Waited for herhe waited for her as long as he dared.
And mother? Mother had lost some of herspring, but she had developed judiciousness, and a fine eye for country. It was this latter which, to her son’s amazement, usually kept her two bushes ahead. It was this which made him miss her as the day broke.
He had been to the very topmost pinnacle of a thorn-bush; halfway down he had leapt four feet on to a neighbouring hazel; he had looked back in self-congratulation at the abyss, and, when he had turned again, she had disappeared.
He waited for her as long as he dared, and then crept back subdued and lonely to his nest. Next evening perhaps he would see her again. But the next evening passed, and the next, and the next, and he never saw her again until the end.
Some other time I will tell you how he passed that summer, how he fought for and won a wife, how they built a nest together and made a store together, of the four little dormice, and of the sad fate that befel two of them. Here I can only tell the last scene.
It was late autumn. His wife had already felt the coming of winter, and retired to her six months’ sleep. He himself had sealed her in.
Climbing painfullymother was climbing painfully up to him.
He had taught the two small dormice how to build their nests (honeysuckle fibre and dead leaf), and pointed out the necessity of getting into them beforeChristmas. He had rebuilt his own nest in the same old hollow, for he knew that he could not hold out much longer.
With every light breeze that crept down the hedgerow now came the rustle of the falling leaf. Each night he had seemed less inclined to wake, and this night he seemed less inclined than ever.
The sun had scarcely set before he felt chilled and uncomfortable. To warm himself he did three minutes’ gymnastics. The end of them found him perched on the same old broken twig, and, when he looked down, even as before, mother was climbing painfully up to him.
It needed but a glance to see that she would not outlive the winter. Had she made a nest? No, she had not troubled. The hole she was in last year would do. Perhaps shewould take his nest, he could easily build another. Most certainly she would not. He could help her to put some leaves into hers to-morrow. But that night came the first frost.
First frostbut that night came the first frost.
Down by the brookside the Sallow drooped her sunburnt leaves despondently. Things were at their dullest.
Three months ago she had been a tree of importance. Her dark, slender branches had formed a fashionablerendez-vous. Each evening she had seen her golden catkins studded with opals—the eyes of soft, furry, blundering moths. Each day the bees had thronged to pay court to her.
Then came Palm Sunday. Her catkins were stripped from her, worn for a few hours in yokels’ hats, and flung aside. The moths came no more; the bees forsook her for the bluebells.
But the kingfishers cared nothing for her appearance. They nested, as usual, deep in the bank below, in a hollow formed by her roots.
The kingfishers were always in a hurry, and their colours were fussy and discordant. They flashed up and down the brook like a pair of demented fireworks. The whole bank reeked with the discarded meals of their progeny.
By the time the nestlings were fledged, the sallow wore its summer mantle, a down-lined cloak of green.
The interesting event had been a diversion. Now there seemed nothing to look forward to.
On the one side lay the meadow-land, stretching in unbroken monotony to the sky-line; on the other, the brook; beyond its wooded bank, more meadow-land.
The brook was not what it had been. Its waters were being drawn away to thirsty London, and herein lay the sallow’s chief vexation.
This year her upper boughs had never flowered. Summer arrived, and she had hoped against hope. They had never even put forth leaves.
To be prematurely bald is disheartening. This baldness was so premature as to be serious. It was the first warning of decay.
The Empress Mother came sailing over the hill, high in the sky as befitted her. Behind her, in the far distance, lay the white-ribbed downs, and, along their ridge, there stretched against the sky a thin, shadowy, broken line. It was the great oak wood, the dominion she had abandoned.
The Empress Mother was looking for a black sallow. Sallows there were in plenty in and about the great wood, but she wanted one all to herself; one fit for animperial nursery. So she came with unerring instinct to the brook.
The air hung motionless in the grip of a midsummer noon. As she floated earthwards in stately majesty, the sunlight flung its radiance round her, and her broad, white ribbon gleamed on its velvet ground like molten silver.
