Creatures of the Night Part 13

In the undergrowth, but away from the well worn tracks used by the creatures as they stole out to feed, I had chosen three hiding places, representing in their relative positions the corners of a triangle the centre of which was the main entrance to the "set." I was thus able, whatever might be the direction of the wind, to lie to leeward and obtain a clear view of the princ.i.p.al opening, while I incurred but slight risk of detection, unless the rabbits or the wood-mouse crept into the brambles.

It was during the last week of watching that my patience received its best rewards. Almost regularly then, as the shadows deepened before moonrise, the rabbits stole out, and, sometimes with no hesitation, sometimes after much cautious reconnoitring and sniffing the air and "drumming" alarm signals on the mound before their door, hopped along the paths towards the clover-fields outside the wood. Soon after the rabbits appeared, the wood-mouse timidly peeped around the corner of the entrance, and, seeing nothing of his enemy, the brown owl, disappeared, with a rustle, among the dead leaves that filled a hollow where the old, disused workings of the "set" had "shrunk."

On several occasions, the vixen led forth her cubs long before the badgers came in view, and while the light yet lingered on the crests of the neighbouring hills. The little family went away silently to a dense furze-brake about a hundred yards distant on the lower edge of the wood, and, till the sun had gone down, remained close-hidden in a lair that I afterwards discovered amid the long gra.s.s in the heart of the thicket.

More frequently, however, I saw nothing of the vixen till nightfall, though the cubs, impatient of confinement, now and again visited the mound outside the "set," and for a few moments played together on the bare soil thrown up by the hard-working badgers, as, in spring, they enlarged their breeding chamber. But, in the first calm hour of night, when the red afterglow had faded from the hills, and the moon, ascending cloudless in the southern sky, cast long, mysterious shadows down the aisles of the wood, the fox-cubs and their dam came boldly out, and, instead of moving off towards the furze, adjourned to a rill close by, whence, after quenching their thirst, they repaired to a glade above the "set," and in this favourite playground frisked and romped, unremittingly guarded from danger by their devoted mother. My presence unsuspected, I watched them, little dim figures, flitting to and fro.

When they had gone far up the winding pathway to the cornfields, and the silence was no longer broken by their low cries of dissembled rage and fear, I sometimes lingered in my hiding place; and as on the gra.s.s I lay, looking towards the stars that twinkled between the motionless leaves of the trees above me, my thoughts went back to a time long before our village had been built beside the river; before Giraldus Cambrensis had journeyed hence with the pilgrim band towards Sant Dewi's shrine; before the great Crag of Vortigern, across the near dingle, had resounded with the blare of the trumpets of war; before even, in the primitive hut-circle on the opposite hill, wild little children had played about the twilight fires kindled in readiness for the home-coming of the weary hunters--a time when the fox, the badger, and the tiny mouse had nightly journeyed through the woods, and the call of the gaunt wolf to his mate had weirdly echoed and re-echoed in the valley, startling the innocent hare in the open waste above the slope, and the busy beaver on the dam below in the pool at the bend of the river.

The badgers--or "earth-pigs" as the country folk have named them--were the original occupants of the "set," unless, however, the earliest excavations had been made by the ancestors of the old doe-rabbit now inhabiting a side apartment. The foxes and the wood-mouse might have been looked upon as interlopers, but they often played the part of scouts and sentinels, quick to give alarm to the tolerant, easy-going badgers, in case of imminent danger from the visit of a dog or a man to the neighbourhood of their retreat.

