Part 7 (1/2)

Much kindly talk has been uttered over allotments, and undoubtedly they are a great encouragement to the labourer; yet even this advantage is commonly abused. The tenants have no ground of complaint as to damage to their crops, because the keeper, at a word from them, would lose not a moment of time in killing or driving away the intruder; and as an acknowledgment of honesty and in reparation of the mischief, if any, a couple of rabbits would be presented to the man who carried the complaint. But the labourer, if he spies the tracks of a hare running into his plot of corn, or suspects that a pheasant is hiding there, carefully keeps that knowledge to himself. He knows that a pheasant, if you can get close enough to it before it rises, is a clumsy bird, and large enough to offer a fair mark, and may be brought down with a stout stick dexterously thrown. As very probably the pheasant is a young one and (not yet having undergone its baptism of fire) only recently regularly fed, it is almost tame and may be approached without difficulty. This is why the keeper just looks round the allotment gardens now and then, and lets his dogs run about; for their noses are much more clever at discovering hidden fur or feathers than his eyes.

In winter if the weather be severe, hares and rabbits are very bold, and will enter gardens though attached to dwelling-houses. Sometimes when a vast double-mound hedge is grubbed, the ditches each side are left, and the interior s.p.a.ce is ultimately converted into an osier-bed, osiers being rather profitable at present. But before these are introduced it is necessary that the ground be well dug up, for it is full of roots and the seeds of weeds, which perhaps have lain dormant for years, but now spring up in wonderful profusion. In consideration of cleansing the soil, and working it by digging, burning the weeds and rubbish, etc, the farmer allows one or two of his labourers to use it as a garden for the growth of potatoes, free of rent, for say a couple of years. Potatoes are a crop which flourish in fresh-turned soil, and so they do very well over the arrangement. But unfortunately as they dig and weed, etc, in the evenings after regular work, they have an excuse for their presence in the fields, and perhaps near preserves at a tempting period of the twenty-four hours. The keeper, in short, is quite aware that some sly poaching goes on in this way.

Another cause of unpleasantness between him and the cottagers arises from the dogs they maintain, generally curs, it is true, and not to all appearance capable of harm. But in the early summer a mongrel cur can do as much mischief as a thoroughbred dog. Young rabbits are easily overtaken when not much larger than rats, and at other seasons, when the game has grown better able to take care of itself, any kind of dog rambling loose in the woods and copses frightens it and unsettles it to an annoying degree. Consequently, when a dog once begins to trespa.s.s, it is pretty sure to disappear for good--it is not necessary to indicate how--and though no actual evidence can be got against the keeper, he is accused of the destruction of the ugly, ill-bred ”pet.” If a dog commences to hunt on his own account, he can only be broken of the habit by the utmost severity; and so it sometimes happens that other dogs besides those of the cottagers come to an untimely end by shot and gin.

The keeper being a man with some true sense of sport, dislikes shooting dogs, though compelled to do so occasionally; he never fires at his own, and candidly admits that he hates to see a sportsman give way to anger in that manner. The custom of ”peppering” with shot a dog for disobedience or wildness, which was once very common in the field, has however gone a great deal into disuse.

Shepherds, who often have to visit their flocks in the night--as at this season of the year, while lambing is in progress--who, in fact, sometimes sleep in the fields in a little wooden house on wheels built for the purpose, are strongly suspected of tampering with the hares scampering over the turnips by moonlight. At harvest-time many strange men come into the district for the extra wages of reaping. They rarely take lodgings--which, indeed, they might find some difficulty in obtaining--but in the warm summer weather sleep in the outhouses and sheds, with the permission of the owner. Others camp in the open in the corner of a meadow, where the angle made by meeting hedges protects them from the wind, crouching round the embers of the fire which boils the pot and kettle. This influx of strangers is not without its attendant anxiety to the keeper, who looks round now and then to see what is going on.