The sallow humbly drooped her leaves as one who receives royalty.
Translucent conea small, green-yellow, translucent cone.
For an hour the Empress Mother was busy. The leaves that she honoured were chosen with the nicest discrimination, and she honoured more than a dozen. Each, as she left it, bore on its upper surface a small, green-yellow, shiny, translucent cone, rounded at the top, flat at the base, and ribbed along its sides.
For the rest of the day the sallow held her head high.
There were fourteen eggs in all. Six reachedmaturity, but we are only concerned with one of them. Outwardly he was much like the others. A day’s exposure softened the yellow of his shell to olive. Save at the base he matched his leaf surroundings to a nicety. The base was suffused with a faint blush of purple. As the days passed the purple darkened to black, and shifted upwards, leaving the parts beneath it pale and colourless. It seemed to struggle towards the sun. On the eighteenth day the shell parted at the summit, and the little Emperor was hatched.
His youthful Majesty was mostly dark brown head. Such body as he could boast of was tapering and greenish. But his head caught the eye. It was well-nigh as large as the egg from which he came. Until he had fed he seemed indifferent to his changed surroundings.
The first thing that he ate was his minute discarded shell, and, from this slender meal, resulted disproportionate energy. He started forthwith on his travels, outwards towards the light as far as he could go. On the leaf point he built himself a pigmy throne of silk; and this was his citadel for a week. He only left it to feed, nibbling the leaf edge jerkily on either side of him. At the week’s end he lost his appetite. His body was now of a decided green—green with the finest powdering of yellow. About his waist the yellow fused into a crescent. Nine of him would have measured an inch.
On the eighth day he ceased feeding altogether. Hesat with his hind-quarters anchored to his throne, his head and fore legs raised from off the leaf, rigid and immovable. For three days he grew yellower and yellower. Then his skin split down his back, and he successfully accomplished his first moult. In his short span he passed through many changes, but never one more quaint than this.
During his abstinence he had grown two horns. They branched straight out before him, bristling with short spines, a full third of his length.
He moulted once again before the winter, but this was merely a growing moult. Until October he never left his leaf point. Then Nature herself warned him to seek shelter. The weather was breaking. Rain he did not mind, but wind was different. Suppose his leaf was torn from its socket and hurled a hundred yards into the field?
Leaves were falling all round him, and it was time to take up his winter quarters. He spent a day or two in reaching them, yet they were not far off—merely the junction of his own particular branch to the parent stem. There, in the shelter of the fork, he spun himself a silken blanket, and in it he slept peacefully till April.
Peacefully through everything, and in spite of everything. Rain beat in drenching floods against the sallow, hailstorms lashed her branches, snow enshrouded her, hoar-frost bespangled her,—the little Emperor was quiteunmoved. As the bark weathered from ebony to rusty olive, chameleon-like, he changed with it. This was the only outward sign he gave of life.
The catkins bloomed once more, and once more were rudely gathered. With the bursting of the leaf the little Emperor crept from his blanket. He found the world much as he had left it. Only the leaves were covered with soft down, smaller, and easier to bite. He was by now a full half inch in length, big enough to roam at large, and hungry enough to eat the tree. He started on the first leaf he came to, and, in five minutes, had gnawed a neat crescent out of it. There was method in his gnawing. He fixed his claspers firmly to the stalk, then stretched his head as far as he could reach, and nibbled the leaf edge backwards. When his feet reached his claspers, he commenced afresh.
Before the winter he had only fed at night; now he fed from sunrise to sunset, and at night as well. He fattened steadily, and in proportion, growing more slug-like every day. His horns but emphasized the likeness. He carried them well forward, and, at his rare sleeping intervals, they lay flat against the leaf. Thus with his swollen waist he seemed to fall away both ends. Three times he outgrew his coat. Each time he had eaten till it stretched to bursting point. Each time the process of disrobing was the same.