The badgers were more irregular as to the time when they left the "set"

than were any of the other inhabitants. Perhaps they suspected a human presence, because of some peculiar vibration in the earth through a false step of mine. Perhaps, during certain conditions of the atmosphere, a taint--borne from me, on a wave rather than a current of air, to the wide archway beneath the tree-roots in front of the main entrance, and then drawn down into the draughty pa.s.sages--was detected by them immediately they pa.s.sed beyond the stagnant atmosphere of the blind-alley where they slept. Evening after evening, one of the old badgers would appear at the mouth of the "set," and, with snout uplifted in the archway of the tree-roots, would stay as motionless, but for the restless twitching of the alert nostrils, as were the trees and the stones around his home, while I, not even daring to flick an irritating gnat from my forehead or neck, would wait and long for the philosopher in grey to make up his slow-moving mind.

With regard to the badger's habit of staying for some time in the doorway of his home, it may be mentioned that years afterwards, when one night I compared my notes with those of a companion who had hidden near the main opening of the "set" while I had watched by a hole higher in the wood, I found that each entrance had, simultaneously and for long, been occupied by a vigilant badger; and, as both animals were full-grown "greys," I concluded that parent badgers not unusually took ample precautions against surprise before allowing their cubs to venture out into the night.

Once away from the "set," the old male badger seemed to lose suspicion of any obnoxious presence. Then, lumbering after him, every member of his family would appear in full view on the mound, and, with little fits and starts of pretended rage and fright, would roll over and over each other, rush helter-skelter back to the underground dwelling and out again, and round and round the tree-trunks. A favourite trick, indulged in by young and old alike, was that of raising themselves on their hind-legs close beside a broad beech-trunk near the "set," and then, on tiptoe, stretching out their fore-claws to the fullest extent and scratching vigorously at the bark.

This trick irresistibly reminded me of an incident connected with a shooting expedition to the moors, when, one evening, after much gossip in the ingle-nook, I accompanied my jolly host to the barn, and there, much to the merriment of all concerned, acted as judge, while, by the light of a lantern, the farmer measured and recorded the height of his wife, as well as of each of his six children and his servants, against the oaken door-post, and finally insisted that he himself, a veritable giant, should submit to the test, and gave orders for a chair to be fetched that "mother," a stout little woman of some sixty inches in height and, also, in circ.u.mference, might mount to the level necessary for "chalking his mark."

One day a keen naturalist and sportsman, whose acquaintance I had recently formed, proposed to join me in my vigil near the badger's home.

In the declining afternoon, we left the village, crossed the bridge, and made a detour of the river path. As we pa.s.sed along, I showed him an otter's "holt" under a shelving bank, where, on the fine, wet sand, the prints of the creature's pads were fresh and clearly outlined. We then visited an "earth" within the wood, in which dwelt a lonely old fox I had often watched as he stole along the rabbit-tracks towards the Crag of Vortigern; and there I pointed out how crafty Reynard, having selected a convenient rabbit burrow, had blocked up every hole--but one, in a thick clump of brambles--with soil thrown out in digging, and how the gra.s.s and the ground-ivy had luxuriantly covered the bare mounds, and so encroached on the fox's winding track through the wood and about the bramble clump, that even to an experienced visitor the only fox-sign likely to be detected was in the loose arrangement of the bents and the twigs by the arch of the run-way as it entered the thicket.

Rabbits, as well as water-voles and field-voles, are particularly careful to nibble off wind-blown or sprouting twigs that encroach on their tracks through the undergrowth; but foxes, otters, and badgers simply brush them aside as they pa.s.s.

The sun had not yet gone down when we arrived at the "set." I had planned an early visit, so that my friend might have an opportunity of examining the much frequented track-ways, the footprints of the badgers on the soft earth of the mound, and the scratches on the tree-trunk where the badgers had sharpened their claws and incidentally measured themselves. These numerous claw-marks were especially interesting, and, on a certain tree by the "set," they formed irregular lines extending from a foot above the ground to a height of three feet or rather more.

The lowest scratches had been made by the cubs seated on their haunches and facing the tree; a little higher, the marks were those of the parent animals while in a similar position; after a s.p.a.ce in which a few abrasions occurred, the marks showed how the cubs had gradually grown till they could reach within a few inches of the clear, deep furrows scratched by the old male badger as he measured his full length against the tree.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "AS HE MEASURED HIS FULL LENGTH AGAINST THE TREE." (_See_ p. 419).]

