Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches Part 10

And, after all this anxiety and rapid locomotion,--after turning and winding in and out of the wood, and round the wood to avoid the open--across the brook to avoid the bridge--through the brambles and thick underwood to avoid the open path--when you think you have cheated, or, at any rate, distanced your enemy,--when you perceive in front of you the object of your hopes,--the well-known and much-desired hut which seems to invite you to repose after your long day's walk--why, at that interesting moment, even your own, your very own brother would be a veritable Bedouin in your eyes, a man to be put out of the way any how, if he attempted to stop you.

At such a crisis, if a real sportsman were to hear that his house was on fire, that his banker was off to America, taking with him his wife and his money, he would not, I say, in such a moment turn his head round to see which way they went;--Imagine, then, when in order to succeed you have made yourself out a cheat of the first water, and employed every possible subterfuge,--conceive what would be the extent of your anger and indignation, what your disgust,--when on arriving at your coveted _Mare_, at your oasis, at your paradise, at the spot for which you have toiled and invented such lies, to find the hut--occupied!

Sometimes you may find in the possessor a _cha.s.seur_, who likes to amuse himself at your expense,--a jocose fellow, who, hearing you at a distance working your way through the underwood, and seeing you through the leaves advancing with eager and rapid steps to the spot, conceals himself behind the entrance, and as you are just on the point of entering the hut, your foot just on the step, the droll sportsman puts his ugly head out of the window, as a yellow tortoise would his out of his sh.e.l.l, asking you, in most polite terms, what o'clock it is; or if it should chance to be raining a deluge at the time, remark in compa.s.sionate accents, "Why, sir, you seem rather damp!"

Job was never so unfortunate as to arrive at a _Mare_ already occupied; had he done so, it is not by any means clear to me that he would have been able to contain his wrath. For my own part, I have frequently been beside myself with vexation, and on one occasion was very nearly having a quarrel to the death with my best friend. We had accidentally met in the forest, as described, and had deceived each other, as two Greeks of Pera would, when making a bargain. After our _rencontre_, my friend went to the right, I to the left; he on the sly, turning and twisting by footpath and wood to conceal himself from observation; I, on the contrary, went directly to the spot, and striding away as fast as I could go, arrived at the _Mare_ about three minutes before him, scarlet and streaming with exertion, and quite out of breath. My friend who was equally heated, but, in addition, disappointed and in a furious rage, addressed me in most insulting language, declaring between the hiccup, which his want of breath and want of coolness had produced, that I was a Jesuit, a hypocrite; and many other affectionate epithets did he apply to me with the utmost volubility.

If I had not been the fortunate occupant of the hut, which gratifying fact was as honey to my lips and oil to my bones, and had a most soothing influence on my temper, I should naturally have revolted at such conduct; but this constrained me, and I remained perfectly quiet, determined to allow my lungs to regain their composure before I replied.

Seeing this, his rage increased tenfold, and he proposed a duel with our fowling-pieces, hunting-knives, or two large sticks; he offered me, also, an aquatic duel of a most novel character,--namely, for both of us to undress and endeavour to drown each other in the _Mare_! In short, he continued for at least a quarter of an hour to rave and rail without ceasing.

But of all this abuse I took not the slightest notice, remaining perfectly calm, sitting in my hut like Solomon on his throne, and fanning my heated countenance with the brim of my broad hat, as if I had been in a gla.s.s-house. It is true I laughed in my sleeve, looked vacantly at the blue heavens, and whistled the chorus or s.n.a.t.c.hes of a hunting song. Finding therefore, it was impossible to move me, my adversary finished by getting tired of roaring and abusing; and having rubbed the perspiration from his distorted face with a force which seemed as if he would rub his nose off, he turned on his heel with the grace of a wild boar that had received a brace of b.a.l.l.s in his haunches,--looking me fiercely in the face, and pouring forth as a last broadside, a dozen of oaths in the true _argot_ style, which seemed to dry up the very plants near him, and silenced the frogs that were croaking in the _Mare_.

Such, however, is the force of habit and of this rule; and so truly does every one feel that on the strict observance of it depends the tranquillity of all, that the law of first possession is never violated; although it is but simply acknowledged by the justice and good sense of every sportsman, it is quite as well established in their manners and customs as if it were written on tables of iron. The consequence is, that however enraged a person may be, he sees, and generally at the outset, that his best course is to give way; he may fume and strut, look big and villify, but he bows his head and is off with as embarra.s.sed a face as yours, gentle reader, would certainly be, if a friend whom you knew to be ruined came and asked you to lend him twenty thousand francs.

