Part 4

And indeed in peace and plenty they passed many days without further troubles or adventures, while the little wings began to put out their quill feathers, and the little voices to gain in strength and tone. And all this time the sun shone and the river sang a quiet song, as it slowly sank for want of rain, leaving new and varied margins of sand and pebbles for the Sandpipers to search for food.

But one morning the sun did not greet them as usual with his warmth; the sky was grey and streaky, and seemed to hang lower over the hills than when it was all clear blue. At first all was still and silent, but presently a gust of wind came up the river, and then another as suddenly came down, worrying the early angler on the opposite bank, and teasing the little Sandpipers as it blew their soft plumage the wrong way. And then a large white bird sailed gracefully up the valley, balancing itself against the wind, to the great admiration of the chicks.

“That is a Seagull, children,” said the mother, “and you will see plenty of them when you cross the sea to the warm southern lands for the winter. And he is telling us that there is a storm coming—listen!”

And they listened to the melancholy wail of the great bird, but felt no fear of him, for the parent birds showed none. But the old ones knew the meaning of that sad music, and thought of the weary waste of sea over which they would soon have to pass, and the sudden squall at night, and the loss of old friends and comrades.

Before the morning was out the storm began in earnest, and the chicks, after enjoying the first soothing rain for a while, were hustled under the shelter of the big rock, and crept into a hole to leeward. The eldest of course was the last to go in; for as a sudden strong gust swept past him, he opened his growing wings, and to his great delight found himself carried off his legs and almost flying. But the watchful father had seen him, and in a moment was ahead of him, just as he was being carried out upon the stream.

“Back into the hole!” he called with real anger; “look at the river! Even if you could use those wings as you think you can, it would be unsafe for you in wind and flood.” And the little bird looked at the water, and saw that it was coming much faster than he had ever seen it, and its voice was deeper and hoarser; for far away up on the hills the great storm was already travelling round and round, and the growling of its thunder mixed ominously with the deepening tone of the river. So he crept into the hole and lay down by the others; and they all listened to the fearful splashing of the rain, and the scream of the tearing gusts, and the sighing of the trees on the hill above them. From time to time the old birds went out to get food for themselves and the young, and perhaps, too, to enjoy the freshening moisture, and the towzling worry of the wind, as old birds can and may after a long calm and drought. It might have been wiser if one of them had stayed at home; but the young ones were quiet and overawed, and, what was more, they were hungry.

During one of these absences the violence of the storm seemed to abate a little, and the flashes of sudden fire which had been making them shut their eyes came now but very faintly. It was getting towards evening, and the restless eldest chick wanted badly to be out again, and all the more because he heard the roar of the river below him, and could hear its waves leaping and splashing on the rocky promontory in the side of which they were sheltered. So, without saying a word to the rest, he got up and went out of the hole on to a little ledge of rock which overhung the water.

What a sight it was! Dark-brown water rushing madly down into the pool, carrying with it logs and branches of trees with all the glory of fresh foliage wasted, and then the pool itself no longer golden-brown and clear, but black as ink, and flecked with creamy patches of surf. But the wind seemed lighter, and there were the Sandmartins, who had their nests in the cliff, flitting up and down just over the water as if nothing had happened, and there too was the friendly Grey Wagtail, with his long tail going up and down just the same as ever. Feeling that he might safely see more still, that adventurous young bird trotted round the corner of the ledge.

In a twinkling the wind had carried him off his feet, and he was flying—really flying for the first time in his life. He needed no teaching in the art—whether he would or no, fly he must. Those growing quills were big enough to carry him along with the wind, and he had only to guide himself as well as he could. It was glorious, and he felt no terror, for there was no time to feel it. Over the black pool, past the foot-bridge, over which he shot like one of the Sandmartins which he had so often watched with envy and admiration; over the ford, now impassable, and then, as the river made a sharp curve, over field and hedge to the roaring flood again where it turned once more in the wind’s direction. But those weak wings were getting tired, and piping loudly for help, he looked for some safe place to drop upon.