After making observations with the utmost wariness, we hurried away, so that, before dusk, our scent might evaporate, and become almost imperceptible in the vicinity of the princ.i.p.al entrance to the lonely burrow.

After a second ramble by the riverside, we returned in the face of the wind, and at twilight began our silent watch. A robin sang plaintively from the hawthorns on the outskirts of the wood; the rooks sailed slowly above us, and then, gossiping loudly of the day's events, congregated around their nests in the great elms dimly outlined against the pearly southern sky; the wood-pigeons dropped one by one into the beech-trees near us; and a jay, uttering his harsh alarm, hopped in and out of some young hazels fringing the glade beyond the "set." Presently, a brown owl, in a group of tall pines near the little rill that made faint music in the woods, began to mutter and complain, in those low, peculiar notes that are often heard before she leaves her daytime resting place. Then no sound disturbed the stillness but the far-off cawing of the rooks, and the only creatures visible were some rabbits playing in the moonlit glade, and a glow-worm s.h.i.+ning with her soft green light on a bramble spray within my reach.

Nearly half an hour pa.s.sed by, and no sign of life came from the badgers' home. Then the familiar white and black striped head, framed in the darkness beneath the gnarled tree-root, suddenly appeared, and as suddenly vanished. Another half-hour went by, and yet another, but no further sign was given. My companion, unused to such a long vigil, s.h.i.+fted uneasily, and protested that he was tingling with cramp and longing for sleep; presently, unable to endure his discomfort, he arose, and stretched his limbs before settling down again amid the briars.

Our patience was in vain. Once more the badger came in sight, but my companion did not see what I myself had noticed, for sleep had sealed his tired eyes, and when I nudged him he awoke with such a start that the badger instantly withdrew into the burrow.

By the glow-worm's lamp, I found from my watch that midnight had long pa.s.sed; and so, since the hour was towards dawn and the moon was not favourable for close observation of the "earth-pigs," even if they crossed the open glade, I whispered to my friend that the proceedings, in which his interest had manifestly waned, were over for the night. His disappointment was keen, and though to me the night seemed warm, he, accustomed to a tropical climate, chattered with the cold. He had not even noticed the first appearance of the "earth-pig," and henceforth night watching held no charm for him.

My own disappointment, if only for my friend's sake, was also keen; but, on the evening following those hours of fruitless watching, I discovered the vixen's lair in the furze-brake, and learned why she resorted thither with her cubs, before the badger family had awakened from their day-dreams, or the pale glow-worm's rays had lit up the dew-besprinkled spider-webs.

Knowing that badgers are, as the country folk say, _pwdu_ (pouty) creatures, likely to sulk at home for several nights if they consider it unsafe to roam abroad, I carefully examined the mound of earth and the beech-trunk near the "set," that I might learn whether the animals had been out of doors since my previous visit. On the soil, fresh footprints could be seen, their outlines clearly lit and deeply shadowed as the sun sank in the west, and, in some of the scratches on the beech, the pith had barely changed its colour from creamy white to the faintest tinge of brown. I concluded, therefore, that the badgers had been out, as usual, some time before the dawn. My eyes, however, were not sufficiently trained to detect any sure evidence of the recent movements of the vixen and her cubs.