He dragged his slow bulk to some thick mass of leaves, selected the innermost of them, and spun a web of silk upon its surface. From this he hung himself head downwards. His weight helped him, and, in due course, the old skin split along his back, and he emerged resplendent in a fresh, untarnished, elastic livery.
Each moult was marked by some embellishment. Rusty olive gave place to pale sap green, this in turn to the green of the young willow-leaf, and this again to the green of lush grass. Nor was the change in body colour all. His sides in time were decked with slanting stripes of yellow. A V-shaped orange girdle marked his waist. Its buckle was a tiny splotch of crimson. His horns were tipped with russet brown, and head and tail alike were faintly tinged with blue.
Yet, for all his rainbow tints, Nature had decreed that he should live invisible. To this end she had coloured him to match his food plant. The lines of yellow on his sides broke the monotony of green, as veins break the monotony of a leaf. The blue about him was sister to the blue of summer that played amid the foliage with quivering transparent lights and shadows.
Nor did the cunning harmony end here. In form as well as tint he cheated observation. His outline, as he lay at rest, formed the most perfect outline of a twisted leaf.
Slug-like(l) growing more slug-like every day. (r) for all his rainbow tints, nature had decreed that he should live invisible.
Birds passed him by unnoticed. Once, and once only, the ichneumon marked him down.
It was after his fifth and final moult. He was just a shade too light for nature, and the ichneumon has a pretty sense of colour. She buzzed viciously through the foliage, and settled for a moment on his back. She had reckoned without her host. His skin was indeed dangerously bright, but it was sensitive in proportion.
Before she could establish herself, a vicious back-sweep of his horns dislodged her.
Again and again she returned to the attack. Could she but pierce the skin, her paralyzing venom would quickly do its work. Then the murderous task would be easy. Eggs would be laid deep in the wound; grubs would hatch from them, and batten luxuriously on their unwilling host, sapping his strength, but cunningly avoiding his vitals, until they were full-fed. As they turned to pupæ he would die, and from caterpillar, or may be chrysalis, there would then issue, in place of gorgeous butterfly, a host of dingy hymenoptera. So would the race of ichneumons be preserved.
The little Emperor was fat and well-liking—an idealcréchefor young ichneumons; but the little Emperor was very wide-awake.
The fly could find no foothold on him. He flung his armed head backwards to his tail. He pawed the air with six fore feet. He shook himself in paroxysms offury. The fly cared little for the latter, but the horns were hard and formidable. They covered his whole body with their sweep, and struck with lightning speed.
At sundown she withdrew discomfited; the little Emperor’s horns had served him well.
His life was uneventful after this. When he had reached a length of two inches, his growth ceased. He fed less ravenously and less frequently. Three parts of his time he spent in contemplation of a special leaf. It was hard to tell wherein lay the fascination. He had spun a silken carpet on it. At rare intervals he tore himself away and snatched a hurried meal, but he infallibly returned to its friendly shelter. He rested on its mid-rib, facing the foot-stalk. His body was strongly arched and so compressed that the ridges of its crowded segments recalled the pile of velvet. His head and fore feet scarcely touched the surface. So he made ready for the second change.
For this even the favourite leaf was discarded. He roamed about the tree for days, seeking one that would suit his purpose. At last he found one, hidden in a thick-set cluster. It hung free, but he secured it in such fashion to its stem that a stiff breeze could hardly shake it. He stretched silken ropes from its edges and passed them completely round the foot-stalk. Then, on its under surface, he spun a little boss of silk, gripped it with his hind-claspers, and swung with easy confidencehead downwards. For three days he hung thus motionless, yet within him there was a lively motion.
From the time he left the egg his life had been a dual one. The eye saw nothing but the outward mask, the caterpillar-form. Within this living vehicle that moved and spun and fed, lived the true butterfly—life within life, being within being.
