At one time I had many patients in the Roussel Yard. Ten or twelve families lived there, but none were so badly off, I believe, as the Salvatore family. At Salvatore's it was so dark that they were obliged to burn a little oil-lamp the whole day, and there was no fireplace except a brazier which stood in the middle of the floor. Damp as a cellar it was at all times; but when it rained the water penetrated into the room, which lay a couple of feet lower than the street.
And nevertheless one could see in everything a kind of pathetic struggle against the gloomy impression which the dwelling itself made. Old illustrated papers were pasted up round the walls, the bed was neat and clean, and behind an old curtain in one corner, the family's little wardrobe was hung up in the neatest order. Salvatore himself, with skilful hand, had made the little girl's bed out of an old box, and in the day one could sit upon it as if it were a sofa. The corner shelf where the Madonna stood was adorned with bright-coloured paper flowers, and there, too, the small treasures of the family lay spread out,—the gilt brooch which Salvatore had presented to his wife when they were married; the string of corals which her brother had brought from the coral fishery in "Barbaria" (Algeria); the two gorgeous cups out of which coffee was drunk on solemn occasions; and there, too, stood the wonderful porcelain dog which Concetta had once received as a present from a grand lady, and which was only taken down on Sundays to be admired more closely.
I did not understand how the mother managed it; but the little girls were always neat and tidy in their outgrown clothes, and their faces shone, so washed and polished were they. The eldest child, Concetta, had been at the free school for more than half a year; and it was the mother's pride to make her read aloud to me out of her book. She herself had never learned to read, and although I allowed myself to be told that Salvatore read very well, neither he nor I had ever ventured to try his capabilities. Now, since Petruccio could hardly ever get out of bed, Concetta had been obliged to give up going to school, so that she might stay at home with her sick brother whilstla mammawas at her work away in the eating-house. This place could not be given up, as not only did she get ten sous a day for washing dishes, but sometimes she could bring home scraps under her apron, which no one else could turn to account, but out of which she managed to make a capital soup for Petruccio.
Salvatore himself worked the whole day away in La Villette. He was obliged to be at the stone-mason's yard at six o'clock every morning, and it was much too far to go home during the mid-day rest. Sometimes it happened that I was there when he came home in the evening after his day's work, and then he looked very proudly at me when Petruccio stretched out his arms towards him. He took his little son up so carefully with his big horny hands, lifted him on his broad shoulders, and tenderly leaned his sunburnt cheek against the sick little one's waxen face. Petruccio sat quite quiet and silent on his father's arm; sometimes he laid hold of his father's matted beard with his thin fingers, and then Salvatore looked very happy. "Vedete, Signor dottore," he then would say, "n'è vero che sta meglio sta sera?"[14]He received his week's wages every Saturday, and then he always came home triumphantly with a little toy for his son, and both father and mother knelt down beside the bed to see how Petruccio liked it. Petruccio, alas! liked scarcely anything. He took the toy in his hand, but that was all. Petruccio's face was old and withered, and his solemn, weary eyes were not the eyes of a child. I had never known him cry or complain, but neither had I seen him smile except once when he was given a great hairy horse—a horse which stretched out its tongue when one turned it upside down. But it was not every day that a horse like that could be got.
Petruccio was four years old, but he could not speak. He would lie hour after hour quite quiet and silent, but he did not sleep: his great eyes stood wide open, and it seemed as if he saw something far beyond the narrow walls of the room—"Sta sempre in pensiero,"[15]said Salvatore.
Petruccio was supposed to understand everything which was said around him, and nothing of importance was undertaken in the little family without first trying to discover Petruccio's opinion of the affair; and if any one believed that they could read disapproval in the features of the soulless little one, the whole question fell to the ground at once, and it was afterwards found that Petruccio had almost always been right.
On Sundays Salvatore sat at home, and there were usually some other holiday-dressed workmen visiting him, and in low-toned voices they sat and argued about wages, about news fromil paese, and sometimes Salvatore treated them to a litre of wine, and they played a game,alla scopa. Sometimes it was supposed that Petruccio wished to look on, and then his little bed was moved to the bench where they sat; and sometimes Petruccio wished to be alone, and then Salvatore and his guests moved out into the passage. I had, however, remarked that Petruccio's wish to be alone, and the consequent removal of the company to the passage, usually happened when the wife was away: if she were at home she saw plainly that Petruccio wished his father to stay indoors and not go out with the others. And Petruccio was right enough there, too. Salvatore was not very difficult to persuade if one of the guests wished to treat him in his turn. Once out in the passage, it happened often enough that he went off to the wine-shop too. And once there, it was not so easy for Salvatore to get away again.