Suddenly the wind fell for an instant, and a puff from the opposite direction brought him to. He was over the very middle of the river: a great boulder, water-splashed, lay just under him. How he managed it I cannot tell, but he dropped exhausted on the rough damp surface of the stone, and felt himself safe at last.

Safe! for the moment perhaps, but what was to become of him? The water was surging and roaring against his boulder: was it going to rise upon him and carry him away helpless? The wind was so strong that to fly up stream was hopeless, and as he sat there exhausted, he felt that he could not even use his wings to get to shore. Uttering from time to time a plaintive “wheet,” he clung to the stone with all his might, balancing himself with body and tail against the gusts: not reflecting, nor despairing, but just wondering what would happen.

The Sandmartins shot by overhead, but not one of them seemed to notice him, or to be the least inclined to perch on his stone. A Dipper came slowly up stream against the wind, perched on another stone not far off, bowed repeatedly and went on again. A Grey Wagtail coming down stream in graceful waves of flight, poised himself over the stone, and for a moment actually alighted on it: then, seeing his mate pass down after him, opened his wings and was gone. The Sandpiper opened his too, but his heart sank within him, and he clung still more passionately to his stone.

Two figures came rapidly up the river-bank,—two drenched human creatures, fighting against the wind, but enjoying it. Just as they came level with the boulder they caught the sound of a faint “whee-et.” The angler turned sharp round, and after some search with a fieldglass, discovered the little brown object on the boulder.

“It’s a young one,” he said to his companion: “it’s a veritable infant! And see, it can’t fly,—it’s clutching at the stone like grim death! By all that’s feathered, it must be one of our young friends blown away, for there’s no brood between them and this, and the wind’s been down stream pretty well all day. I say, we must have him off that somehow.” They looked at each other and at the swollen river.

“I’ll go,” said the friend the next moment: “I’m taller and stronger. I should rather like a towzle, but it won’t be easy. I can’t try it from above, or I shall come with a bang on the stone: but there are the stepping-stones just below. I can get out there if I can see them through the flood, and then I sha’n’t have above twenty yards to swim.”

While he said this he was pulling off his clothes, and then he leapt exuberantly down the bank to the water. Suddenly he stopped. “How am I to bring him back?” he shouted.

The angler was puzzled. To swim in a current like that with a bird in your hand was impossible without crushing it; and a naked man has no pockets. But necessity is the mother of invention. Quick as thought he whipped a casting-line off his hat, taking two flies off it and sticking them into his coat: this he wound round his friend’s wrist, and making the end fast, told him to tie it round the bird’s leg if he reached him.

Carefully into the water his companion descended, feeling with his hand for the first stepping-stone; then balancing himself between this and the rushing water, he went on to the second. It was teasing work, but he managed the third, the fourth, the fifth, and then it was high time to swim, for the water was up to his middle and higher, and swayed him to and fro in a way that made the angler watch him eagerly. Then came a splash and a plunge, and his head was seen working up against the current, zigzagging to diminish the force of it. Twenty yards is a long way in such a stream, but if he could once get under the lee of that great boulder he would do. And in something like five minutes he was under the stone, and then on it.

A strange sight it was to see a naked human creature sitting cross-legged on a boulder in such a flood! But he has caught the truant, and now he is tying that handy gut line round his leg. And then, standing up on the boulder, he flings the bird shorewards, one end of the line being still fast round his wrist.

The bird sank on the water, and the man plunged in; fighting with the current that was sweeping him down, he made for the shore, and reached it breathless far below the stepping-stones, where the angler pulled him out of the water as joyfully as he ever pulled a trout. Then they wound up the line, and sure enough there came ashore at the end of it, a draggled, exhausted, and almost lifeless Sandpiper.

