‘Where did you place the saddle-bags, Derrick?’ asked Sir Carnaby, when
Hobb Dipping had quitted the old wainscoted apartment in which his
distinguished visitor was about to partake of supper.
Speech was a gift which nature had bestowed very sparingly upon the
attendant; moreover, he was possessed of a rough, unmelodious voice.
Pointing towards a chair in one corner, he slowly ejaculated: ‘There,
sir—underneath.’
‘Good!’ said Sir Carnaby, seating himself at the table.—‘By the way,
Derrick, I think it would be just as well to look after the innkeeper:
his glances are a trifle too curious to please me. When I have finished
my supper, you had better descend into the public room and try to
ascertain his opinion of us.’
‘Right, sir,’ replied the attendant.
‘Come from behind my chair, you varlet,’ said the baronet, motioning
him at the same time with his hand. ‘Draw up to the table and break
your fast with me; we shall gain time by so doing.’
Derrick sat down respectfully at the farther end of the board, and
gazed in a thoughtful way at a dark patch of sky which could be seen
through the diamond-shaped panes of glass in a window opposite him.
‘You seem in no hurry to refresh the inner man,’ remarked Sir Carnaby.
‘What are you thinking of, Derrick?’
‘A dream, sir.’
‘A what?’
‘A dream, sir,’ repeated Derrick—‘one I had last night.’
‘Well, as your mind appears to be somewhat uneasy,’ remarked Sir
Carnaby, with a slight smile playing over his features, ‘I should
recommend open confession as being the proper thing to relieve it.’
‘There’s little enough to tell, sir,’ said Derrick; ‘’twas only a bit
of dark sky up there that brought it back to me.’
‘Well,’ said Sir Carnaby simply.
‘It seemed to me,’ continued the attendant, ‘as if I was riding alone,
holding your horse by the bridle. The moon was up, and the sky looked
the same as it does out there. I can remember now quite plain that I
felt kind of troubled, but what about, I know just as little as you,
sir.’
‘Is that the whole story?’ asked Sir Carnaby with a laugh. ‘Well, I
can tell you, good Derrick, so far as riding alone goes, your prophecy
is likely to prove a true one, though I certainly don’t intend you to
carry off my horse with you.—See here; this is something more important
than a heavy-headed dream. You must start to-morrow for the Grange. Be
in the saddle early, and don’t spare your spurs.’
‘Am I to go alone, sir?’
‘Certainly. The journey has no object beyond the delivery of this
letter; and as inquiry is sure to be pretty rife concerning me, I shall
stay where I am and await your return.’
Derrick received the sealed envelope which was handed to him with a
gruff but respectful ‘Right, sir,’ and then relapsed into his customary
silence.
‘I shall leave it to your discretion to find out the way,’ said Sir
Carnaby. ‘Of course you will go armed?’
The attendant opened his coat without speaking and touched the hilt of
a stout hanger which he wore at his side.
Sir Carnaby smiled. ‘Yes,’ he said; ‘you are ready enough to play
at blood-letting; but that sort of thing is best avoided. Let your
movements be as quiet and speedy as possible; and when you reach your
destination, seek out Captain Hollis by means of that address. Give the
note into his hands, then make haste back. I shall have other work for
you when you return.’
‘More plots,’ thought Derrick, but he merely uttered a grunt and
pocketed the letter.
‘This room,’ continued the baronet, ‘seems to be parlour and bedchamber
in one. So far well. If there should be any occasion to consult me
again before you start, one rap at this door will be quite sufficient
to wake me. I am a light sleeper.’
‘Anything more, sir?’
‘Nothing more to-night; you have all my orders for the
present.—Good-night, Derrick.’
‘Good-night, sir.’
When the last faint clank of Derrick’s boots has ceased to ring upon
the staircase, Sir Carnaby Vincent rises and locks the door, glancing
outside first, to see that no one lurks without. This being done, he
carefully bars the shutters over the window, looks inside two cupboards
which the room contains, and then having ascertained that he is not
likely to be overlooked, draws forth the afore-mentioned saddle-bags. A
strange look of anxiety passes over the fugitive’s face as he plunges
his hand into one of them, and brings out a small, shallow, oaken box,
black with age. Its contents are apparently of no little value, for
the lid is secured by two locks, and a corresponding number of blotchy
red seals, upon which may be deciphered the impression of a crest. Sir
Carnaby turns the box over and examines its fastenings, then rises and
walks slowly round the room, as if in search of something. His manner
at this moment is most strange, and the light step with which he treads
over the old flooring does not awaken enough creaking to disturb a
mouse. Four times round the room he goes, with a curious expression on
his face which would puzzle even a skilful physiognomist to interpret,
then stooping down, he places the box on the floor and appears to
listen.
THE MUSK-RAT OF INDIA.
FROM AN ANGLO-INDIAN.
The musk-rat is from six to eight inches long, of a slatish-blue
colour, with a long movable snout, and diminutive eyes. Its skin is
very loose, and quite conceals the extremities, only allowing the feet
to be seen. This formation occasions the peculiar pattering of its
run. The tail, broad at its base, is pinkish and bare of everything
except a few hairs; ears are diminutive. Loathed and detested by all,
this creature leads a charmed life; only a few dogs will kill it, and
then there is always sneezing and a little foaming afterwards. Cats
follow but won’t touch it; it is, moreover, equally avoided by more
aristocratic rats and mice. As the animal runs along the wall of the
room, it emits a kind of self-satisfied purr, which, if alarmed, breaks
into a squeak, and immediately the scent-bottle is opened. If there is
light to see the tiny creature, you will observe it scanning with its
nose all parts of the horizon in search of what caused the alarm; the
eyes apparently being unequal to the task.