Crowded segments of his bodythe crowded segments of his bodyrecalled the pile of velvet.
The caterpillar mask had done its work, and having done its work, must die. Yet one can hardly call such dissolution death. As it hung suspended, all the marvellous mechanism which had formed a moving, eating, spinning, sentient being, was absorbed into the chrysalis it covered. Merely the outer empty shell remained.
Chrysalis headon the chrysalis head were two short-pointed horns.
colour and form combinedtheir skilful mimicry.Sallow-leafits form the form of the sallow-leaf.
On the fourth day this shell split cleanly at the tail, and, from the opening, the hind part of the chrysalisemerged. It jerked from side to side, to all appearance aimlessly. Yet there was method in its madness. A side-swing forced it deep into the boss of silk, and, in a moment, the hooks that studded its extremity were fast entangled. The chrysalis had itspoint d’appui.
Again the old skin cracked, this time behind the neck. The chrysalis head was free. On it were two short, flattened, pointed horns. A jerky movement of the shoulders followed—first expansion, then contraction. At each expansion the old skin slipped a trifle upwards. Turn by turn the segments of the body did their work, until it lay in gathered folds about the tail, just as the pushed-off stocking lies about the ankle.
But even so, the task was not completed. The skin must be got rid of. Its dull white mass, with dangling skeleton horns, was too conspicuous. Nature had armed the chrysalis with the needful tools, a grip attachment and a set of tiny sharp-edged hooks. The skin was fast entangled in the boss of silk. The chrysalis secured an independent foothold (using as stepping-stone the skin itself), spun itself from side to side, and cut the threads that boundit. It jerked lightly from leaf to leaf, until it reached the ground. The second change was accomplished.
Outwardly the chrysalis was nothing but an extra leaf. Colour and form combined their skilful mimicry. Its colour was the green of the sallow; its form, the form of the sallow-leaf.
For fifteen days it hung unchanged and motionless. On the sixteenth change was obviously impending. The upper segments had lengthened, the lower segments had darkened. On the twentieth day came the last great change of all.
He chose the loftiest branchhe chose the loftiest branchof the loftiest oak in the forest.
It was a normal July day. Thunder was over the Downs. Now and again great rain-drops struck the sallow. They were few and far between, however. The thunder was content to grumble on the hills, leaving the valley to the sunshine. For all the middayheat the air was laden with moisture. This was at once both good and bad for the little Emperor, good because it made the bursting of his cerement easy, bad because it made the drying of his wings slow.
Still he had no choice in the matter; his time had come, and he must make the best of it.
Whiteswhites.
Barely a minute passed between the first yielding of the shell and his complete emergence. He issued head foremost, groping with bewildered legs for something to cling to. He struck the only thing within his reach, the chrysalis case itself. To this he clung with desperation, and he had need to. As yet he had no means of flight.
There is no room for wing expanse inside a chrysalis.Material for wings was lying ready on his shoulders, it was moisture laden, packed in crumpled folds, and lifeless.
Brimstonesbrimstones.
The thunder passed away seawards, drawing the valley moisture in its train. From eastward came a gentle drying breeze. It crept from leaf to leaf with its soft-whispered message until it reached the leaf that most had need of it.
The little Emperor trembled with excitement. His wings were coming into being. One by one, like petals of an opening flower, the clinging folds relaxed and told their secret. One by one the branching nervures hardened.
By sundown the great change of all was over. TheEmperor, no longer little, was fit to mount his throne. Westward, as if in sympathy, the sky was flooded with imperial purple.
He chose the loftiest branch of the loftiest oak in the forest. Before him stretched an acre of clearing, thronged with his subjects. Every class was represented, or rather every class but one. Ages ago the Swallow tail disputed sovereignty with the Purple Emperor. Fortune declared against him, and he retreated, like some Hereward, to the fens. There to this day he holds a third-rate court.
Peacockspeacocks.