But also, by St. Hubert, if you remain the lord and master of this _Mare_, how your heart leaps, how all fatigue is forgotten! and when the twilight approaches, what a fever there is in your veins!--what anxiety!

I have heard of the delirious and suffocating emotions of a lover waiting for his mistress at the rendezvous. Fiddlesticks! I say, gruel and iced-water. The most volcanic Romeo that ever penned a letter or scaled a wall, is to the sportsman waiting amidst the howling storm on a dark night for the wolves, what a cup of cream is to a bottle of vitriol. As for myself, I would give,--yes, ladies, I am wolf enough to say,--that I would willingly give up the delightful emotions of ninety rendezvous, with the loveliest women in the world, black or white, for twelve with a boar or a wolf. In return for this bad taste, I shall probably be devoured some day or other,--a fate no doubt duly merited.

I will suppose, therefore, that the sportsman is squatting quietly in his hut, like a serpent in a bush. With what ardour and nervous anxiety does he not await the propitious and long-expected hour! He throws open the ivory doors of his castle in the air,--his hopes are multiplied a thousandfold. What shall I shoot?--what shall I not shoot? Will it be a she-wolf, or a roebuck? No, I prefer a boar. Will he be a large one? But if by chance I should kill a sow?--what a capital affair that would be; the young ones never leave their mother; perhaps I should bag three or four,--perhaps the whole fare. But then, how shall I carry them off?

Perhaps the wolves will save me the difficulty of contriving that, and dispute my t.i.tle to them,--perhaps they will attack me, eat me, the sow, the pigs, and my sealskin cap.

How, I beseech you, is the following _monologue_ to stand comparison with the fierce excitement of such antic.i.p.ations? Will she come this evening, the darling--will my sweetest be able to come?--shall I be blessed with one kiss?--shall it be on the left cheek or the right, or shall I press her lips to mine? Bah! there can be no comparison in the hunter's mind; and then you barricade yourself in your hut as evening approaches, strengthen the weak points, study the best positions, look to your arms; the day seems as if it would never close,--nothing is left for you to do but to muse in the interval, and think of the poor maudlin lovers, who at this very hour are squatting under a wall like so many young apes; or of him who, half concealed, stands on the watch at the angle of a dirty street, waiting with a fluttering heart the arrival of some sentimental little chit of a girl, who is nevertheless coquette enough to keep him waiting for half an hour. And again, with what disdain and contempt you regard such birds as pigeons, turtle-doves, buzzards, wild duck, and teal; hares and foxes, too, which make their appearance from time to time,--to kill these never enters your head.

What, not the fox, with his splendid bushy tail?

Why what do you take me for, good reader?--what can I possibly want with that?--I, who am about to knock over two roebucks and three wolves?

Peace, peace, my friends; skip and skuttle about, young rabbits; nibble away, middle-aged hares,--don't put yourselves the least out of the way, you won't have any of my powder. Besides, to fire would be very imprudent, and to a great extent compromise the sport; for at this period the sun is sinking, the shadows are slowly lengthening, the roebuck are on their way, and the she wolf in the neighbouring thicket is raising her head and listening for the sounds which indicate that her prey is not far off. And you listen also to catch the slightest noise that comes on the wind,--for each and all are a vocabulary to the huntsman,--a gust of wind, the note of a bird disturbed, a weasel running across the path, a squirrel gnawing the bark, a breaking branch, startles you, circulates your blood, and puts you anxiously alive to what may follow. Everything that surrounds you at this still tour of twilight courts your attention,--the waving branches speak to you,--the hazel thicket, bending to the weight of some advancing animal, puts you on your guard; the heart beats, not for the rustling of a silk gown, nor for the hurried footfall of woman treading with fairy lightness on the fallen leaves. The syren voice is not about to whisper softly in your ear, "Are you there, violet of my heart!" nor are you about to reply, "Angelic being, moss-rose of my soul, let me press your sweet lips?"

What you are waiting for are the wild beasts of the forest,--you are listening for their distant and subdued tones, their bounding spring, their near approach, their bodies as a mark for your rifle, their yells, and cries, and death agony for your triumph.

Then the inexplicable charms of danger excite the sportsman's feelings; his physical faculties, like those of the Indian, are doubled; he grasps his rifle with a firmer clutch, and looks down the blade of his hunting-knife with anxiety and yet with satisfaction. It grows dark, but his eyes pierce the gloom--his life is at stake, but he forgets that it is so; for the love of the chase, the wild pleasures of the huntsman, have taken possession of his soul. Breathless, his heart thumping against his chest, as if it would break its bounds, he listens, the cloudy curtain rises, and with it the moon; the roebucks are heard in the distance, then the stealthy steps of the wolves, afterwards the rush of the boar: and now, gentlemen, the tragedy is about to commence--choose your victims.

