, but the one he chose proved to be barely three feet deep, and I
succeeded in seizing the Badger's short thick tail. Gripping it firmly
with both hands, I pulled and pulled, but he was stronger than I. He
braced himself against the sides of the den and defied me. With anything
like fair play, he would have escaped, but I had accomplices, and the
details of what followed are not pleasant reminiscences. But I was very
young at the time, and that was my first Badger. I wanted his skin, and
I had not learned to respect his exemplary life and dauntless spirit.
In the summer of 1897 I was staying at Yancey's in the Park. Daily I saw
signs of Badgers about, and one morning while prowling, camera in hand,
I saw old Gray-coat wandering on the prairie, looking for fresh
Ground-squirrel holes. Keeping low, I ran toward him. He soon sensed me,
and to my surprise came rushing toward me, uttering sharp snarls. This
one was behaving differently from any Badger I had seen before, but
evidently he was going to give me a chance for a picture. After that was
taken, doubtless I could save myself by running. We were within thirty
yards of each other and both coming strong, when "crash" I went into a
Badger hole _I_ had not seen, just as he went "thump" down tail first
into a hole _he_ had not seen. For a moment we both looked very foolish,
but he recovered first, and rushing a few yards nearer, plunged into a
deep and wide den toward which he evidently had been heading from the
first.
HIS SOCIABLE BENT
The strongest peculiar trait of the Badger is perhaps his
sociability--sociability being, of course, a very different thing from
gregariousness. Usually there are two Badgers in each den. Nothing
peculiar about that, but there are several cases on record of a Badger,
presumably a bachelor or a widower, sharing his life with some totally
different animal. In some instances that other animal has been a Coyote;
and the friendship really had its foundation in enmity and intended
robbery.
This is the probable history of a typical case: The Badger, being a
mighty miner and very able to dig out the Ground-squirrels of the
prairie, was followed about by a Coyote, whose speed and agility kept
him safe from the Badger's jaws, while he hovered close by, knowing
quite well that when the Badger was digging out the Ground-squirrels at
their front door, these rodents were very apt to bolt by the back door,
and thus give the Coyote an excellent chance for a cheap dinner.
So the Coyote acquired the habit of following the hard-working Badger.
At first, no doubt, the latter resented the parasite that dogged his
steps, but becoming used to it "first endured, then pitied, then
embraced", or, to put it more mildly, he got accustomed to the Coyote's
presence, and being of a kindly disposition, forgot his enmity and
thenceforth they contentedly lived their lives together. I do not know
that they inhabited the same den. Yet that would not be impossible,
since similar things are reported of the British Badger and the Fox.
More than one observer has seen a Badger and a Coyote travelling
together, sometimes one leading, sometimes the other. Evidently it was a
partnership founded on good-will, however it may have been begun.
THE STORY OF THE KINDLY BADGER
But the most interesting case, and one which I might hesitate to
reproduce but for the witnesses, reached me at Winnipeg.
[Illustration]
In 1871 there was a family named Service living at Bird's Hill, on the
prairie north of Winnipeg. They had one child, a seven-year-old boy
named Harry. He was a strange child, very small for his age, and shy
without being cowardly. He had an odd habit of following dogs, chickens,
pigs, and birds, imitating their voices and actions, with an exactness
that onlookers sometimes declared to be uncanny. One day he had gone
quietly after a Prairie Chicken that kept moving away from him without
taking flight, clucking when she clucked, and nodding his head or
shaking his "wings" when she did. So he wandered on and on, till the
house was hidden from view behind the trees that fringed the river, and
the child was completely lost.
There was nothing remarkable in his being away for several hours, but a
heavy thunderstorm coming up that afternoon called attention to the fact
that the boy was missing, and when the first casual glance did not
discover him it became serious and a careful search was begun.
Father and mother, with the near neighbours, scoured the prairie till
dark, and began the next day at dawn, riding in all directions, calling,
and looking for signs. After a day or two the neighbours gave it up,
believing that the child was drowned and carried away by the river. But
the parents continued their search even long after all hope seemed
dead. And there was no hour of the day when that stricken mother did not
send up a prayer for heavenly help; nor any night when she did not kneel
with her husband and implore the One who loved and blessed the babes of
Jerusalem to guard her little one and bring him back in safety.
THE EVIL ONE
[Illustration]
There was one neighbour of the family who joined in the search that had
nevertheless incurred the bitter dislike of little Harry Service. The
feeling was partly a mere baby instinct, but pointedly because of the
man's vicious cruelty to the animals, wild or tame, that came within his
power. Only a week before he had set steel traps at a den where he
chanced to find a pair of Badgers in residence. The first night he
captured the father Badger. The cruel jaws of the jag-toothed trap had
seized him by both paws, so he was held helpless. The trap was champed
and wet with blood and froth when Grogan came in the morning. Of what
use are courage and strength when one cannot reach the foe? The Badger
craved only a fair fight, but Grogan stood out of reach and used a club
till the light was gone from the brave eyes and the fighting snarl was
still.