It was a brilliant gathering that greeted the Emperor. Every colour, every form was there. Whites andbrimstones, silver-studded fritillaries, peacocks, red admirals, and painted ladies, walls and ringlets, hairstreaks, blues, and skippers, even the little Duke of Burgundy, even the white and admirable Sibylla.
Hairstreakshairstreaks.
Happy midsummer children! They flashed their dainty tints from leaf to leaf, from flower to flower, their life one long-drawn revel in the sunshine.
From his high throne the Emperor watched and envied. He was tiring of lonely grandeur. Now and again he soared a hundred feet into the air, then with his wings full spread and motionless, sailed slowly back on to the summit of the oak.
Admiralsadmirals.
Never was flight more exquisite. As he rose, one caught the glint of the imperial purple; as he descended, its full glory was revealed. Nowhere in nature is the pure radiant effulgence of that purple surpassed. It is the purple of the rainbow itself.
Skippersskippers.
Sibyllathe white and admirable sibylla.
Once, and once only, did he deign to touch theground. Deep in the hollow behind the clearing, where the footpaths crossed each other, a shallow muddied pool had formed. In it the Emperor saw, from on high, his own reflection. Perhaps it was mere vanity that drew him closer; perhaps the fancy that he saw a rival; perhaps, but this is not likely, thirst. Close to the margin lay a rough-edged clumsy flint. On this he settled, and, Narcissus like, feasted his eyes on his own beauty. He nearly met Narcissus’ fate. It was the flint that saved him. He felt the shadow, almost before it reached him, but even so he rose too late. For half a minute he, the Purple Emperor, was prisoner in a boy’s straw hat. Had the hat covered the flintcompletely, he must assuredly have graced a cabinet. Fortunately for him the flint was just an inch too wide. The hat lay slant-wise across it, leaving a narrow crescent outlet on each side.
She sat on an oak pinnacleshe sat on an oak pinnacleoutlined against the sky.
The emperor alightedthe emperor alighted within a foot of her, ... as he opened his wings to show their beauty.
An old collector would have doffed his coat to cover hat and flint alike, would have sat beside them patiently till nightfall, would have done anything to make certain of his prize. But this collector was only a boy. With youthful recklessness he raised the brim a hair’s-breadth off the flint, and, in a moment, the Emperor was fifty feet above him.
It had been a near thing. Higher he soared, andhigher, exulting in his freedom, and, as he soared, he sighted the Princess. She sat on an oak pinnacle outlined against the sky. Who was she? Whence had she come? On her wings was the broad white ribbon of butterfly royalty.
She turned her backshe turned herback on him.
The emperorthe emperor once more settledon a neighbouring leaf.
The Emperor alighted within a foot of her. For the first time in his life he felt humble. As he opened his wings to show their beauty, she turned her back on him; as he closed them again, she sought another tree.But the Emperor was not so easily baffled. He followed in hot haste, and once more settled on a neighbouring leaf. The Princess drooped her upper wings, as if she was asleep. But she was not. The Emperor crept along the leaves a little closer.
The emperorthe emperor crept along the leaves a little closer.
White ribbonhe showed her the broad,white ribbon that he also wore.
It was the strangest courtship imaginable, for it was all on one side. From tree to tree they went, the Emperor flashing his purple in the sunshine, the Princess, to all appearance, unconscious of her suitor’s presence.Yet he tried every allurement he could think of. He circled round her, changing from purple to violet, from violet to velvet black. He soared above her skywards until he was a mere speck in the blue. He showed her the broad ribbon that he also wore. He even uncurled his slender saffron proboscis, and toasted his divinity in the sap of the oak-leaf.
What made her change her mind at the eleventh tree? What had he said to her? I cannot tell you, but I can tell you this. From that tree they rose together, circling round each other. Higher they went and higher,until the oakwood shrunk to a copse beneath them; higher and higher, until the sea was their horizon; higher and higher, until they passed from sight.