What was still more difficult was the coming home. His wife forgave him certainly,—she had done it so many times before; but Salvatore knew that Petruccio was inexorable, and the thicker the mist of intoxication fell over him, the more crushed did he feel himself under Petruccio's reproachful eye. No dissimulation helped here; Petruccio saw through it at once. Petruccio could even see how much he had drunk, as Salvatore himself confided to me one Sunday evening when I came upon him sitting out in the passage, in the deepest repentance. Salvatore was, alas! obviously uncertain in his speech that evening, and it did not need Petruccio's perspicacity to see that he had drunk more than usual. I asked him if he would not go in, but he wished to remain outside to getun poco d'aria; he was, however, very anxious to know if Petruccio were awake or not, and I promised to come out and tell him. I also thought it was best he should sit out there till his head should clear itself a little bit, though not so much for Petruccio's sake as to spare his wife; and for that matter this was not the first time I had been Salvatore's confidant in the like difficult situation. They who see the lives of the poor near at hand cannot be very severe upon a working man who, after he has toiled twelve hours a day the whole week, sometimes gets a little wine into his head. It is a melancholy fact, but we must judge it leniently; for we must not forget that here at least society has hardly offered the poorer classes any other distraction.
I therefore advised my friend Salvatore to sit outside till I came back, and I went in alone. Inside sat the wife with her child of sorrow in her arms; and the even breathing of the little girls could be heard from the box. Petruccio was supposed to know me very well, and even to be fond of me—although he had never shown it in any way, nor, as far as I knew, had any sort of feeling ever been mirrored in his face. The mother's eye, so clear-sighted in everything, nevertheless did not see that there was no soul in the child's vacant eye; the mother's ear, so sensible to each breath of the little one, yet did not hear that the confused sounds which sometimes came from his lips would never form themselves into human speech. Petruccio had been ill from his birth, his body was shrunken, and no thought lived under the child's wrinkled forehead. Unhappily I could do nothing for him; all I could hope for was that the ill-favoured little one should soon die. And it looked as if his release were near. That Petruccio had been worse for some time both the mother and I had understood; and this evening he was so feeble that he was not able to hold his head up. Petruccio had refused all food since yesterday, and Salvatore's wife, when I came in, was just trying to persuade him, with all the sweet words which only a mother knows, to swallow a little milk; but he would not. In vain the mother put the spoon to his mouth and said that it was wonderfully good, in vain did she appeal to my presence, "Per fare piacere al Signor dottore,"—Petruccio would not. His forehead was puckered, and his eyes had a look of painful anxiety, but no complaint came from his tightly compressed lips.
Suddenly the mother gave a scream. Petruccio's face was distorted with cramp, and a strong convulsion shook his whole little body. The attack was soon over; and whilst Petruccio was being laid in his bed, I tried to calm the mother as well as I could by telling her that children often had convulsions which were of very little importance, and that there was no further danger from this one now. I looked up and I saw Salvatore, who stood leaning against the door-post. He had taken courage, and had staggered to the door, and, unseen by us, he had witnessed that sight so terrifying to unaccustomed eyes. He was pale as a corpse, and great tears ran down the cheeks which had been so lately flushed with drink. "Castigo di Dio! Castigo di Dio!"[16]muttered he with trembling voice; and he fell on his knees by the door, as if he dared not approach the feeble cripple who seemed to him like God's mighty avenger.
The unconscious little son had once more shown his father the right way; Salvatore went no more to the wine-shop.
Petruccio grew worse and worse, and the mother no longer left his side. And it was scarcely a month after she lost her place that Salvatore's accident happened: he fell from a scaffolding and broke his leg. He was taken to the Lariboisière Hospital; and the company for whom he worked paid fifty centimes a day to his family, which they were not obliged to do,—so that Salvatore's wife had to be very grateful for it. Every Thursday—the visiting day at the hospital—she was with him for an hour; and I too saw him now and then. The days went on, and with Petruccio's mother want increased more and more. The porcelain dog stood alone now on the Madonna's shelf; and it was not long before the holiday clothes went the same way as the treasures—to the pawnshop. Petruccio needed broth and milk every day, and he had them. The little girls too had enough, I believe, to satisfy them more or less; but what the mother herself lived upon I do not know.
I had already tried many times to take Petruccio to the children's hospital, where he would have been much better off, but as usual all my powers of eloquence could not achieve this: the poor, as is well known, will hardly ever be separated from their sick children. The lower middle class and the town artisans have learnt to understand the value of the hospital, but the really poor mother, whose culture is very low, will not leave the side of her sick child: the exceptions to this rule are extremely rare.
And so came the 15th, the dreaded day when the quarter's rent must be paid, when the working man drags his mattress to the pawn-shop, and the wife draws off her ring, which in her class means much more than in ours; the day full of terror, when numberless suppliants stand with lowered heads before their landlord, and when hundreds of families do not know where they will sleep the next night.