Walking along the tracks, I chanced to notice that the path by which the vixen sought the shelter of the furze-brake branched off at a sharp angle, and led into the thicket at a bend that was hidden from my sight while I watched near the "set." Picking my way in a line straight through the tangle and parallel with this path, I came to an opening where the gra.s.s was beaten down for about six square yards--more particularly for two or three yards in the part nearest the spot at which the tunnelled run-way entered it. Along the margin of this open place, I could find no second entrance; everywhere at the foot of the surrounding gorse-bushes the long gra.s.s grew in an unbroken line, except close to the mouth of the run-way. There I found a shallow depression, not unlike the "form" of a hare, but longer and broader, and I determined to keep strict watch evening after evening, till I learned the reason for the occasional visits of the vixen and her cubs to the brake. But I little imagined that the secret would quickly be disclosed, for it was my belief that, should the vixen venture to the mouth of the "set" before the gloom was deepening into night, she would cross the line of my scent, and either move away from the direction of the furze-brake or return to her underground chamber. And yet previous experiences led me to hope that, if certain atmospherical conditions should prevail, the scent would probably become so weak that she would recognise no cause for alarm.

It was the work of a few minutes for me to make couch of gra.s.s and twigs behind a screen of broken furze-branches well in from the gra.s.sy opening. Then, by raising with a p.r.o.ng-shaped stake the gra.s.s I had trodden down, and by thrusting back the bramble-trails and fern-fronds I had brushed aside, I carefully removed as far as possible all traces of my visit.

I had scarcely settled down to watch and listen, when the faint snap of a twig reached my ears, and I saw that the vixen with her cubs had arrived on the scene. She walked around the enclosure, sniffing now and again in the gra.s.s, while the young foxes frisked and gambolled with each other, or trotted demurely by her side. She was at first suspicious, but for some reason she soon gained confidence; then she squatted in her lair, and surrendered herself, with patient motherhood, to be the plaything of her healthy, headstrong youngsters.

For more than a half hour I watched the happy family, the little ones climbing over the mother's back, and licking or biting her ears, her pads, her brush, or racing over the gra.s.sy plot, frolicking with each other till some little temper was aroused and play degenerated into a fight. In general, they behaved like wild children without a thought of care, yet they never went beyond the gra.s.s-fringe into the thicket, and to each low note of warning or encouragement from their dam they gave immediate attention. Sometimes the vixen bounded gaily about the edge of the gorse, stooping again and again to snap with pretended rage at one or another of her offspring. But for most of the time she remained in her lair, listening intently for the slightest sound of danger, and guarding the only approach through the bushes.

I longed to discover what she would have done had I suddenly come upon her and cut off her retreat, but I dared not move for fear of raising alarm. It is more than likely that, finding me in the path, she, snarling and hissing, would have dashed without hesitation into any part of the furze-brake, and her young would have followed with desperate haste and vanished at her heels within the shadows.

By-and-by she led her little ones back through the run-way, and when, a few minutes afterwards, I stole to the outer edge of the thicket, I saw the merry family stooping in a row beside the rill, and lapping the cool, delicious water, which refreshed them after their rough-and-tumble sport. From the rill they wandered off into the gloom beneath the beech-trees, and I, satisfied with having added to my knowledge of the life of the woods, returned homewards in the light of the rising moon.

II.

THE CRAG OF VORTIGERN.

One of the chief difficulties with which the naturalist has to contend while watching at night is the frequent invisibility of wild creatures among the shadows, even when the full moon is high and unclouded. The contrasts of light and shade are far more marked by night than by day; by night everything seems severely white where the moonbeams glance between the trees, or over the fields, or on the river, and the shadows are colourless, mysterious, profound; whereas by day variety of tone and colour may be observed in both light and shade, and every hour new and unexpected charms are unfolded in bewildering succession.

The wild creatures of the night often seem to be aware of their invisibility in the gloom, and of the risk they run while crossing open s.p.a.ces towards trees and hedgerows where an enemy may lurk awaiting their approach. A fox is so familiar with his immediate surroundings that, till his keen senses detect signs of danger, he will roam unconcernedly hither and thither in the dark woods near his "earth,"

frolicking with his mate, or hunting the rabbits and the mice, or sportively chasing the wind-blown leaves, as if a hound could never disturb his peace. The fox knows the shape of each tree and bush, and of each shadow thrown on the gra.s.s; he notes the havoc of the tempest and the work of the forester. When the wind roars loudly in the branches overhead, or the raindrops patter ceaselessly on the dead herbage underfoot, or the mists blot out the vistas of the woods, he seldom wanders far from home, for at such times Nature plays curious tricks with sound and scent and sight, and danger steals upon him unawares.

