Bevis: The Story of a Boy

by Richard Jefferies

almost likequicksand, till he had made a bowl-like cavity. The stream soon filledit, but then the water was thick, being disturbed, and they had to waittill it had settled. Then they lapped too, very carefully, with thehollow palm, taking care that the water which ran through their fingersshould fall below, and not above the bowl, or the weight of the dropswould disturb it again. With perseverance they satisfied their thirst;then they returned to the oak, and took out their provisions; they couldeat now.

  "This is a jolly jungle," said Mark, with his mouth full.

  "That's a banyan," said Bevis, pointing with the knuckle-end of thedrum-stick he was gnawing at the oak over them. "It's about eleventhousand years old."

  Then Mark took the drum-stick, and had his turn at it. When it waspolished, Pan had it: he cracked it across with his teeth, just as thehyenas did in the cave days, for the animals never learnt to splitbones, as the earliest men did. Pan cracked it very disconsolately: hisheart was with the fleshpots.

  Boom!

  They starred. It was the same peculiar sound they had heard before, andseemed to come from an immense distance. A pheasant crowed as he heardit in the jungle close by them, and a second farther away.

  "What can it be?" whispered Mark. "Is there anything here?"--glancingaround.

  "There may be some genii," said Bevis quietly. "Very likely there aresome genii: they are everywhere. But I do not know what that was.Listen!"

  They listened: the wood was still; so still, they could hear a moth or achafer entangled in the leaves of the oak overhead, and trying to getout. Looking up there, the sky was blue and clear, and the sunlightfell brightly on the open space by the streamlet. There was nothing butthe hum. The long, long summer days seem gradually to dispose the mindto expect something unusual. Out of such an expanse of light, when theearth is tangibly in the midst of a vast illumined space, what may notcome?--perhaps something more than is common to the senses. The mindopens with the enlarging day.

  It is said the sandhills of the desert under the noonday sun emitstrange sounds; that the rocky valleys are vocal; the primeval forestspeaks in its depths; hollow ocean sends a muttering to the becalmedvessel; and up in the mountains the bound words are set loose. Of oldtimes the huntsmen in our own woods met the noonday spirit under theleafy canopy.

  Bevis and Mark listened, but heard nothing, except the entangled chafer,the midsummer hum, and, presently, Pan snuffling, as he buried hisnostrils in his hair to bite a flea. They laughed at him, for his eyeswere staring, and his flexible nostrils turned up as if his face was notalive but stuffed. The boom did not come again, so they finished theirdinner.

  "I feel jolly lazy," said Mark. "You ought to put the things down onthe map."

  "So I did," said Bevis, and he got out his brown paper, and Mark held itwhile he worked. He drew Fir-Tree Gulf and the Nile.

  "Write that there is a deep hole there," said Mark, "and awfulcrocodiles: that's it. Now Africa--you want a very long stroke there;write reeds and bamboos."

  "No, not bamboos, papyrus," said Bevis. "Bamboos grow in India, wherewe are now. There's some," pointing to a tall wild parsnip, or "gix,"on the verge of the streamlet.

  "I'm so lazy," said Mark. "I shall go to sleep."

  "No you won't," said Bevis. "I ought to go to sleep, and you ought towatch. Get your spear, and now take my bow."

  Mark took the bow sullenly.

  "You ought to stand up, and walk up and down."

  "I can't," said Mark very short.

  "Very well; then go farther away, where you can see more round you.There, sit down there."

  Mark sat down at the edge of the shadow of the oak. "Don't you see youcan look into the channel; if there are any savages they are sure tocreep up that channel. Do you see?"

  "Yes, I see," said Mark.

  "And mind nothing comes behind that woodbine," pointing to a mass ofwoodbine which hung from some ash-poles, and stretched like a curtainacross the view there. "That's a very likely place for a tiger: andkeep your eye sharp on those nut-tree bushes across the brook--mostlikely you'll see the barrel of a matchlock pushed through there."

  "I ought to have a matchlock," said Mark.

  "So you did; but we had to start with what we had, and it is all themore glory to us if we _get_ through. Now mind you keep awake."