To be carried in a human pocket is not pleasant for a bird, but our young scapegrace was too far gone to trouble himself about it. At his birthplace he was taken out, and there the angler stayed with him, sending his companion home to change. It was getting dark fast, but the old birds were still flying wildly up and down the river, piping loudly in a forlorn hope of finding their young one ere night should wrap the river in darkness. The angler put him down near the water and waited at a little distance.

Ere long his wits came back to him, as the well-known notes told him that he was indeed again near home. And weak as he was, he found strength to send out over the river his own little feeble pipe. In a moment his mother was by his side.

The angler watched them for a moment, and then left them to tell his friend of the good result of a kindly deed. The next day they had to leave the river and all its delights, and to return to work and duty: but they cannot forget the Sandpipers, nor, when the birds return after their winter sojourn in the far south, will they fail to look out without misgiving for their human friends.

THE LAST OF THE BARONS

I

The Baron sat perched on an old gnarled oak, gazing across the deep ravine below him, where the noisy river leapt from pool to pool. He had been far over the moorland that day with his wife, searching for a safe nesting-place, and had given up the search in despair and returned to his old home; but the Baroness had dallied and been left behind, and now he was expecting her as the sun began to sink in the west. He sat there silent and sad, the last, so he thought, of an ancient race; his head, almost white with age, slightly bent downwards, and his long forked tail sadly weather-worn and drooping.

It was a fresh evening in early April, and one sweet shower after another had begun to entice the ferns to uncurl themselves, and the oaks on the rocky slopes of the Kite’s fortress to put on their first ruddy hue; and now the showers had passed, and the setting sun was shining full in the old Baron’s face as he sat on his bough above the precipices. But neither sun nor shower could rouse him from his reverie.

Suddenly he raised his head and uttered a cry; and at the same moment you might have seen the Baroness gliding slowly over the opposite hill. As she neared him, she stopped in mid-air over the roaring torrent and answered his call; and then he slipped off his bough, like a ship launched into the yielding water, and silently joined her. They flew round and round each other once or twice, and the fisherman on the rocks below looked up and gazed at them with admiration. You could tell them apart without difficulty: the Baroness was the larger bird of the two, and her feathers were in better order—she was still young, not more than twenty or so; while the old Baron looked worn and battered, though the red of his back was brighter, and his fine tail was more deeply forked than that of his lady.

They began to circle round each other slowly, hardly moving their wings, but steering with their long tails, and soon they were far above the isolated hill which was known as the Kite’s fortress. Sweeping in great circles higher and higher, they seemed to be ascending for ever into the blue, never to come down again; now and again a white cloud would pass above them, against which their forms looked black and clear-cut, and then it would drift away, and you had to look keenly to see them still sailing slowly round and round, tiny specks in the pure ether.

All this time they were talking about a very important matter; not chattering and fussing, as common birds do—starlings, sparrows, and such low-born creatures—but saying a few words gravely as they neared each other in their great circles of flight, and thinking of the next question or answer as they parted for another sweep.

“Well,” said the Baron after a while, “have you found a better place than this, where our persecutors cannot reach us without risking their miserable lives?”

“No,” she answered, “none as good as this, and I have been far over the moors toward the setting sun. There are the crags looking down on the flat country and the sea, but they are not so well wooded, and they are too near that seaside town where we have enemies. I have looked at many other places too, but there were none to please me much.”

“I thought so,” said the Baron. “I have known all this country, every tree and every crag, since I first learnt to fly on the hill down below; and there is no such place as this. I and my old Baroness brought up many broods here, and now that I have a young wife again, she wanders about and wants to find a new home.”

“But men found you out and shot her here,” said the Baroness. The Baron sailed away from her in a wide sweep, but soon returned and spoke gravely again.