I happened to pass by there on that very evening, and at the door stood Salvatore's little girl crying all to herself. I asked her why she cried, but that she did not know; at last, however, I learned that she cried because "la mamma piange tanto."[17]Inside the yard I ran against my friend Archangelo Fusco, the street-sweeper, who lived next door to the Salvatores. He was occupied in dragging his bed out into the yard, and I did not need to wait for his explanation to understand that he had been evicted.[18]I asked him where he was going to move to, and he hoped to sleep that night at the Refuge in the Rue Tocqueville, and afterwards he must find out some other place. Inside sat Salvatore's wife crying by Petruccio's bed, and on the table stood a bundle containing the clothes of the family. The Salvatore family had not been able to pay their rent, and the Salvatore family had been evicted. The landlord had been there that afternoon, and had said that the room was let from the morning of the next day. I asked her where she thought of going, and she said she did not know.
I had often heard the dreaded landlord talked of; the year before I had witnessed the same sorrowful scene, when he had turned out into the street a couple of unhappy families and laid hands upon the little they possessed. I had never seen him personally, but I thought it might be useful in my study of human nature to make his acquaintance. Archangelo Fusco offered to take me to him, and we set forth slowly. On the way my companion informed me that the landlord was "molto ricco"; besides the whole court he owned a large house in the vicinity, and this did not surprise me in the least, because I had long known that he secretly carried on that most lucrative of all professions—money-lending to the poor. Archangelo Fusco considered that he on his side had nothing to gain by a meeting with the landlord, and after he had told me that besides the rent he also owed him ten francs, we agreed that he should only accompany me to the entrance.
A shabbily-dressed old man, with a bloated, disagreeable face opened the door carefully, and after he had looked me over, admitted me into the room. I mentioned my errand, and asked him to allow Salvatore to settle his rent in a few days' time. I told him that Salvatore himself lay in the hospital, that the child was dying, and that his severity towards these poor people was inhuman cruelty. He asked who I was, and I answered that I was a friend of the family. He looked at me, and with an ugly laugh he said that I could best show that by at once paying their rent. I felt the blood rushing to my head, I hope and believe it was only with anger, for one never ought to blush because one is not rich. I listened for a couple of minutes whilst he abused my poor destitute Italians with the coarsest words; he said that they were a dirty thieving pack, who did not deserve to be treated like human beings; that Salvatore drank up his wages; that the street-sweeper had stolen ten francs from him; and that they all of them well deserved the misery in which they lived.
I asked if he needed this money just now, and from his answer I understood that here no prayers would avail. He was rich; he owned over 50,000 francs in money, he said, and he had begun with nothing of his own. It is a melancholy fact that the man who has risen from destitution to riches is usually cruel to the poor: one would hope and believe the contrary, but this is unhappily the case.
My intention when I went there was to endeavour with diplomatic cunning to effect a kind of arrangement, but alas! I was not the man for that. I lost my temper altogether and went further than I had intended to do, as usual. At first he answered me scornfully and with coarse insults, but he soon grew silent, and I ended by talking alone I should say for nearly an hour's time. It would serve no purpose to relate what I said to him; there are occasions when it is legitimate to show one's anger in action, but it is always stupid to show it in words. I said to him, however, that this money which had been squeezed out of the poor was the wages of sin; that his debt to all these poor human beings was far greater than theirs to him. I pointed to the crucifix which hung against the wall, and I said that if any divine justice was to be found on this earth, vengeance could not fail to reach him, and that no prayers could buy his deliverance from the punishment which awaited him, for his life was stained with the greatest of all sins—namely cruelty towards the poor. "And take care, old blood-sucker!" I shouted out at last with threatening voice; "You owe your money to the poor, but you owe yourself to the devil, and the hour is near when he will demand his own again!" I checked myself, startled, for the man sank down in his chair as if touched by an unseen hand, and pale as death, he stared at me with a terror which I felt communicated itself to me. The curse I had just called down rang still in my ears with a strange uncanny sound, which I did not recognise; and it seemed to me as if there were some one else in the room besides us two.
I was so agitated that I have no recollection of how I came away. When I got home it was already late, but I did not sleep a wink all night; and even to this day I think with wonder of the waking dream which that night filled me with an inconceivable emotion. I dreamt that I had condemned a man to death.
When I got there in the forenoon the blow had already fallen upon me. Iknewwhat had happened although no human being had told me. All the inhabitants of the yard were assembled before the door in eager talk. "Sapete Signor dottore?"[19]they called out as soon as they saw me.
"Yes, I know," answered I, and hurried to Salvatore's. I bent down over Petruccio and pretended to examine his chest; but breathless I listened to every word that the wife said to me.