Uncurled his saffron proboscishe even uncurled his saffron proboscis, and toasted her in the sap of the oak-leaf.
Harvest mouse
Once upon a time, and not so very long ago either, the Harvest Mouse was the smallest of British beasties, absolutely the very smallest. Even the museum men, who look through microscopes, had to admit that.
Then a Liliputian shrewmouse turned up. He was found stretched dead in the middle of the path, and the time, as any book that deals with shrewmice would tell you, was the autumn. He was so small that, had he not died in the path, he would assuredly not have been found at all.
Now, because of his smallness, and because he was found dead in the autumn (from which you may assume that he was full-grown), he was sent to the museum men; and the museum men examined his teeth, and rubbedtheir hands with glee, for they found that his upper incisors were abnormal.
So they had his poor little body stuffed, and propped him up with wire in the way they thought he looked nicest, and wrote a brand new ticket for him—Sorex Minutus. The lesser shrew. ThesmallestBritish quadruped.
Liliputian shrewmousethen a liliputian shrewmouse turned up.
Prehensile tailhe, and he only, has a prehensile tail.
Thus was one unique distinction stolen from the harvest mouse. But to this day the harvest mouse shrugs his furry shoulders and says, that there are plenty of dwarfs with abnormal teeth in his own family, if the museum men want them.
He can afford to be superior, for he has yet another unique distinction left, and that is not likely to be taken from him.
Of all the four-footed creatures in Great Britain and Ireland, he, and he only, has a prehensile tail. The middle of it he can bend through half a circle, the last half-inch he can wrap completely round a cornstalk. It is pale chestnut above, and pasty white below. Taken all round, it is the most marvellous tail in the United Kingdom.
A mass of whipcord muscle, it can be made rigid, or flexible, at will. He can sit back with his hind feet resting on one stalk, hitch his tail round another, and lean his full weight against it. His full weight is one-sixth of an ounce. Were the G.P.O. more friendly to naturalists, a score of him could travel for a penny; but, even so, his tail is trivial in proportion.
He is so proud of it that he cleans it continually. Other mice clean their tails at odd times—only when they really seem to need it. The harvest mouse cleans his tail as a matter of regular toilet routine, and he does his toilet fifteen times a day. First his whiskers, then his head and ears, then his body, and finally his tail. He pulls it forward betweenhis hind legs and combs it with his teeth. It is quite worth it.
The harvest mousethe harvest mouse sat on the top of astalk and nibbled his supper.
The harvest mouse sat on the top of a cornstalk and nibbled his supper. His first summer had been most successful. So much had been crowded into it that he could only dimly remember the oat-stack in which he was born. Even the hedgerow seemed difficult to recall. He had lived in that two months, next door to the wood-mouse, and from him he mayhave learnt something of the art of nest-building. Then he had wandered abroad. The field, on the left of the hedgerow as you walk westward, was, when he entered it, tinged with uncertain green,—a sand-stained green like that of shallow sea. Yet there was cover enough for him. In a week’s time, the sprouting corn had got the mastery, shrouding with its exquisite mantle the humble mother soil it seemed ashamed of; then, as if it had imprisoned the sunbeams, it turned to golden yellow, and now, wearying of conquest, had borrowed the copper radiance of a dying day.
The wood-mousethe wood-mouse.
It was with the first budding and ripening of the young corn that the harvest mouse tasted the true joy of living. In the hedgerow it had been mere existence; for there had been no real scope for his tail. The grasping portion of it could only encircle the tiniest twigs. Here, Nature herself seemed to have been at pains to suit him. Whichever way he looked, there stretched before him long yellow avenues of pygmytrees. Had they been passed through a gauge, they could not have better suited his proportions. He could whip his tail round any one of them. As he travelled from ear to ear, there was always something handy to grip on to. To reach the top of a cornstalk from the ground took him just two seconds and a half. He ran up it, he did not condescend to climb. Once among the ears, he travelled with little jumps, sometimes waiting for the wind to sway the corn, and help him, sometimes boldly leaping from the summit, and trusting confidently to his tiny hands and feet to pull him up a foot or so below. Even if he blundered to earth he had nothing to fear, for, of all the denizensof the cornfield, he alone could thread the avenues in perfect silence.