The trap was reset in the sand and Grogan went. He carried the dead
Badger to the Service house to show his prize and get help to skin it,
after which he set off for the town and bartered the skin for what evil
indulgence it might command, and thought no more of the trap for three
days. Meanwhile the mother Badger, coming home at dawn, was caught by
one foot. Strain as she might, that deadly grip still held her; all that
night and all the next day she struggled. She had little ones to care
for. Their hungry cries from down the burrow were driving her almost
mad; but the trap was of strong steel, beyond her strength, and at last
the crying of the little ones in the den grew still. On the second day
of her torture the mother, in desperation, chewed off one of her toes
and dragged her bleeding foot from the trap.
[Illustration]
Down the burrow she went first, but it was too late; her babies were
dead. She buried them where they lay and hastened from that evil spot.
Water was her first need, next food, and then at evening she made for an
old den she had used the fall before.
THE BADGER THAT RESCUED THE BOY
And little Harry, meanwhile, where was he? That sunny afternoon in June
he had wandered away from the house, and losing sight of the familiar
building behind the long fringe of trees by the river, he had lost his
bearings. Then came the thunder shower which made him seek for shelter.
There was nothing about him but level prairie, and the only shelter he
could find was a Badger hole, none too wide even for his small form.
Into this he had backed and stayed with some comfort during the
thunderstorm, which continued till night. Then in the evening the child
heard a sniffing sound, and a great, gray animal loomed up against the
sky, sniffed at the tracks and at the open door of the den. Next it put
its head in, and Harry saw by the black marks on its face that it was a
Badger. He had seen one just three days before. A neighbour had brought
it to his father's house to skin it. There it stood sniffing, and Harry,
gazing with less fear than most children, noticed that the visitor had
five claws on one foot and four on the other, with recent wounds, proof
of some sad experience in a trap. Doubtless this was the Badger's den,
for she--it proved a mother--came in, but Harry had no mind to
surrender. The Badger snarled and came on, and Harry shrieked, "Get
out!" and struck with his tiny fists, and then, to use his own words, "I
scratched the Badger's face and she scratched mine." Surely this Badger
was in a generous mood, for she did him no serious harm, and though the
rightful owner of the den, she went away and doubtless slept elsewhere.
[Illustration]
Night came down. Harry was very thirsty. Close by the door was a pool of
rainwater. He crawled out, slaked his thirst, and backed into the warm
den as far as he could. Then remembering his prayers, he begged God to
"send mamma," and cried himself to sleep. During the night he was
awakened by the Badger coming again, but it went away when the child
scolded it. Next morning Harry went to the pool again and drank. Now he
was so hungry; a few old rose hips hung on the bushes near the den. He
gathered and ate these, but was even hungrier. Then he saw something
moving out on the plain. It might be the Badger, so he backed into the
den, but he watched the moving thing. It was a horseman galloping. As it
came near, Harry saw that it was Grogan, the neighbour for whom he had
such a dislike, so he got down out of sight. Twice that morning men came
riding by, but having once yielded to his shy impulse, he hid again each
time. The Badger came back at noon. In her mouth she held the body of a
Prairie Chicken, pretty well plucked and partly devoured. She came into
the den sniffing as before. Harry shouted, "Get out! Go away." The
Badger dropped the meat and raised her head. Harry reached and grasped
the food and devoured it with the appetite of one starving. There must
have been another doorway, for later the Badger was behind the child in
the den, and still later when he had fallen asleep she came and slept
beside him. He awoke to find the warm furry body filling the space
between him and the wall, and knew now why it was he had slept so
comfortably.
[Illustration]
That evening the Badger brought the egg of a Prairie Chicken and set it
down unbroken before the child. He devoured it eagerly, and again drank
from the drying mud puddle to quench his thirst. During the night it
rained again, and he would have been cold, but the Badger came and
cuddled around him. Once or twice it licked his face. The child could
not know, but the parents discovered later that this was a mother Badger
which had lost her brood and her heart was yearning for something to
love.
Now there were two habits that grew on the boy. One was to shun the
men that daily passed by in their search, the other was to look to
the Badger for food and protection, and live the Badger's life.
She brought him food often not at all to his taste--dead Mice or
Ground-squirrels--but several times she brought in the comb of a bee's
nest or eggs of game birds, and once a piece of bread almost certainly
dropped on the trail from some traveller's lunch bag. His chief trouble
was water. The prairie pool was down to mere ooze and with this he
moistened his lips and tongue. Possibly the mother Badger wondered why
he did not accept her motherly offerings. But rain came often enough to
keep him from serious suffering.