The landlord had come down there late yesterday evening, she said. The little girl had run away and hidden herself when he came into the room; but Concetta had remained behind her mother's chair, and when he asked why they were so afraid of him, Concetta had answered because he was so cruel to mamma. He had sat there upon the bench a long time without saying a word, but he did not look angry, Salvatore's wife thought. At last he said to her she need not be anxious about the rent; she could wait to pay it till next time. And when he left he laid a five-franc piece upon the table to buy something for Petruccio. Outside the door he had met Archangelo Fusco with his bed on a hand-cart, preparing to take himself off, and he had told the street-sweeper too that he could remain in his lodging. He had asked Archangelo Fusco about me, and Archangelo Fusco, who judged me with friendship's all-forgiving forbearance, had said nothing unkind about me. He had then gone on his way, and according to what was discovered by the police investigations he had, contrary to his habit, passed the evening in the wine-shop close by, and the porter had thought he looked drunk when he came home. As he lived quite alone, and for fear of thieves or from avarice, attended to his housekeeping himself, no one knew what had happened; but lights were burning in the house the whole night, and when he did not come down in the morning, and his door was fastened inside, they had begun to suspect foul play and sent for the police. He was still warm when they cut him down; but the doctor whom the police sent for said that he had already been dead a couple of hours. They had not been able to discover the smallest reason for his hanging himself. All that was known was that he had been visited in the evening by a strange gentleman who had stayed with him more than an hour, and the neighbours had heard a violent dispute going on inside. No one in the house had seen the strange gentleman before, and no one knew who he was.
The Roussel Yard belongs now to the dead man's brother; and to my joy the new landlord's first action was to have the rooms in it repaired, so that now they look more habitable. He also lowered the rents.
The Salvatores moved thence when Petruccio died; but the place is still full of Italians. I go there now and then; and in spite of all the talk about the Paris doctors'jalousie de métier, I have never yet met any one who tried to supplant me in this practice.
The passion for the chase is man's passion for pursuing, and if possible killing, animals living in liberty. The passion for the chase is the expression of the same impulse of the stronger to overthrow the weaker which goes through the whole animal series. The wild beast's lust for murder has been tamed to unconscious instinct, and thousand years of culture lie between our wild ancestors who slew each other with stone axes for a piece of raw fish, and the sportsman of our day. But it is only the method which has been refined, the principle is the same.
The passion for killing is an animal instinct, and as such, impossible to eradicate. But it behoves man, conscious of his high rank, to struggle against this vice of his wild childhood, this phantom from the grave in which sleep the progenitors of his race.
I cannot give you here in detail my proposals for new game laws—the matter is not yet quite ripe—but I am very willing to explain the fundamental principle on which they rest. I maintain that the very great start which mankind has gained through the law of natural selection has made the struggle between the man and the animaltoo unequal to be fair; I maintain that killing animals is an unmanly and an ignoble occupation.
Yes, but as regards wild beasts, wolves, foxes, etc., you don't really mean to stand up for them? Of course I do! First of all it has never been proved that the wild animals attacked man the first. And in the hopeless, defensive warfare in which the animals with vanishing strength struggle against mankind, all my sympathies are unhesitatingly given to the weaker. Yes, it is quite true that now and then they take a hen or a sheep from us; but what is that in comparison with all we take from them, from woods and fields which were meant to be their larder as well as ours? And do not talk too much about the ferocity of the wolf, you men, who have the heart treacherously to put out poisoned food for the starving animal! Perhaps you have not seen this way of killing wolves, but I have. I have seen the victim's agony written in the snow; seen how he has walked a little way and then begun to totter; has fallen, and with ebbing strength tried to get up again; in mad delirium has rolled in the snow whilst the poison was burning his bowels, and then at last has lain down to die. And I have watched the trapper when he joyfully came to seize his prey.
Do not talk too much about the cunning of the fox, you men who have invented the spring-traps which cut into his leg when he tries to take the lying bait which you have set out for him. In England you have not seen this way of catching foxes, but I have. I have seen the prisoner struggling with his last strength to get free, with the blood flowing from his wounded leg, cut to the bone by the sharp iron; I have heard the animal's moan far off in the night, and I have seen the footmarks in the snow of his comrades, who have anxiously roamed around.
"But this is horrible! how is it possible that such a thing can be allowed?"
"Yes, you are right; it is horrible; but this is the death which awaits many foxes both in Russia and Scandinavia, and in Germany too."
"In England it would be considered a crime to kill a fox in that way."
"Yes, I know well that England is the country for lovers of animals. What a fine graceful animal is the fox——"
"Only think what would become of the noblest of all sports, that of fox-hunting——"
Fox-hunting! and you call that a noble sport? I will tell you what fox-hunting is—no, I think I will not tell you. I will only say that were I a fox, I think I would rather try to cross the Channel and become a continental fox than to be hunted to death by your hounds and your spurred horses. And the spur which urges you on, what is that? The love of galloping away on a fiery horse in wild chase over hedge and ditch—ah! I understand that joy well! But why must you have an animal flying in terror for its life before you? Why not leave the pursuers and the pursued to themselves if the latter is doomed to die and has to die? Why do you wish to witness his desperate struggle for life against his manifold stronger enemy? And why, if everything be all right, do you often enough feel something akin to satisfaction if by chance the fox escapes? I only ask, I dare not answer—I dare not for fear of my Editor. And I think we had better drop this subject altogether; it is too dangerous a one to discuss before an English public.