“Don’t talk of that, dear,” he said. “I have found another wife, and that was more than I could expect. I searched far and wide, over land and over sea; I reached the ugly country to the south, where the smoke made my eyes water, and the fields were no longer green, and no mice or beetles were to be found; I turned again for fresher air, and came to a wild and treeless sea-coast, where the Gulls mobbed me and a gun was fired at me: but not one of our kind did I see—only the stupid Buzzards, and a Kestrel or two. I gave it up, and thought I was indeed the last of the Barons.”

“And then you found me after all near your old home,” said the Baroness, tenderly. “And we have brought up two broods, though what has become of them I know not. And last year we should have done the same, but for the creatures that came up the valley when we were just ready to hatch.”

“Ah,” sighed the Baron, and swept away again in a grand ascending curve.

“Why should they wish to ruin us?” asked she, as with motionless wings he came near her again. “Do we do them any harm, like the Ravens who dig out the young lambs’ eyes, or the vulgar Jays and Magpies—poachers and egg-stealers?”

“Do them harm?” said the Baron, with anger in his voice. “Look at the white farmhouse down yonder! They are good people that live there, and know us well. For generations my family has been on friendly terms with them; they know we do not steal, or pick the lambs’ eyes, and in hard winters they do not grudge us a duckling or two, for if we were to die out it would be bad luck for them. We have our own estate, which seldom fails us; we have the wide moorland and are content with it, and can live on it without meddling with old friends’ property, like the Buzzards and the Ravens.”

“Then why are those other men so mad against us?” asked the Baroness again. “Is not this our own fortress, our old estate, entailed from father to son as you have so often told me, and called by our name? Why do they come and trouble us?”

“Perhaps the old Raven was right,” said the Baron, after a wide sweep; “he told me he had spent years among them as a captive, and had learnt their language and their notions. A great change, he told me, had come over them in the course of his long life. They are now too much interested in us, he said. Once they did not care at all about us, and then we flourished. Now they are poking and prying everywhere; they run about on all sorts of machines, find us out, and won’t let us alone. They go to the ends of the earth to worry us birds, wear our feathers in their hats, and put our skins and our eggs in their museums. It isn’t that they hate us, he said: it’s much worse than that. No, they pretend to love us, and they show their love by coming and spying after us and watching all we do. They are so fond of us that they can’t keep their hands off us; and the harder it is to find us the more trouble they take. Yes, I believe that old Raven was right! Man takes such an interest in us that there will be none of us left soon!”

“Let us try once more,” said the Baroness, with all the hopefulness of youth. “Come down and find a tree on the steepest face of the old fortress. It is quite time we were beginning; the oaks are reddening. Let us do what we can, and hope they will not take an interest in us this year.”

The Baron silently assented, glad that the ancestral rock should not be deserted; and descending rapidly, still in circles, they reached it as the sun set. Next morning at daybreak the tree was chosen—an oak, high up on a rocky shelf, looking to the west across the ravine and the tumbling river. And before the sun was high the foundation of the nest was laid.

II

In a close little room, in a narrow little street of a large town, poor Mrs. Lee, pale and worn, and rather acid, was scraping bread and butter for her children’s breakfast, and doling out cups of watery tea. Five young ones, of various ages, hungry and untidy, sat expectant round the table. Two places were still vacant; one, the father’s, as you might guess from the two letters awaiting him there, and the other for the eldest son, who helped his father in the workshop. In that shop father and son had been already hard at work for a couple of hours, stuffing an otter which had been brought in the day before.

Now the two came in; the father keen-eyed but sad-looking, the son a big bold lad, the hope of an unlucky family.

Mr. Lee sat down and opened one of the two letters. As he read it, his face grew dark, and his wife watched him anxiously.

“Not an order, Stephen?” she asked.