  "Yes," said Mark.

  Bevis, having given his orders, settled himself very comfortably on themoss at the foot of the oak, tilted his hat aside to shelter him stillmore, and, with a spray of ash in his hand to ward off the flies, beganto forget. In a minute up he started.

  "Mark!"

  "Yes;" still sulky.

  "There's another oak--no, it's a banyan up farther; behind you."

  "I know."

  "Well, if you hear any rustle there, it's a python."

  "Very well."

  "And those dead leaves and sticks in the hole there by the stump of thatold tree?"

  "I see."

  "There's a cobra there."

  "All right."

  "And if a shadow comes over suddenly."

  "What's that, then?" said Mark.

  "That's the roc from Sinbad's Island."

  "I say, Bevis," as Bevis settled himself down again. "Bevis, don't goto sleep."

  "Pooh!"

  "But it's not nice."

  "Rubbish."

  "Bevis."

  "Don't talk silly."

  In a minute Bevis was fast asleep. He always slept quickly, and theheat and the exertion made him forget himself still quicker.

  Volume One, Chapter VII.

  THE JUNGLE.

  Mark was alone. He felt without going nearer that Bevis was asleep, anddared not wake him lest he should be called a coward. He moved a littleway so as to have the oak more at his back, and to get a clearer view onall sides. Then he looked up at the sky, and whistled very low. Pan,who was half asleep too, got up slowly, and came to him; but findingthat there was nothing to eat, and disliking to be stroked and patted onsuch a hot day, he went back to his old place, the barest spot he couldfind, mere dry ground.

  Mark sat, bow and arrow ready in his hand, the arrow on the string, withthe spear beside him, and his pocket-knife with the big blade open, andlooked into the jungle. It was still and silent. The chafer had gotloose, and there was nothing but the hum overhead. He kept thestrictest watch, scarce allowing himself to blink his eyes. Now helooked steadily into the brushwood he could see some distance, hisglance found a way through between the boughs, till presently, after hehad searched out those crevices, he could command a circle of view.

  Like so many slender webs his lines of sight thus drawn through merechinks of foliage radiated from a central spot, and at the end of eachhe seemed as if he could feel if anything moved as much as he could seeit. Each of these webs strained at his weary mind, and even in theshade the strong glare of the summer noon pressed heavily on hiseyelids. Had anything moved, a bird or moth, or had the leaves rustled,it would have relieved him. This expectation was a continual effort.His eyes closed, he opened them, frowned and blinked; then he reclinedon one arm as an easier position. His eyes closed, the shrill midsummerhum sounded low and distant, then loud, suddenly it ceased--he wasasleep.

  The sunburnt woodbine, the oaks dotted with coppery leaves where thesecond shoot appeared, the ash-poles rising from the hollow stoles, andwhose pale sprays touching above formed a green surface, hazel withwhite nuts, stiff, ragged thistles on the stream bank, burrs withbrown-tipped hooks, the hard dry ground, all silent, fixed, held in thelight.

  The sun slipped through the sky like a yacht under the shore where thelight wind coming over a bank just fills the sails, but leaves thesurface smooth. Through the smooth blue the sun slipped silently, andno white fleck of foam cloud marked his speed. But in the deep narrowchannel of the streamlet there was a change--the tiny trickle of waterwas no longer illumined by the vertical beams, a slight slant left it torun in shadow.

  Burr! came a humble-bee whose dro
ne was now put out as he went downamong the grass and leaves, now rose again as he travelled. Burr! Thefaintest breath of air moved without rustling the topmost leaves of theoaks. The humble-bee went on, and disappeared behind the stoles.

  A little flicker of movement happened among the woodbine, not to be seenof itself, but as a something interrupting the light like a larger motecrossing the beam. The leaves of the woodbine in one place were drawntogether and coated with a white web and a tiny bird came to take awaythe destroyer. Then mounting to a branch of ash he sang, "Sip, sip--chip, chip!"

  Again the upper leaves of the oak moved and jostling together caused aslight sound. Coo! coo!