Once when travelling in Norway I heard of a famous man, the wealthiest of that country. I was told he had made his fame and his money as a promoter of a new method of catching whales. Nature to protect the whales has given them their slippery coat and their thick lining of blubber, but that man has overreached Nature. He kills them with dynamite. You ask, as I did, when I heard the horrible story, if that man has not been hanged. Alas, my poor friend! we do not understand the world at all; the man has by no means been hanged. True that a cord has been put round his neck, but it was the cord of Commander of St. Olaf—sapristi!they are not very particular in that country! I am very sorry for him, but were I to meet that man I would decline to shake hands with him. What have the whales done to man to be treated in this way? Have they not always been inoffensive and harmless ever since that kind old whale who happened to swallow the prophet Jonah, and then spat him carefully back on the shore? Only think what a horrible idea to blast in pieces a sensitive body as one blasts in pieces a rock! Think what a barbarous conception of man's position towards animals is here allowed to be put in practice, think of that—before the man is promoted to a Grand Cross of his St. Olaf!
Before giving the last touches to my new game-laws—the fundamental principles of which I have hinted to you—I am perfectly willing to listen to any legitimate claims of the sportsman, and I shall be glad to try to satisfy them if they do not harm the animals. But on one point I am firm. Under no pretext shall children be allowed to shoot, on account of the great development this occupation gives to the instinctive cruelty of the child, and the rude colour it lends to the formation of the whole character. Kindness to our inferiors we ought to be taught as children; life will surely teach us to grow hard enough. Nor are children to be allowed to watch shooting; for men's faces turn so ugly when they are pursuing a flying animal, and the child should be protected as much as possible from the sight of anything unbeautiful.
Ah! I remember so well a little lad up in Sweden who had escaped from school one clear spring morning. He saw how the trees were budding and the meadows in flower, and high up in the air he heard the song of the first skylark. The boy lay down silently in the grass and listened with thankfulness and joy. He knew well what the skylark sang: it sang that the long winter was over, and that it was springtime in the North. And he stared at the little bird high up in the bright air; he stared at it till the tears came into his eyes. He would have liked to kiss the wings which had borne it far over the wide sea home again; he would have liked to warm it at his heart in the frosty spring nights; he would have liked to guard its summer nest from all evil. Yes, surely the skylark could have remained longer in the land of eternal summer! But it knew that up in the cold North there wandered about men longing for spring breezes and summer sun, for flowers and song of birds. So it flew home, the courageous little bird, home to the frozen field from where the pale morning sun melted the white frost-flowers of the night, where primroses and anemones were waking up from their winter sleep. With the head hidden under the down of its wings it kept out the cold of the night, and when the horizon brightened, it flew up and sang its joyful morning hymn—sang Nature's promise of life-bringing sun. But the next day the boy read in the newspaper under the title:Forerunner of Spring—"Yesterday the first skylark of the year was shot, and brought to the Kings palace." Man had killed the innocent little bird on whose wings Spring had flown to the North, and whose little songster's heart was beating with Nature's jubilant joy! And in the palace they had eaten the gray-coated little messenger of summer! That day the boy swore his Hannibal oath against shooting. And when he fell asleep that night he dreamt about a republican rebellion.
Do not believe that this is nothing but theoretical nonsense—that I am discussing matters of which I know nothing. For there was a time when I felt the fascination of the gun myself; there was a time when I too was a great shot. The man who is now sitting here and scribbling about his love for animals, shoots no more; but it is with an indulgent smile on his lips that he looks back upon the whimsical sportsman of bygone days.
Yes, I have been a sportsman—a great sportsman. I have often made long journeys to join shooting parties, and more than once there was no one in the whole company who fired off as many cartridges as I did. All my best friends were amongst sportsmen, and it was seldom indeed I failed to be present on the opening day of the season. We had lots of good sport about my place, but the best was blackcock-shooting. Do you know anything about blackcock-shooting? A very fine sport. How many pleasant recollections have I not from those happy sporting days! how many joyful rambles through the silent forests! how many peaceful hours passed away in half-waking dreams, with the head leaning against a mossy hillock and soft murmuring pines all around! And how happy, too, was my poor old Tom during these never-to-be-forgotten days of sport! How glad was he to scamper about on the soft moss instead of the stones of the streets! how contentedly he lay down to harmonious contemplations by my side—so near that I could now and then caress his beautiful head and catch a friendly glance from his half-open eyes. He knew I was always in splendid temper on those shooting days, and that was all he required to be perfectly happy himself. But if I begin to speak about my dear old dog we shall never arrive at the blackcock, and it is about them I want to speak to-day.