Ripening of the wheat(l) in the first budding and ripening of the wheathe tasted the true joy of living.(r) sometimes waiting for the wind to sway the corn and help him.
The stoat heralded his coming by a stealthy swish that could be heard full twenty yards away. Many a foolish bewildered vole he caught, but never a harvest mouse.
The rat’s approach was a blundering four-footedcrescendo, clear to mouse-ears as is the ringing of a horse’s hoofs to man. Little else appeared at all. Now and again came a foolish hen-faced pheasant, strayed from its nursery, and screaming for its keeper. One was shot as it crossed the path in front of him, but we must not say anything about that. Now and again a corn-crake, moving in silence, bowed to the ground, but betrayed by its loquacity. Now and again a trembling glass-eyed rabbit. To each and every footstep he had one invariable response. He ran up the nearest cornstalk, as high as he could go, and watched the author of it pass beneath him. He was rarely sighted. Once a weasel leapt at him. The weasel is a pretty jumper, but this time a tendril of convolvulus upset his aim. Before he reached the ground again the mouse was five and twenty feet away, playing with his tail.
Half the summer passed before he tired of these diversions. The coming of the sparrows put an end to them. They came just as the corn-ears had commenced to harden. There must have been a thousand. Theywere not in the field all day, but, while they were there, life was not worth living. Picture it to yourself. A thousand unkempt, shrieking hooligans, plucking at the corn-ears, flinging the milky grain aside half eaten, filling the air with the whirring of their wings as they sighted man a hundred yards away, back again as man departed, quarrelling incessantly, blatant, noisy, vulgar. The cornstalks were no place for mice while sparrows were about.
Harvest mouseas dainty a little harvest mouseas ever crossed a cornfield.
But the evil had been of short duration. A month had seen the end of it. During that month the ways of the mouse were humble. He wandered in and out the undergrowth, feeding on what the sparrows had discarded. Not that he was really afraid of them. Had they cared to eat him, they assuredly would have done so at the start. But they never missed the opportunityof making him jump, and involuntary jumping is always unpleasant.
However, the life below had its compensations. He would certainly have lost her in the waving maze above. As it was, he saw her at the end of a straight avenue, and he could more or less mark her direction. She was running at full speed, as dainty a little harvest mouse as ever crossed a cornfield.
Her front was of the purest whiteher front was of the purest white, and twisted in a dainty curve to match her features.
Her coat was of the softest fawn-chestnut; sharply contrasted with her pure white front, and twisted in adainty curve to match her features. Her feet and tiny claws were the pink of a sea-shell. Her eyes were small (harvest mice have small eyes), but they were very gentle. As she sighted him, she swung lightly up a thistle stem, and sat for a moment balanced on the head. Evidently he was not altogether uninteresting.
Her eyes were smallher eyes were small,but they were very gentle.
Far into the evening he pressed his suit. When the inevitable rival mouse appeared, half the sun’s disk was already masked by the hedgerow. Ungainly, straggling shadows spread across the field, dark barsacross a lurid crimson ground. Never was finermise-en-scènefor such a conflict. They fought on the very summits of the stalks, and the sun just managed to see the finish.
Conflictnever was finermise-en-scènefor such a conflict.
They built the nest together. It was his part to bite the long ribbon leaves from their sockets, hers to soften them and knot them and plait them until they formed a neat, compact, and self-coherent sphere.