Their daily life was together now, and with the imitative power strong
in all children and dominant in him, he copied the Badger's growls,
snarls, and purrs. Sometimes they played tag on the prairie, but both
were ready to rush below at the slightest sign of a stranger.
Two weeks went by. Galloping men no longer passed each day. Harry and
the Badger had fitted their lives into each other's, and strange as it
may seem, the memory of his home was already blurred and weakened in the
boy. Once or twice during the second week men had passed near by, but
the habit of eluding them was now in full possession of him.
FINDING THE LOST ONE
[Illustration]
One morning he wandered a little farther in search of water and was
alarmed by a horseman appearing. He made for home on all fours--he ran
much on all fours now--and backed into the den. In the prairie grass he
was concealed, but the den was on a bare mound, and the horseman caught
a glimpse of a whitish thing disappearing down the hole. Badgers were
familiar to him, but the peculiar yellow of this and the absence of
black marks gave it a strange appearance. He rode up quietly within
twenty yards and waited.
After a few minutes the gray-yellow ball slowly reappeared and resolved
itself into the head of a tow-topped child. The young man leaped to the
ground and rushed forward, but the child retreated far back into the
den, beyond reach of the man, and refused to come out. Nevertheless,
there was no doubt that this was the missing Harry Service. "Harry!
Harry! don't you know me? I'm your Cousin Jack," the young man said in
soothing, coaxing tones. "Harry, won't you come out and let me take you
back to mamma? Come Harry! Look! here are some cookies!" but all in
vain. The child hissed and snarled at him like a wild thing, and
retreated as far as he could till checked by a turn in the burrow.
[Illustration]
Now Jack got out his knife and began to dig until the burrow was large
enough for him to crawl in a little way. At once he succeeded in
getting hold of the little one's arm and drew him out struggling and
crying. But now there rushed also from the hole a Badger, snarling and
angry; it charged at the man, uttering its fighting snort. He fought it
off with his whip, then swung to the saddle with his precious burden and
rode away as for his very life, while the Badger pursued for a time, but
it was easily left behind, and its snorts were lost and forgotten.
HOME AGAIN
The father was coming in from another direction as he saw this strange
sight: a horse galloping madly over the prairie, on its back a young man
shouting loudly, and in his arms a small dirty child, alternately
snarling at his captor, trying to scratch his face, or struggling to be
free.
The father was used to changing intensity of feeling at these times, but
he turned pale and held his breath till the words reached him: "I have
got him, thank God! He's all right," and he rushed forward shouting, "My
boy! my boy!"
[Illustration]
But he got a rude rebuff. The child glared like a hunted cat, hissed at
him, and menaced with hands held claw fashion. Fear and hate were all he
seemed to express. The door of the house was flung open and the
distracted mother, now suddenly overjoyed, rushed to join the group. "My
darling! my darling!" she sobbed, but little Harry was not as when he
left them. He hung back, he hid his face in the coat of his captor, he
scratched and snarled like a beast, he displayed his claws and
threatened fight, till strong arms gathered him up and placed him on his
mother's knees in the old, familiar room with the pictures, and the
clock ticking as of old, and the smell of frying bacon, his sister's
voice, and his father's form, and, above all, his mother's arms about
him, her magic touch on his brow, and her voice, "My darling! my
darling! Oh! Harry, don't you know your mother? My boy! my boy!" And the
struggling little wild thing in her arms grew quiet, his animal anger
died away, his raucous hissing gave place to a short panting, and that
to a low sobbing that ended in a flood of tears and a passionate "Mamma,
mamma, mamma!" as the veil of a different life was rolled away, and he
clung to his mother's bosom.
[Illustration]
But even as she cooed to him, and stroked his brow and won him back
again, there was a strange sound, a snarling hiss at the open door. All
turned to see a great Badger standing there with its front feet on the
threshold. Father and cousin exclaimed, "Look at that Badger!" and
reached for the ready gun, but the boy screamed again. He wriggled from
his mother's arms and rushing to the door, cried, "My Badgie! my
Badgie!" He flung his arms about the savage thing's neck, and it
answered with a low purring sound as it licked its lost companion's
face. The men were for killing the Badger, but it was the mother's
keener insight that saved it, as one might save a noble dog that had
rescued a child from the water.
It was some days before the child would let the father come near. "I
hate that man; he passed me every day and would not look at me," was the
only explanation. Doubtless the first part was true, for the Badger den
was but two miles from the house and the father rode past many times in
his radiating search, but the tow-topped head had escaped his eye.
It was long and only by slow degrees that the mother got the story that
is written here, and parts of it were far from clear. It might all have
been dismissed as a dream or a delirium but for the fact that the boy
had been absent two weeks; he was well and strong now, excepting that
his lips were blackened and cracked with the muddy water, the Badger had
followed him home, and was now his constant friend.