“O yes, it’s an order,” he said bitterly; “a very nice order. It’s an order to pay up the rent, or quit these premises. Twenty pounds, and arrears five pounds ten. Where am I to get twenty-five pounds just now, I should like to know? Look at the jobs we’ve had all this last winter, barely enough to feed these little beggars, let alone their clothes. A few miserable kingfishers, and a white stoat or two, and such-like vermin. This otter was a godsend, and I shall only get a guinea for it. There’s Lord —— gone round the world, and no orders from him: and young Rathbone killed by the Boers, and no one with any money to spare, or this fellow wouldn’t be pressing so. I tell you, Susan, I don’t know how to pay it.”

“Well, don’t pay it,” she said; “it’s not worth paying for. Take a house in Foregate Street, where people can see you, if you want to get on; I’ve told you so again and again. You’ll never get new customers in this slum.”

“I like to pay my debts,” he answered slowly, “and the workshop here is good. But there’s one advantage in Foregate Street, Susan: it’s nearer the workhouse!”

“Don’t talk nonsense before the children, Stephen. What’s the other letter?”

“I don’t know the hand,” he said, fingering it as he drank his tea. “I daresay it’s an offer to make me chief stuffer to the British Museum, or—Hallo!”

All eyes were fixed upon him; his teacup descended with a rattle into the saucer. The mother got up and came to look over his shoulder. And this was the letter:—

London, _April 15, 1901_.

Sir,—I learn from my friend Mr. Scotton of Eaton Place that you supplied him a year ago with a full clutch of British Kite’s eggs. I hope you will be able to do the same for me this year, as you know where they are to be obtained. I have in my cabinet full clutches of nearly all the British-breeding birds of prey, but the Kite is now so rare that I had despaired of adding its eggs to my collection till my friend gave me your address. I am ready to offer you twenty-five guineas for a clutch properly authenticated as British, and if you should be able to get me a bird as well I will give you ten guineas more, and employ you to set it up. I trust this offer will be satisfactory to you.

Yours truly,

William Gatherum.

“Satisfactory! I should think so,” cried the eldest son.

“Satisfactory! Why, you’ll get fifty guineas, if you ask for them, Stephen,” said the excited mother.

“Well, we could pay the rent anyhow with what he offers,” said Stephen, as he put the letter in his pocket. “But to tell you the truth, Susan, I don’t much like the job. I’ve a tender feeling about those eggs.”

“Don’t like the job!” she cried, looking at him almost fiercely. “Why, what’s the matter with it? Look at these children—haven’t they as much right to be fed as young Kites?” And Stephen, looking on his young birds, felt a twinge at his heart, while the fledglings opened all their young mouths at once in a chorus of protest.

“It’s a bad trade,” he said at last: “I wish I had never taken it up. So long as I collected in foreign parts, it was all very well, and I was young and independent; but now I’m getting old, Susan, and the travellers won’t take me with them; and here in England there’s no price for anything but what’s a rarity—and rarities do me as much harm as good. I tell you, Susan, those Kite’s eggs last year were the very mischief: it got about that I had taken them, and my name’s in bad odour with the best naturalists. It’s those private collectors, with their clutches and their British-killed specimens that I have to live by now; and a precious set they are! What’ll they do with all their cabinets, I should like to know! Sell them to be scattered all over the place! Stow them away in a garret and forget all about them! Die some day, and have the public-house people picking ’em up cheap at your sale, to put in a glass case in the parlour! It’s infernal; I don’t like this job, Susan.”

Susan’s tears were beginning to run down. The sun had shone upon her for a moment, and then suddenly gone behind a cloud again. Two or three of the children, seeing their mother troubled, began to roar. Poor Stephen swallowed his tea, and fled from the confusion to his workshop, followed by his son.

“We must do this job, dad,” said Tom, when they were alone.

“I tell you I don’t like it, my lad,” said his father: “’tis bad for us in the long run, and bad for the Kites too. Your mother will say I am a fool; but there are not half a dozen pairs left in the kingdom, and I can’t go and persecute them for these private collectors. There’s a lot of nonsense talked about these things—extinction of birds, and all the rest of it: but the Kites are going sure enough, and I won’t have a hand in it.”