The gamekeeper had long known the whereabouts of the birds, and carefully exploring the woods he had often enough heard the call of the hen; the blackcock chicks had, so to speak, grown up under his eyes, and he had tried in all sorts of ways to take care of them, the good gamekeeper! And now since they had grown up, the important thing had been to keep them undisturbed lest they should be dispersed. We sportsmen came down the day before the opening day, and well do I remember those pleasant evenings, with a stroll in the forest to clear the lungs from the dust of the town, and then supper in the gamekeeper's cottage in excellent company, flavoured with stories of first-rate shots and marvellous adventures. At first I used to be rather shy, and would silently sit and listen to the others' wonderful tales, but I soon got to learn the trick, and having once mastered the technical terms, I had shot every kind of game at every conceivable range. After dinner, when we got hold of our pipes, I had killed swallows with bullets at tremendous distances, and my friends began to consult me about guns and cartridges and all the other paraphernalia, and were most anxious to have my advice about the arrangements for the next day. Tom lay beside us in the grass and stared with solemn dignity at the company, winking knowingly at me with one eye when no one else was looking, whilst I was telling them about his pedigree and some of his most astounding achievements. When we had delivered ourselves of all our stories, and every one's power of invention had come to an end, we began to yawn, and soon dispersed to our sleeping-quarters to gain strength for next day's hard work.
I remember so well my first blackcock. I had happened to come upon the birds during a short walk with the gamekeeper in the afternoon, and I had heard the mother's anxious call, and had seen some clumsy blackcock children following after her into the forest. I was so excited that I could not close my eyes all night, and could think of nothing but blackcock. Outside, the enchanting summer night allured me to its darkening fells and mysterious woods, and it was as though I could see before my eyes the condemned blackcock where they sat and slept their last sleep. Everything was still in the cottage, and, silent as ghosts, Tom and I glided out armed to the teeth. Yes, I could see the blackcock so distinctly before me, that I had scarcely reached the glen where we had come upon them in the afternoon than I fired off my gun. No blackcock fell. But hardly had the dreadful thunder of the gun died away than the whole forest woke up. Startled small birds fluttered backward and forward deeper into the brushwood. A little squirrel peeped cautiously between two branches, dropped in his fright the fir-cone he was crunching, and then jumped hastily away. The nasty smoke spread with the wind farther in the wood, and pinched the nose of a hare who sat half-asleep under a bush. "I smell human blood," said the hare to himself, like the giant to Tom Thumb, and off he went in a tremendous hurry to find a safer refuge for the day's rest. Tom and I watched him with interest as he stopped short in catching sight of us, stamped with his paws, and then scampered off. The hare has the reputation of being rather ugly; we noticed, on the contrary, that he was quite graceful in his elegant leap over a fallen fir-tree, and I was sorry he did not give us a little longer time in which to look at him. It is not every day one gets a hare; and very satisfied with the beginning of our day, we went on farther into the forest, keeping a sharp look-out for the blackcock. We soon left the forest track and wandered along over the moss, soft as velvet, without the slightest idea where we were going. So we came upon a little brook which cheerfully murmured in our ears as he hurried along, would we not like to accompany him down to the lake? and that we did, to make sure that he did not go astray in the gloom between hillocks and stones. We could not see him, but we heard him singing to himself the whole time. Now and then he stopped short at a jutting rock or fallen tree and waited for us, and then he rushed down the vale quicker than ever to make up for lost time. Yes, it was easy enough for him, who had nothing to carry but some flowers and dry leaves, to rush off with such a speed; he should have had that confounded gun to drag with him, he would then have seen how easy a matter it was! And thus it happened that he ran away from us. We did not know what to do next, so we fired off a shot again. No blackcock fell. But we had scarcely time to load the gun again before we came upon the whole covey. Fancy if I had not had time to load! But they got it all right. There was a tremendous whirring up in the tree-tops, and on heavy wings they dispersed in different directions. We thought the blackcock was a very fine bird, who looks exceedingly well in a forest.
Hallo! There he came again, our friend the brook, dancing toward us happier than ever, and I bent down to kiss his night-cool face just as he glided past me. Ah! now there was no longer any danger that he should lose his way, for already the night had fled away on swift dwarf-feet to hide itself deeper in the forest under the thick firs. Around us birches and aspens put on their green coats, and amongst the moss and fern at our feet small flowers stretched their pretty heads out of the gloom and looked at us as we passed. And deep below in the misty valley a lake opened its eyelid.
So we got sick of blackcock-shooting and we sat down on a mossy stone to read a chapter of Nature's bible whilst the sun rose above the fir-tops and the sky brightened over our heads.