[Illustration]
It was strange to see how the child oscillated between the two lives,
sometimes talking to his people exactly as he used to talk, and
sometimes running on all fours, growling, hissing, and tussling with the
Badger. Many a game of "King of the Castle" they had together on the low
pile of sand left after the digging of a new well. Each would climb to
the top and defy the other to pull him down, till a hold was secured and
they rolled together to the level, clutching and tugging, Harry
giggling, the Badger uttering a peculiar high-pitched sound that might
have been called snarling had it not been an expression of good nature.
Surely it was a Badger laugh. There was little that Harry could ask
without receiving, in those days, but his mother was shocked when he
persisted that the Badger must sleep in his bed; yet she so arranged it.
The mother would go in the late hours and look on them with a little
pang of jealousy as she saw her baby curled up, sleeping soundly with
that strange beast.
It was Harry's turn to feed his friend now, and side by side they sat to
eat. The Badger had become an established member of the family. But
after a month had gone by an incident took place that I would gladly
leave untold.
THE HUMAN BRUTE
Grogan, the unpleasant neighbour, who had first frightened Harry into
the den, came riding up to the Service homestead. Harry was in the house
for the moment. The Badger was on the sand pile. Instantly on catching
sight of it, Grogan unslung his gun and exclaimed, "A Badger!" To him a
Badger was merely something to be killed. "Bang!" and the kindly animal
rolled over, stung and bleeding, but recovered and dragged herself
toward the house. "Bang!" and the murderer fired again, just as the
inmates rushed to the door--too late. Harry ran toward the Badger
shouting, "Badgie! my Badgie!" He flung his baby arms around the
bleeding neck. It fawned on him feebly, purring a low, hissing purr,
then mixing the purrs with moans, grew silent, and slowly sank down, and
died in his arms. "My Badgie! my Badgie!" the boy wailed, and all the
ferocity of his animal nature was directed against Grogan.
"You better get out of this before I kill you!" thundered the father,
and the hulking halfbreed sullenly mounted his horse and rode away.
A great part of his life had been cut away and it seemed as though a
deathblow had been dealt the boy. The shock was more than he could
stand. He moaned and wept all day, he screamed himself into
convulsions, he was worn out at sundown and slept little that night.
Next morning he was in a raging fever and ever he called for "My
Badgie!" He seemed at death's door the next day, but a week later he
began to mend and in three weeks was strong as ever and childishly gay,
with occasional spells of sad remembering that gradually ceased.
He grew up to early manhood in a land of hunters, but he took no
pleasure in the killing that was such sport to his neighbour's sons, and
to his dying day he could not look on the skin of a Badger without
feelings of love, tenderness, and regret.
This is the story of the Badger as it was told me, and those who wish to
inquire further can do so at Winnipeg, if they seek out Archbishop
Matheson, Dr. R. M. Simpson, or Mrs. George A. Frazer of Kildonan. These
witnesses may differ as to the details, but all have assured me that in
its main outlines this tale is true, and I gladly tell it, for I want
you to realize the kindly disposition that is in that sturdy, harmless,
noble wild animal that sits on the low prairie mounds, for then I know
that you will join with me in loving him, and in seeking to save his
race from extermination.
* * * * *
VIII
The Squirrel and His Jerky-tail Brothers
* * * * *
VIII
The Squirrel and His Jerky-tail Brothers
You remember that Hiawatha christened the Squirrel
"Adjidaumo"--"Tail-in-air" and this Tail-in-air was chattering overhead
as I sat, some twenty-five years ago, on the shore of the Lake of the
Woods with an Ojibwa Indian, checking up the animals' names in the
native tongue. Of course the Red-squirrel was early in our notice.
"Ad-je-_daw_-mo" I called it, but the Indian corrected me;
"Ah-chit-aw-_mo_" he made it; and when I translated it "Tail-in-air" he
said gravely, "No, it means head downward." Then noting my surprise, he
added, with characteristic courtesy, "Yes, yes, you are right; if his
head is down, his tail must be up." Thoreau talks of the Red-squirrel
flicking his tail like a whip-lash, and the word "Squirrel," from the
Latin "_Sciurus_" and Greek "_Skia-oura_" means "shady tail." Thus all
of its names seem to note the wonderful banner that serves the animal
in turn as sun-shade, signal-flag, coverlet, and parachute.
THE CHEEKY PINE SQUIRREL
[Illustration]
A wonderfully extensive kingdom has fallen to Adjidaumo of the shady
tail; all of Canada and most of the Rockies are his. He is at home
wherever there are pine forests and a cool climate; and he covers so
many ranges of diverse conditions that, responding to the new
environments in lesser matters of makeup, we have a score of different
Squirrel races from this parent stock. In size, in tail, in kind or
depth of coat they differ to the expert eye, but so far as I can see
they are exactly alike in all their ways, their calls and their
dispositions.