CHAPTER XIV.

_Mare_ No. 2.--Description of it--Not sought after by the sportsman--The sick banker--The doctor's prescription--The patient's disgust at it--Is at length obliged to yield--Leaves Paris for Le Morvan--Consequences to the inmates of the chateau--The banker convalescent.

If the great _Mares_ No. 1, situated in the dark and silent depths of the forest, far from every habitation, and where you find you are left as much to yourself as the poor s.h.i.+pwrecked sailor supporting his exhausted frame upon a single plank on the angry billows, are so attractive, and so much coveted, though dangerous and difficult to secure, the same cannot be said of those which lie in the vicinity of a village, and which I shall call _Mare_ No. 2.

These last are to be met with easily enough; but being so very readily discovered, it is therefore rare to find near them the larger descriptions of game,--though the sportsman may see a few thrushes, some dozen of water-wagtails, and flocks of little impudent chaffinches, greenfinches, &c., which come there to imbibe, hopping from stone to stone, and singing in the willows; beyond these he will see nothing worth the cap on the nipple of his gun. Nevertheless to him who is without experience,--to the hunter who cannot read the language of the forest on the bark of the trees, on the freshly trodden ground, or the bent gra.s.s and broken flowers,--these pieces of water seem quite as beautiful and well situated, indeed quite as desirable, as the others.

Perhaps such an ignoramus might prefer them; for they are always more open, more free from weeds, rushes and flags, and less dark; and at the hour of _la cha.s.se au poste_, the hour of twilight, they are as solitary as the _Mare_ No. 1. But the savage beasts of the forest are not to be deceived; their instinct tells them that at a quarter, or perhaps half a mile from them, there is, though unseen and hidden in the thickness of the trees, a farm, or two or three houses; and when they are not pressed onward by the winter snows, or by maddening hunger, they stop,--for the smell of man is not pleasant to their nostrils, the neighbourhood is not agreeable to them, and they immediately withdraw from the spot.

It is thus that these _Mares_ are always at any person's disposal; the pa.s.sing sportsman rarely makes more than a circuit round them; and if one is occasionally found on their banks, he may at once be set down as a beginner, who, having found the _Mares_ No. 1 in the vicinity all occupied, has here installed himself for the evening in sheer vexation and despair. Over these pools of troubled water, frequented during the whole day by the inhabitants of the adjoining cottages, that eternal stillness and imposing solitude, which are the delight of the wolf and the boar, never reigns.

The day has scarcely dawned ere the wood-cutters' wives, in their red petticoats, with brown jugs on their heads, come to fill them there, or to wash their vegetables; the cows to drink, the children to play at ducks and drakes, or the men to water the horses. But a little before nightfall all this going and coming, this trampling of heavy _sabots_, the bellowings, oaths, and cracking of whips subside, and cease, as if by magic, when the sun is down. The poultry and the peasants are equally silent, their huts are closed, their beds are gained, and their dogs, stretched motionless behind the door, snore and sleep soundly with open ear, and every leaf without is still.

The _cha.s.seur a l'affut_, if inexperienced or not acquainted with the country, while reconnoitring the spot during the last few minutes of the twilight that remain, would never imagine that he was near an inhabited spot; not a bark, not a sound, not one twinkling light in a cottage window, not one wreath of ascending smoke is to be heard or seen.

Thinking therefore that he has made a grand discovery, he rubs his hands with no little satisfaction, squats down at the foot of some tree, or in the temporary shed on the bank, and believes he is going to kill a dozen wolves at least.

But, alas! it is in vain for him to open his eyes and his ears; nothing is to be seen but one or two hideous bats, which flap their wings in his face, and frighten him in the midst of a reverie. Nothing is on the move; no newt or tadpole is playing in the water, and nothing can be descried there but the rays of the moon, as she moves slowly o'er its surface; nor is anything to be heard except the wind whistling through the trees, or an occasional shot from the rifle of a brother sportsman, who, more happy, more clever, and better placed than himself, may be heard in the distance. I should not have thought of mentioning the _Mares_ No. 2, so little do they deserve attention, if one of them had not been the scene of a very strange adventure of which I was witness; and as the description of it will give me an opportunity of speaking of the _Mares_ No. 3, and of the third mode of taking woodc.o.c.ks, I shall profit by the circ.u.mstance to relate it.