The disturber of the peace sat there quite quiet, silently wondering to himself how it could be possible that men exist who have the heart to bring sorrow and death into a friendly forest. And the small birds also began to wonder, wonder whether that dreadful thunder which awoke them was only a bad dream; the whole forest was so silent again, and perchance it might not be so dangerous to try a little song! And so they took courage one after another and began each to sing their tune. Some were perfect artists and sang long arias with trills and variations; some sang folk-songs; some knew nothing but a little refrain, and that they did not in the least mind repeating over and over again; and some only knew how to hum a single little note, but they were just as merry for all that. And now and again one could hear among all the soprani a rich melodious alto who sang an old ballad—listen! that is the greatest artist in the whole forest; that is the blackbird!
So I thanked my little wild friends for their song; they knew well how happy I felt with them. But I was obliged to turn home again. I told them that I was a sportsman and that I had to be at the rendezvous with my party at seven sharp. I told them to be prudent, to listen carefully for the sound of our voices and to fly on quick wings as soon as we approached—they must be aware that men are so unmusical that they do not know how to appreciate a soulful artist; that they are so unkind, one can never know what may happen. And the merry squirrels, the red-skinned little acrobats of the woods, I told them also to be on the look-out, to take care not to crunch their fir-cones too loudly and not to peep too much from behind their tree—they must know that men are so cold in their hearts that to keep warm they wrap themselves in furs made from their small red coats. I had also prepared a speech for the blackcock, but, as I never caught sight of them again, I could not deliver it. But I had the impression that they had grasped the situation thoroughly, and that was all I wanted of them.
I was punctual at the rendezvous, and the party set off in excellent spirits. We roamed about the whole day, strode miles and miles with our huge game-bags dangling behind our backs, sank knee-deep into morasses and bogs, climbed over hundreds of hedges and tore our faces with the branches of the tangled brushwood. We were all to meet in the evening at the shooting-box, where supper (with roast blackcock) was to be served, and where also, idyllic enough, ladies were to come to give the sportsmen welcome, and to share the spoil.
As one sportsman after the other, hungry and disappointed, reached the meeting-place, dragging his gun after him, those who were already there looked eagerly at his bag. I was one of the last, and I saw at once that the situation was gloomy. I was also in a bad temper, having just discovered that I had unfortunately left my gun behind somewhere, and I could not remember in the least where it might be. I was very disagreeably surprised to see one of the party with a cry of triumph seize hold of my bag. The bag looked really as if it were filled, but the fact was I was absolutely unprepared for such importunate examination. I protested and said it contained nothing but small birds and squirrels, but he took the bag from me and the whole party watched with avaricious eyes when he thrust in his hand and fumbled in the bag. After he had pulled out my whole little shooting-library, Heine and Alfred de Musset and my old friend Leopardi, all the sportsmen looked at each other with amazement. And I quite lost my head. They became absolutely furious when, with my unfortunate absent-mindedness, I happened to let out that I had made a little private excursion before sunrise and by chance had come across some blackcock. "But had you not time to fire at them?" they cried, shaking me by the arms and pulling at my coat. "Yes, of course, I had time to fire, but the blackcock had also time to get away." "Did you not aim at the thick of the covey?" they yelled with bloodshot eyes and contorted faces. "No, I think that I aimed at a little cloud, and, for the matter of that, I think I hit it, for a moment later I saw that the sky was beautifully blue." My remark about the cloud must have been to the point, for it made them absolutely dumbfounded; they only shook their heads in silence and stared at me while I put my books in the bag again. I had not time to stay longer, having to go and look at the effects of the sunset deeper in the wood, and I politely begged them to excuse me for breaking up the party.
I had not gone many steps before there broke out a frightful dispute amongst them as to who was guilty of having brought me amongst them, and, as far as I could make out, they called me "that idiot."
I was never invited to that place any more. For the matter of that, it was an observation I often made—I was never invited more than once to any place. To my astonishment I saw myself cut out from one house-party after another, and there sprang up a rumour that I brought bad luck with me. Isn't it odd, this often-observed tendency to superstition amongst sportsmen?
I have really no time to linger any longer over my new game-laws, for I have so many other reforms concerning the animals at hand. Only think how much there is to be done for domestic animals also! The division of labour forms here a most important chapter. The domestic animals will only have to work a certain number of hours a day, in proportion to their strength, and not, as now, work themselves to death. And so when age comes upon them men will have to try to give back to the tired animals a small part of all that these humble fellow-workmen have given to them as long as they were able. Surely the domestic animals belong to the family; and just as the old labourer is allowed to end his days in peace in his little cottage, so shall the old horse, when his eyes begin to grow dim and his legs to get stiff, be allowed to rest in his stall; and now and then one should go and pet the old servant with grateful hands, and give him his bit of bread as before. The old worn-out ox, surely he too might be allowed at last to glean a little dry hay from the fields which he in his strong days has so many times ploughed for the seed, which year after year filled the farmer's barn with golden sheaves and sweet clover. And the kind, sympathetic little donkeys, whose whole life is a series of self-renunciation, and whose melancholy is an unheard protest against the degradation into which they have fallen—surely I shall not forget you in my reforms, my poor Italian friends! And keep up your courage, resigned little donkeys! your cause is a good one, the tyranny of barbarians shall come to an end one day, and the oppressed animals shall be given back their right to enjoy life, even they! And the day will come when you are to be reinstated in the high social position which your misunderstood intelligence and your subtle humour entitle you to hold, and when you shall throw back in the faces of your oppressors the epithet which short-sighted men now apply to you!