Despite the ill-will in their hearts, the labourers are particularly civil to the keeper; he is, in fact, a considerable employer of labour-- not on his own account--but in the woods and preserves. He can often give men a job in the dead of winter, when farm work is scarce and the wages paid for it are less; such as hedge-cutting, mending the gaps in the fences, cleaning out ditches or the watercourses through the wood.

Then there is an immense amount of ferreting to be done, and there is such an instinctive love of sport in every man's breast, that to a.s.sist in this work is almost an ambition; besides which, no doubt the chances afforded of an occasional private ”bag” form a secret attraction. One would imagine that there could be but little pleasure in crouching all day in a ditch, perhaps ankle-deep in ice-cold water, with flakes of snow driving in the face, and fingers numbed by the biting wind as it rushes through the bare hawthorn bushes, just to watch a rabbit jump out of a hole into a net, and to break his neck afterwards. Yet so it is; and some men become so enamoured of this slow sport as to do nothing else the winter through; and as of course their employment depends entirely upon the will of the keeper, they are anxious to conciliate him.

Despite therefore of missing cur dogs and straying cats which never return, the keeper is treated with marked deference by the cottagers.

He is, nevertheless, fully aware of the concealed ill-will towards him; and perhaps this knowledge has contributed to render him more morose, and sharper of temper, and more suspicious of human nature than he would otherwise have been; for it never improves a man's character to have to be constantly watching his fellows.

The streams are no more sacred from marauders than the woods and preserves. The brooks and upper waters are not so full of fish as formerly, the ca.n.a.l into which they fall being netted so much; and another cause of the diminution is the prevalence of fish-poaching, especially for jack, during the sp.a.w.ning season and afterwards. Though the keepers can check this within their own boundaries, it is not of much use.

Fish-poaching is simple and yet clever in its way. In the sp.a.w.ning time jack fish, which at other periods are apparently of a solitary disposition, go in pairs, and sometimes in trios, and are more tame than usual. A long slender ash stick is selected, slender enough to lie light in the hand and strong enough to bear a sudden weight. A loop and running noose are formed of a piece of thin copper wire, the other end of which is twisted round and firmly attached to the smaller end of the stick. The loop is adjusted to the size of the fish--it should not be very much larger, else it will not draw up quick enough, nor too small, else it may touch and disturb the jack. It does not take much practice to hit the happy medium. Approaching the bank of the brook quietly, so as not to shake the ground, to the vibrations of which fish are peculiarly sensitive, the poacher tries if possible to avoid letting his shadow fall across the water.

Some persons' eyes seem to have an extraordinary power of seeing through water, and of distinguis.h.i.+ng at a glance a fish from a long swaying strip of dead brown flag, or the rotting pieces of wood which lie at the bottom. The ripple of the breeze, the eddy at the curve, or the sparkle of the suns.h.i.+ne cannot deceive them; while others, and by far the greater number, are dazzled and see nothing. It is astonis.h.i.+ng how few persons seem to have the gift of sight when in the field.

The poacher, having marked his prey in the shallow yonder, gently extends his rod slowly across the water three or four yards higher up the stream, and lets the wire noose sink without noise till it almost or quite touches the bottom. It is easier to guide the noose to its destination when it occasionally touches the mud, for refraction distorts the true position of objects in water, and accuracy is important. Gradually the wire swims down with the current, just as if it were any ordinary twig or root carried along, such as the jack is accustomed to see, and he therefore feels no alarm. By degrees the loop comes closer to the fish, till with steady hand the poacher slips it over the head, past the long vicious jaws and gills, past the first fins, and pauses when it has reached a place corresponding to about one-third of the length of the fish, reckoning from the head. That end of the jack is heavier than the other, and the ”lines” of the body are there nearly straight. Thus the poacher gets a firm hold--for a fish, of course, is slippery--and a good balance. If the operation is performed gently the jack will remain quite still, though the wire rubs against his side: silence and stillness have such a power over all living creatures. The poacher now clears his arm and, with a sudden jerk, lifts the fish right out of the stream and lands him on the sward.