One day a _millionnaire_, a Lucullus, a rich banker of Paris, found himself dreadfully ill: his body grew larger every twenty-four hours; his neck sunk into his shoulders, his breathing became difficult, and three or four times in the course of a week he was within a little of being suffocated; as many times in the course of a month the gout, which in the morning had been tearing his toes and his heels as if with hot pincers, in the evening twisted his calves and his knees as if they were being made into ropes. What was to be done under these circ.u.mstances?

The best physicians consulted together, and recommended him to order a pair of hob-nailed shoes from a country shoemaker, and instantly leave the capital.

"Hob-nailed shoes, with donkey heels!" cried the banker, all amazed; "and for what, in the name of goodness?"

"Why, to run with in search of health over the wild moors and heaths, and improve your figure by long walks in the mountains," was the reply.

And as the only hope of health was obedience, he prepared his mind to set off. It is true the doctors permitted him to carry with him his cane, his flute, and his eye-gla.s.s; but he was obliged to leave behind his carriages, his horses, his luxurious arm-chairs and his cooks; in short, he was informed that, under the penalty of being quickly placed under ground, and obliged to shake hands with his respectable ancestors, and enjoy with them the nice white marble monuments under which they reposed, he must, for the next year at least, make use of his own legs, forget there were such things as _Rentes_, eat only when he felt hungry, and drink when he was thirsty.

What a sentence for a rich Parisian banker! to leave his splendid hotel and his apartments, redolent with delicious perfumes, and play the pedestrian up and down the footpaths in the woods, the mossy glades and highway of the forest, or sit on a large stone at the top of a hill under the mid-day sun, and inhale from the valleys the soft breezes, laden with the odours of the new-mown hay, or the clover-fields in full blossom. His box at the grand opera, lined with velvet, must too be left behind, and many an adieu be given to the gauze-clad sylphides and painted nightingales of that gay establishment.

Yes, all these were to be exchanged for morning walks to the summit of some mountain; to make his bow to Aurora, and listen to the joyous carol of the larks chanting high in the air their hymns of praise, or listening to their blithe little brothers of song, awakening in the bushes, and fluttering, amidst a shower of pearls and rubies--those dewy gems which hang in the sunny rays upon every branch. "Ah, it is all over with me!" wheezed the plethoric banker, when the junior doctor of the consultation of three informed him of their unanimous opinion.

"It is all over with me, gentlemen; in the name of mercy what will become of me, if I am put on the peasant's daily fare of buck-wheat and roasted beans? Consider again, gentlemen."

"It is a matter of necessity, sir," replied the trio; "your life is at stake."

"Dear doctors, withdraw these unwholesome words; open the consultation afresh; pa.s.s once more in review all your scientific acquirements, your great knowledge of chemistry, your hospital experience. Press, dear gentlemen, between both your hands the pharmacopean sponge, and in the name of mercy squeeze out for me some more agreeable remedy."

"There is no other," replied the funereal-looking physicians.

"What, is the house then really in danger?"

"Danger! sir, why it is nearly on fire. Your heart is getting diseased, your lungs are touched, your blood is actually scented and coloured with the truffles you have eaten. Why, your very nose (pray excuse the freedom of our remark), your roseate nose bears testimony to what we say."

"Alas, alas! this is I fear the truth; but, gentlemen, if I leave Paris, what on earth will become of the Great Northern and the Orleans Railways, and the funds,--my dividends, rents, and bad debts?"

"And your feverish pulse, sir, your wrinkled liver, and your digestion, which scarcely ever allows you to close your eyes?"

"Yes! yes,--but my Spanish fives and Mexican bonds?"

"And your bilious eyes and eyelids full of crows' feet, and the gout and the rheumatism which excruciate you?--those horrid spiders which are weaving their threads in the muscles of your calves?"

"But my carrier-pigeons, gentlemen, source of my tenderest care; the brokerage, the speculation for the account, and my good friend, the Minister of the Interior, and of the _Travaux Publics_; and the s...o...b..ll of my fortune, which must stop unproductive till I recover;--how can I leave all these to fate?"

"Think of your respiration, which is disorganized, and the vital principle, the torch of life, which flickers up and down in the socket, and ere many weeks will be extinguished, unless you at once take our advice."

"What!" continued the votary of wealth,--"what! cannot gold purchase health, most sapient doctors?"

"No, sir; doctors are paid, that's all, and people cure themselves."

"You persist, then, in saying that I am not even to take my head cook with me?"

"On no account whatever."

"Then I am defunct already."