The hunted creatures of the night so dislike the rain, that during a storm Reynard would have difficulty in obtaining sufficient food; but down in the river-pools below the wood, fearless Lutra, unaffected by the inclement weather, swims with her cubs from bank to bank, and learns that frogs and fish are as numerous in the time of tempest as when the moon is bright and the air is warm and still.

Since my earliest years of friends.h.i.+p with Ianto the fisherman and Philip the poacher, I have regarded night watching in the woods or by the riverside as a fascinating sport, in which my knowledge of Nature is put to its severest test. By close, patient observation alone, can the naturalist learn the habits of the creatures of the night; and if it should be his good fortune to become the friend of such men as I have mentioned he would find their help of inestimable value.

To Ianto and Philip I owe a debt of grat.i.tude, of which I become increasingly conscious with the pa.s.sing of the years. I could never make them an adequate return for their kindness; but I am solaced by my recollection that I was able to comfort such staunch old friends when they were pa.s.sing into the darkness of death--haply to find, beyond, some fair dawn brighter than any we had together seen from the hills around my home. Often, as I write, I see them sitting in the evening sunlight of my little room; often, in my garden, I see them walking up the path attended by my dogs that now are dead; often, in the river valley, whether I wander by night or by day, I see them at my side.

Ianto and Philip were always eager to help me by every means in their power, but Philip, because of the risk to my health, would never invite me to accompany him when the night was cold and stormy. One afternoon, as Ianto and I were returning home from the riverside, the old fisherman remarked: "I met Philip last night, sir, and he wants you and me to come along with him for a ramble to the woods above the Crag. He's got something to show you; I think it's an old earth-pig that lives in the rocks. What do you say to joining me by the church as soon as you've had something to eat? Then we'll go together as far as the bridge, but I'll leave you there, for I've got a little job on hand that'll keep me till sundown, I think. You'll find Philip at the 'castell' (prehistoric earth-work) above the Crag, and I'll wade the river and be with you again sometime 'between the lights.' Keep to cover, or to the hedges and the lanes, and look about you well, most of all afore you cross a gap, and when you're going out of cover or into it. n.o.body must have a chance of following you to-night to the Crag; so, if you meet a farm labourer sudden-like, make off to the furze by the river farm, and double back through the woods. You'll get to Philip early enough. He's going to net the river after we leave him. It's a game I don't care much for--maybe because I've given it up myself--but I've promised to do something aforehand, that, if Philip didn't want you particular, he'd be bound to do hisself. That's why I'm to leave you at the bridge."

I was tired after a day's hard fis.h.i.+ng, but I readily fell in with the arrangements my two old friends had made. On the way to the bridge, Ianto gave me further instructions. "If, when you're nigh the Crag, sir, you happen to come across a farm servant, or even if you think, from seeing a _corgi_ (sheep-dog), that a farm servant is near, get right away, and, as soon as you're sure n.o.body knows where you are, give that signal I taught you--four quick barks of a terrier with a howl at the end of 'em. Philip'll understand. But if everything goes well till you get to the Crag, make that other signal--the noise of young wood-owls waking up for the night--and Philip's sure to answer with a hoot. Then let him come up to you; but, mind, don't you go to him."

A little mystified by Ianto's last injunction, I crossed the bridge, pa.s.sed through a succession of gra.s.sy lanes that for years had fallen into disuse, picked my footsteps cautiously through the woods, and arrived without adventure at the top of the Crag.