So sharp is the grasp of the wire that it frequently cuts its way through the scales, leaving a mark plainly visible when the jack is offered for sale. The suddenness and violence of the compression seem to disperse the muscular forces, and the fish appears dead for the moment. Very often, indeed, it really is killed by the jerk. This happens when the loop either has not pa.s.sed far enough along the body or has slipped and seized the creature just at the gills. It then garottes the fish. If, on the other hand, the wire has been pa.s.sed too far towards the tail, it slips off that way, the jack falling back into the water with a broad white band where the wire has sc.r.a.ped the scales.

Fish thus marked may not unfrequently be seen in the stream. The jack, from its shape, is specially liable to capture in this manner; long and well balanced, the wire has every chance of holding it. This poaching is always going on; the implement is so easily obtained and concealed.

The wire can be carried in the pocket, and the stick may be cut from an adjacent copse.

The poachers observe that after a fish has once escaped from an attempt of the kind it is ever after far more difficult of capture. The first time the jack was still and took no notice of the insidious approach of the wire gliding along towards it; but the next--unless a long interval elapses before a second trial--the moment it comes near he is away. At each succeeding attempt, whether hurt or not, he grows more and more suspicious, till at last to merely stand still or stop while walking on the bank is sufficient for him; he is off with a swish of the tail to the deeper water, leaving behind him a cloud, so to say, of mud swept up from the bottom to conceal the direction of his flight. For it would almost seem as if the jack throws up this mud on purpose; if much disturbed he will quite discolour the brook. The wire does a good deal to depopulate the stream, and is altogether a deadly implement.

But a clever fish-poacher can land a jack even without a wire, and with no better instrument than a willow stick cut from the nearest osier-bed.

The willow, or withy as it is usually called, is remarkably pliant, and can be twisted into any shape. Selecting a long slender wand, the poacher strips it of leaves, gives the smaller end a couple of twists, making a noose and running knot of the stick itself. The mode of using it is precisely similar to that followed with a wire, but it requires a little more dexterity, because, of course, the wood, flexible as it is, does not draw up so quickly or so closely as the metal, neither does it take so firm a grip. A fish once caught by a wire can be slung about almost anyhow, it holds so tightly. The withy noose must be jerked up the instant it pa.s.ses under that part of the jack where the weight of the fish is balanced--the centre of gravity; if there is an error in this respect it should be towards the head, rather than towards the tail. Directly the jack is thrown out upon the sward he must be seized, or he will slip from the noose, and possibly find his way back again into the water. With a wire there is little risk of that; but then the withy does not cut its way into the fish.

This trick is often accomplished with the common withy--not that which grows on pollard-trees, but in osier-beds; that on the trees is brittle.

But a special kind is sought for the purpose, and for any other requiring extreme flexibility. It is, I think, locally called the stone osier, and it does not grow so tall as the common sorts. It will tie like string. Being so short, for poaching fish it has to be fastened to a thicker and longer stick, which is easily done; and some prefer it to wire because it looks more natural in the water and does not alarm the fish, while, should the keeper be about, it is easily cut up in several pieces and thrown away. I have heard of rabbits, and even hares, being caught with a noose of this kind of withy, which is as ”tough as wire;”

and yet it seems hardly possible, as it is so much thicker and would be seen. Still, both hares and rabbits, when playing and scampering about at night, are sometimes curiously heedless, and foolish enough to run their necks into anything.

With such a rude implement as this some fish-poachers will speedily land a good basket of pike. During the sp.a.w.ning season, as was observed previously, jack go in pairs, and now and then in trios, and of this the poacher avails himself to take more than one at a haul. The fish lie so close together--side by side just at that time--that it is quite practicable, with care and judgment, to slip a wire over two at once.