The sanitary condition of animals is to be improved a great deal. Hospitals and asylums for sick and aged animals are to be founded. Up till now I know personally of only two almshouses, that in London for "lost and starving dogs"—where they are not so badly cared for—and that in Florence for aged and infirm cats—it includes acrêchefor lost and orphan kittens (it has been founded by an English lady, I believe).
The jurisdiction is to be entirely changed. Flogging is only to be allowed in certain exceptional cases, and only after serious remonstrances and repeated warnings. There is nothing in the whole of creation so stubborn as a school-boy when he tries his best; well, now, when one is no longer allowed to flog him, why may one then be allowed to beat the animal whose duller perception ought so much the more to protect him from the birch-rod?
Capital execution—I recognise its necessity—is to be changed from arbitrary barbarity to an institution watched over by mildness and tenderness for the condemned animal. The animal-executioners should form a corporation apart, kept under the severest supervision. The profession is a repulsive but a necessary one, and the individuals who enlist themselves on its roll deserve high wages.
It was never meant that man should be an autocratic tyrant in the great society which peoples the world, but a constitutional monarch. I had dreamt of a republic, but I admit that our earth is not yet ripe for this form of government. Yes, man is the ruler of the earth; always victorious, he carries his blood-stained banner round the world, and his kingdom has no longer any limit. But man is an upstart—I, at any rate, cannot believe all his talk about his high birth. He will try to take us in by saying that he is a foundling who was mysteriously put into the nursery of creation, and that he is of far nobler origin than anybody else on the whole earth. It is true there is something peculiar about him, and that he is domineering and arrogant: that he showed early enough. Even when a baby, and lying at Nature's mother-breast, he pushed away the other children of the earth, and drank the strength of life in deep draughts. Hardly could he crawl before he scratched his kind nurse in the face and beat his weaker foster-brothers. So he grew up to be a true bully, a brutish Protanthropos, breaking down each obstacle, subduing with the right of the stronger all opposition. And the law of selection enlarged his facial angle, and culture put arms in his hands. How could the sickle-like claws ofUrsus spelæus(cave-bear) prevail against his trident studded with thorns or twig-spikes or set with razor-edged shells? What could the six-inch long canines of Machærodus do against his sharpened flint? And so they disappeared, one after the other, these vanquished giants, into the gloom of past ages. But the power of man expanded more and more, and higher and higher flew his thoughts. Now the earth lies at his feet, and he prepares to assault heaven! And he has been so spoiled by all his success, so refined by all civilisation, that he turns up his aristocratic nose whenever one reminds him of his childhood. And his humble old ancestors, among whom his cradle stood, and all his poor relations who, homeless, rove about the earth, these he will not own at all, and he is so hard to them. But man is no longer young—no one knows exactly how many hundred thousand years he carries on his back; but I think it is time for him to reflect a little upon all the evil he has done in his days, and try to grow a little kinder in his old age. The day will come when the last man will lie down to die, and when a new-crowned king of creation will mount the throne—le roi est mort, vive le roi!So falls the twilight of ages round the sarcophagus where the dead monarch sleeps in the Pantheon of Palæontology. The dust covers the inscription which records all the honorary titles of the dead, and the standards which witnessed his victories moulder away. Up there in the new planet sits a professor, and lectures about the remains from prehistoric times, and he hands round to his audience a fragile cranium, which is carefully examined by wondering students. It is our cranium, with that upright facial angle and that large brain-pan which was our pride! And the professor makes a casual remark aboutHomo Sapiens, and he points out the fang which is still to be seen in the jaw.
We learn from the long story of the development of our race that the hunter-stage was the lowest of all human conditions, the most purely animal. The pursuing and killing of animals for mere pleasure is a humiliating reminiscence from this time of savagery. Man's right over the animal is limited to his right of defence, and his right of existence. The former can only very seldom be evoked in our country; the latter cannot be evoked by our class.
A man of culture recognises his obligations towards animals as a compensation for the servitude he imposes on them. The pursuing and killing of animals for mere pleasure is incompatible with the fulfilment of these obligations. Sympathy extending beyond the limit of humanity,i.e.kindness to animals, is one of the latest moral qualities acquired by mankind. This sympathy is absolutely lacking in the lowest human races, and the degree of this sympathy possessed by an individual marks the distance which separates him from his primitive state of savagery.
An individual who enjoys the pursuing and killing of animals is thus to be considered as a transitional type between a savage and a man of culture. He forms the missing link in the evolution of the mind from brutishness to humanity.