Getting down into the oak-scrub, I stood within the deep shadows at the base of the great rock, and gave the signal--a harsh, unmusical cry, such as a hungry young owl would utter at that time of the evening.

The cry had scarcely gone forth, when I was startled by a voice from some hollow quite close to my side: "I'm Philip. Don't move--don't speak. A man's watching you from the blackthorns at the top of the wood.

He hasn't seen me. Don't look his way, but walk along the path below, and when you reach the end of the wood turn up and hide in the cross-hedges, so that you can watch him if he comes out anywhere in the open. And, mind, don't let him see you then. If he goes back to the farm, give the signal again; or, if I give two hoots, one about ten seconds after the other, come to me, but don't pa.s.s this place. The fellow isn't of much account, but we must get rid of him before I can stir. He's kept me here for the last half-hour."

Philip ceased speaking, and I walked carelessly down the wood, pausing here and there to peep through a patch of undergrowth and to satisfy myself that the man at the top of the wood had not moved. When outside the wood, I turned rapidly up the hill and found an excellent hiding place among some brambles on a thick hedge. From this spot I could command a view of the meadows above the wood, and could easily retreat unseen if the farm labourer happened to come towards me.

I watched patiently for twenty minutes or so, then heard Philip's welcome signal from a fir-spinney on the far side of the Crag, and hastened to his side. In reply to my question as to what had become of the man who had watched from the blackthorn thicket, he pointed to the opposite hillside, where a dim figure could be seen ascending the ploughland in the direction of a distant farmstead. "I expect to be able to show you a badger to-night," he said, "but of course I'm not sure about it. A badger's comings and goings are as uncertain as the weather.

But first we'll climb further up the hill. You were asking me about the leaping places of the hares: I know of one of these leaping places, and I think I know of two hares that use them and have lately 'kittled' in snug little 'forms' not far away. We must hurry, else the does will have left the leverets and gone to feed in the clover. You go first. Wait for me in the furze by the pond on the very top of the hill."

When Philip had rejoined me on the hill-top, he rapidly led the way to the fringe of the covert, where he pointed to a low hedge-bank between the gorse and a peat-field partly covered with water. "Hide in the hedge about ten yards from this spot," he said, "so that you can see on either side of the bank, then watch the path on this side." With a smile he added: "This isn't a bad locality for a fern-owl. So, if you happen to hear the rattle of that bird, you'll know the hare has started from her 'form.'" Then, turning quickly into the furze and taking a bypath through the thickest part of the tangle, Philip left me, and, soon afterwards, I moved to my allotted hiding place.

Before I had waited long, the cry of the fern-owl reached me with astonis.h.i.+ng clearness from an adjoining field. Presently, I saw a hare emerge from the gorse and come along the path towards me. At the exact spot indicated by the poacher, she paused, and then with a single bound cleared the wide s.p.a.ce between herself and the hedge. With another bound she landed on the marsh beyond, where she splattered away through the shallow water till a dry reed-bed was reached on a slight elevation in the marsh. There she was lost to view; the rank herbage screened her further line of flight.

A minute afterwards, the fern owl's rattle once more broke on the quiet evening, now from a few fields away to my right. For some time, I closely watched the open s.p.a.ce around the hedge-bank, but no animal moved on the path. Suddenly, however, I thought I detected a slight movement in a bracken frond beside the furze. It was not repeated, and I had concluded that it signified nothing, when, to my amazement, I caught sight of a second hare squatting in the middle of the path near the bracken. How she came there I was unable to understand; for some time my eyes had been directed towards the spot, and certainly I had not seen her leave the ferns. She seemed to have risen from the earth--something intangible that had instantly a.s.sumed the shape of a living creature.

She took a few strides towards my hiding place, but, exactly where the first hare had leaped, she turned sharply at right angles to the path, and with a long, easy bound sprang to the top of the hedge-bank; then with another bound she flung herself into the marshy field. Making straight for the reed-bed, she, too, was soon out of sight.