Musk-rats have a singular habit of always running along the walls of
a room, never crossing from one wall to the other; hence, as they are
not swift movers, they are easily overtaken, and a blow from a cane
instantly kills the animal. Traps are of little use in capturing these
creatures; and if one is captured, that trap is for ever useless as
regards ordinary rats and mice, which won’t approach it after being
contaminated. ‘Muskies’ are omnivorous and very voracious. During the
rains, the insect world is on the wing. If at this season you place
a night-light on the ground near the beat of a musk-rat, you will be
amused at watching its antics in trying to catch some of the buzzers
round the light, or those crawling up the wall, and will be surprised
at its agility. The captives are ruthlessly crunched, and the animal
never seems satiated; at the same time its enjoyment is evinced by
its purring. Woe betide him should another musky invade this happy
hunting-ground! War is at once proclaimed, and immediately the two are
fighting for their lives, squeaking, snapping, biting, rolling over
and over, and all the time letting off their awful scent-bottles. You,
in the comparative distance, just escape the disgusting odour; but the
insect invasion catch it full, and quickly leave the scene. And so the
fight goes on, until you happily catch both the combatants with one
blow of your cane, and the stinking turmoil ceases; and having thrown
open the doors to ventilate the room, you are glad to retire to rest.
I was awakened one night at Arrah by the squeaking and stench of two
musk-rats, which were in mortal combat near my bed. Quietly rising and
seizing my slipper, I smote the combatants a wrathful blow, to which
one succumbed, and the other escaped through the venetian. I then lay
down again, but only to hear the hateful p-r-r-r-r of ‘musky,’ who had
come to look after his dead brother. Seizing him, he carried him off
to the venetian, and there dropped him with a squeak, as I rose to my
elbow. Bringing the dead rat back and laying my slipper handy, I again
lay down. Very soon I heard the disgusting purr and saw the dead musky
being carried off; and now the slipper was true, and both muskies lay
prone.
Apropos to this, if you throw out a dead rat or mouse, he is at once
swooped upon by a kite or crow; but both these scavengers will avoid
a dead musk-rat; the kite will swoop and pass on as if he had not
noticed the odour, whilst our old friend the crow will alight at a
safe distance, and with one eye survey the dead shrew. Perhaps in that
glance a whiff from the scent-bottle reaches him, for he hops off a
yard or two, caws, and then rubs his beak once or twice on the ground.
Then he takes an observation with the other eye, caws, and flies up
into the overhanging nína tree. No one will touch the dead musk-rat;
even those faithful undertakers, the burying-beetles, avoid him.
Now, what is the scent of the musk-rat like? When I was last at home in
1875, I went into a greenhouse on a hot summer day, and found it given
up to the musk-plant. ‘Muskies! muskies!’ I exclaimed, as I fled from
the stifling, dank, and fetid atmosphere. Get up that combination—a
hot day, a dank, humid, and suffocating greenhouse given up to the
musk-plant, and you will have the full effect of only one full-blown
musky. The odour of the plant, heavy when close, is delicate when
diffused; the scent of the musk-rat, on the other hand, is heavy when
diffused, and insupportable when near. The marvellous diffusibility of
this odour is illustrated in many ways. It has long been maintained
that the musk-rat has only to pass over a closely corked bottle of
wine to destroy its contents. I have tasted sherry so destroyed, and
at the same time have placed corked bottles of water in the runs of
musk-rats without any defilement. The odour won’t permeate glass, so
the bottle of sherry must have been contaminated by a defiled cork.
Place a porous water-goblet (_sooráhí_) in the run of a musk-rat, and
defilement is secure; and if that goblet endures for a hundred years,
it will during that century affect all water which may be put into it.
These animals seem to enjoy communicating their disgusting odour to
surrounding objects. It doesn’t follow that mere contact conveys it,
for I have often handled these animals without contamination; but there
is undoubtedly—setting aside the scent-bottle as a means of defence—an
instinctive marking of objects for purposes of recognition, sheer
mischief, or for the easing of the secretion organ.
Another anomaly pertains to this animal: though so disgusting to
others, it is not so to itself; and it is one of the tidiest and most
cleanly of animals. Its nesting arrangements, too, are very peculiar;
nothing is more greedily utilised than paper, which it tears up. Some
years ago, I lived in a boarded house, and used to be nightly worried
by a pattering and purring musky dragging a newspaper towards a certain
corner. Arrived there, it disappeared down a hole and pulled the paper
after it—that is, as much as would enter the hole. If I gently removed
the paper, the inquisitive nose would appear ranging round the hole,
and shortly after, the animal itself in quest of the paper. I had the
boarding taken up, and there, in a paper nest, lay five pink and naked
muskies, all heads, with hardly any bodies, and quite blind.
I cannot find one redeeming trait in the character and conduct of
_Sorex cœrulescens_, and I must admit that he is an ill-favoured beast,
and of questionable utility.
A DAY IN EARLY SUMMER.
A little wood, wherein with silver sound
A brooklet whispers all the sunny day,
And on its banks all flow’rets which abound
In the bright circle of the charmèd May:
Primroses, whose faint fragrance you may know
From other blooms; and oxlips, whose sweet breath
Is kissed by windflowers—star-like gems which blow
Beside pale sorrel, in whose veins is death;
Larch-trees are there, with plumes of palest green;
And cherry, dropping leaves of scented white;
While happy birds, amid the verdant screen,
Warble their songs of innocent delight.
Surely they err who say life is not blest;
Hither may come the weary and have rest.
J. C. H.
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Printed and Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON,
and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH.
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_All Rights Reserved._