When near the bank two may even be captured with a good withy noose: with a wire a clever hand will make a certainty of it. The keeper says that on one occasion he watched a man operating just without his jurisdiction, who actually succeeded in wiring three jacks at once and safely landed them on the gra.s.s. They were small fish, about a pound to a pound and a half each, and the man was but a few minutes in accomplis.h.i.+ng the feat. It sometimes happens that after a heavy flood, when the brook has been thick with suspended mud for several days, so soon as it has gone down fish are more than usually plentiful, as if the flood had brought them up-stream: poachers are then particularly busy.

Fresh fish--that is, those who are new to that particular part of the brook--are, the poachers say, much more easily captured than those who have made it their home for some time. They are, in fact, more easily discovered; they have not yet found out all the nooks and corners, the projecting roots and the hollows under the banks, the dark places where a black shadow falls from overhanging trees and is with difficulty pierced even by a practised eye. They expose themselves in open places, and meet an untimely fate.

Besides pike, tench are occasionally wired, and now and then even a large roach; the tench, though a bottom fish, in the shallow brooks may be sometimes detected by the eye, and is not a difficult fish to capture. Every one has heard of tickling trout: the tench is almost equally amenable to t.i.tillation. Lying at full length on the sward, with his hat off lest it should fall into the water, the poacher peers down into the hole where he has reason to think tench may be found.

This fish is so dark in colour when viewed from above that for a minute or two, till the sight adapts itself to the dull light of the water, the poacher cannot distinguish what he is searching for. Presently, having made out the position of the tench, he slips his bared arm in slowly, and without splash, and finds little or no trouble as a rule in getting his hand close to the fish without alarming it: tench, indeed, seem rather sluggish. He then pa.s.ses his fingers under the belly and gently rubs it. Now it would appear that he has the fish in his power, and has only to grasp it. But grasping is not so easy; or rather it is not so easy to pull a fish up through two feet of superinc.u.mbent water which opposes the quick pa.s.sage of the arm. The gentle rubbing in the first place seems to soothe the fish, so that it becomes perfectly quiescent, except that it slowly rises up in the water, and thus enables the hand to get into proper position for the final seizure. When it has risen up towards the surface sufficiently far--the tench must not be driven too near the surface, for it does not like light and will glide away--the poacher suddenly snaps as it were; his thumb and fingers, if he possibly can manage it, closing on the gills. The body is so slimy and slippery that there alone a firm hold can be got, though the poacher will often flick the fish out of water in an instant so soon as it is near the surface. Poachers evidently feel as much pleasure in practising these tricks as the most enthusiastic angler using the implements of legitimate sport.

No advantage is thought too unfair to be taken of fish; nothing too brutally unsportsmanlike. I have seen a pike killed with a p.r.o.ng as he lay basking in the sun at the top of the water. A labourer stealthily approached, and suddenly speared him with one of the sharp points of the p.r.o.ng or hayfork he carried: the pike was a good sized one too.

The stream, where not strictly preserved, is frequently netted without the slightest regard to season. The net is stretched from bank to bank, and watched by one man, while the other walks up the brook thirty or forty yards, and drives the fish down the current into the bag. With a long pole he thrashes the water, making a good deal of splash, and rousing up the mud, which fish dislike and avoid. The pole is thrust into every hiding-place, and pokes everything out. The watcher by the net knows by the bobbing under of the corks when a shoal of roach and perch, or a heavy pike, has darted into it, and instantly draws the string and makes his haul. In this way, by sections at a time, the brook, perhaps for half a mile, is quite cleared out. Jack, however, sometimes escape; they seem remarkably shrewd and quick to learn. If the string is not immediately drawn when they touch the net, they are out of it without a moment's delay: they will double back up-stream through all the splas.h.i.+ng and mud, and some will even slide as it were between the net and the bank if it does not quite touch in any place, and so get away.

In its downward course the brook irrigates many water meadows, and to drive the stream out upon them there are great wooden hatches.