Nine cornstalks formed the scaffolding. Six inchesfrom the ground she built between them a fragile grass-blade platform. Then she started on the nest itself. Her only tools were her fore-paws, tail, and teeth. The latter she employed to soften stiff material. The weaving she did from below upwards by pure dexterity of hand and tail. For six hours she worked indefatigably, and in six hours it was finished. But it was not meant to live in; it was merely a nursery. All day long the happy pair enjoyed each other’s company aloft, leaping from corn-ear to thistle-head, from thistle-head to poppy, and back again to corn-ear, feasting, frivolling, stalking bluebottles. Their life was one long revel in the sunshine; for the harvest mouse has this distinction also, that, like a Christian, he loves the blue of the sky and sleeps at night.
Frivollingfrivolling.
But he is wise in his generation, and lives far from the haunts of men. You must be quieter than a mouse if you want to see him.
Enjoyed the novel sensationfor an hour they enjoyed the novel sensation.
At night they lived in a tiny burrow, a foot below the surface of the ground. They had no claim to it, but they had found it empty. Empty burrows belong to the first mouse that comes along.
Once only did they stay above the surface after sundown. For an hour they enjoyed the novel sensation. Then the long-drawn wail of the brown owl drove them below in haste.
Long-drawn wailthen the long-drawn wail of the brown owl drove them below in haste.
Perhaps they realized that prey on the surface is the owl’s ideal. It is also the hawk’s. But, where under-keepers are armed with guns, the night-bird has the better prospects. Both would have their wings clear as they strike. The owl’s great chance comes when the corn is “stitched” in shocks of ten. Then he quarters the stubble, and nothing clear of shelter escapes him.
So the summer had passed—the perfect summer that comes once in a century. Day after day the sun hadblazed through a cloudless sky; night after night the dews had fallen and refreshed the earth. The young mice, though pink, as yet, about the nose and waistcoat, were as promising as young mice could be. Everything was altogether and completely satisfactory.
So, as the western sky crimsoned and the shadow of each cornstalk gleamed like copper on its neighbour, the harvest mouse stole down from his eminence and soughthis burrow, for, as I have said before, the nest was only a nursery.
He was up betimes. He was a light sleeper, and half a noise of that kind would have roused him. It was clank and whirr and swish and rattle in one. At first it sounded from the far corner on the right; then it passed along the hedgerow, growing more and more menacing until it seemed to be within a yard of him. Then it shrank away to nothing on the left, ceased for a moment, and, in obedience to human shouting, commenced afresh. So from corner to corner,crescendoanddiminuendo. The harvest mouse was in the very centre of a square field.
Towering stalkshe climbed betweentwo towering stalks.
Aloft once morein five minutes he was up aloft once more.
When the sound seemed at its greatest distance, he climbed between two towering stalks and strained his eyes in its direction. He could not see for more than twenty yards before him. The world beyond was wrapt in soft white mist. Never had he seen anything so uncanny. Yet, had he been an early riser, he might have seen it often. Even as he watched it, it seemed to shrink away before the sunshine. The hedgerow loomed like a mountain-ridge before him. Down he slid, making a bee-line for the nest. That was all right; but his wife was evidently perturbed. Her mouth was full of grass-blades, and she was sealing every crevice on its surface. In five minutes he was up aloft once more. The whirring still continued, and now, through the lifting haze, he could distinguish its origin. Horses it was for certain, ay, and men—a small man sat upon the leading horse; but there was something behind these.
Had the harvest mouse ever seen a windmill, he would assuredly have concluded that a young one had escaped, and was walking in ever-narrowing circuits, round the field. The mist lifted further, and he saw the thing more clearly. Its great red arms swung dark against the sky, gathering the corn in a giant’s grasp to feed its ravenous cutters. Round and round the field it went. Each time as it travelled to the distant corners the mouse dropped down to earth; each time as it thundered close at hand, he dashed like lightning up thestalk to look. Sometimes his wife came with him. Closer it drew and closer. Nor was the mouse the only thing that noticed it. All things that lived within the field, all things that loved its borders, were crowding in mad confusion to its centre.