butt with aflat stone, to save himself the trouble of holding it.
He sat down, and Pan sat by him: he stroked Pan and then teased him; Panmoved away and watched, out of arm's reach. By-and-by the spanielextended himself and became drowsy. Mark's eyes wearied of the bluefloat, and he too stretched himself, lying on his side with his head onhis arm, so that he could see the float, if he opened his eyes, withoutmoving. A wagtail came and ran along the edge of the sand so near thatwith his rod he could have reached it. Jerking his tail the wagtailentered the still water up to the joints of his slender limbs, then cameout, and ran along again.
Mark's head almost touched the water: his hair (for his hat was off, asusual) was reflected in it, and a great brown water-beetle passedthrough the reflection. A dove--his parrakeet--came over and enteredthe wood; it was the same Bevis afterwards heard cooing. Mark halfopened his eyes, and thought the wagtail's tiny legs were no thickerthan one of Frances's hair-pins.
The moorhens and coots had now recovered from the fright Pan had giventhem. As he gazed through the chinks of his eyelids along the surfaceof the water, he could see them one by one returning towards Serendib,pausing on the way among the weeds, swimming again, with nodding heads,turning this side and that to pick up anything they saw; but still,gradually approaching the island opposite. They all came from onedirection, and he remembered that when Pan hunted them out, they allscuttled the same way. So did the wild duck; so did the kingfisher. "Ibelieve they all go to the river," Mark thought; "the river that flowsout through the weeds. Just wait till we have got our raft."
Something swam out presently from the shore of New Formosa; somethingnearly flush with the water, and which left a wake of widening ripplesbehind it, by which Mark knew it was a rat: for water-fowl, though theycan move rapidly, do not cause much undulation. The rat swam out a goodway, then turned and came in again. This coasting voyage he repeateddown the shore several times.
To look along the surface, as Mark did, was like kneeling and glancingover a very broad and well polished table, your eyes level with it. Theslightest movement was visible a great way--a little black speck thatcrossed was seen at once. The little black speck was raised a verysmall degree above the surface, and there was something in the water notvisible following it.
The water undulated, but less than behind the rat; now the moorhens nodtheir heads to and fro, as you or I nod: but this black speck waveditself the other way, from side to side, as it kept steadily onwards.Mark recognised a snake, swimming swiftly, its head (black only fromdistance and contrast with the gleam of the crystal top of the polishedtable) just above the surface, and sinuous length trailing beneath thewater. He did not see whence the snake started, but he saw it go acrossto the weeds at the extreme end of Serendib, and there lost it.
He thought of the huge boa-constrictors hidden in the interior of NewFormosa, they would be basking quite still in such heat, but he ought tohave brought his spear with him. You never ought to venture from thestockade in these unknown places without a spear. By now the shadowshad moved, and his foot was in the sunshine: he could feel the heatthrough the leather. Two bubbles came up to the surface close to theshore: he saw the second one start from the sand and rise up quicklywith a slight wobble, but the sand did not move, and he could not seeanything in it.
His eyes closed, not that he slept, but the gleam of the water inclinedthem to retire into the shadow of the lids. After some time there was ashrill pipe. Mark started, and lifted his head, and saw the kingfisher,which had come back towards his perch on the willow trunk. He camewithin three yards before he saw Mark; then he shot aside, with a shrillwhistle of alarm, rose up and went over the island.
In starting up, Mark moved his foot, and a butterfly floated away fromit: the butterfly had settled in the sunshine on the heated leather.With three flutters, the butterfly floated with broad wings stretchedout over the thin grass by the shore. It was no more effort to him tofly than it is to thistledown.
The same start woke Pan. Pan yawned, licked his paw, got up and waggedhis tail, looked one way and then the other, and then went off back toBevis. The blue float was still perfectly motionless. Mark sat up,took his rod and wound up the winch, and began to wander homewards too,idly along the shore. He had gone some way when he saw a jack baskingby a willow bush aslant from him, so that the markings on his back weremore visible than when seen sideways, for in this position theforeshortening crowded them together. They are like the water-mark onpaper, seen best at a low angle, or the mark on silk, and somewhatremind you of the mackerel.
Volume Two, Chapter XVIII.
NEW FORMOSA--KANGAROOS.
So soon as he was sure the jack had not noticed him, Mark drew softlyback, and with some difficulty forced a way between the bramble thicketstowards the stockade. He thus entered a part they had not beforevisited, for as the trees and bushes were not so thick by the water,their usual path followed the windings of the shore. Trampling oversome and going round others, Mark managed to penetrate between thethickets, having taken his rod to pieces, as it constantly caught in thebranches.
Next he came to a place where scarcely anything grew, everything havingbeen strangled by those Thugs of the wood, the wild hops, except a fewscattered ash-poles, up which they wound, indenting the bark in spirals.The ground was covered with them, for, having slain their supports,they were forced to creep, so that he walked on hops; and from under abower of them, where they were smothering a bramble bush, a nightingale"kurred" at him angrily.
He came near the nightingale's young brood, safely reared. "Sweetkur-r-r!" The bird did not like it. These wild hops are a favouritecover with nightingales. A damp furrow or natural ditch, now dry, butevidently a watercourse in rain, seemed to have stopped the march ofthis creeping, twining plant, for over it he entered among hazel-bushes;and then seeing daylight, fancied he was close to the stockade; but tohis surprise, stepped out into an open glade with a green knoll on oneside.
The knoll did not rise quite so high as the trees, and there was aquantity of fern about the lower part, then an open lawn of grass, alittle meadow in the midst of the wood. He saw a white tail disappearamong the fern--there were then rabbits here.
"Bevis!" said Mark aloud. In his surprise he called to Bevis, as hewould have done had Bevis been present. He ran to the knoll, and as heran, more white tails--little ones--raced into the fern, where he sawburries and sand-heaps thrown out.
On the top of the knoll there were numerous signs of rabbits--placesworn bare, and "runs," or footpaths, leading down across the grass. Helooked round, but could see nothing but trees, which hid the New Sea andthe cliff at home.
Eager to tell Bevis of the discovery, and especially of the rabbits,which would furnish them with food, and were, above all, something freshto shoot at, he ran down the hill so fast that he could not stophimself, though he saw something white in the grass. He returned, andfound it was mushrooms, and he gathered between twenty and thirty in afew minutes--"buttons," full grown mushrooms, and overgrown ketchupones. How to carry them he did not know, having used his handkerchiefalready, and left his coat at home, till he thought of his waistcoat,and took it off and made a rough bundle of them in it. Then he heardBevis's whistle, the well-known notes they always used to call eachother, and shouted in reply, but the shout did not penetrate so far asthe shrill sound had done.
The whistle came from a different direction to that in which he supposedthe cave to be, for in winding in and out the brambles he had lost thetrue course and had forgotten to look at the sun. He found he could notgo straight home, for the brambles were succeeded by blackthorn, throughwhich nothing human can move, and hardly a spaniel, when thick as it washere. He had to go all round by the opposite shore of the island, theweed-grown side, and so to the fire under the teak-tree.
"Where's the gun?" said Bevis, coming to meet him.
"I left it at home."
"No, you had it."
"I put it back as you were not coming."
"I never saw it."
"It's in the hut."
"Didn't you really take it?"
"No--really. We'll both go with the gun--"
"So we will." Bevis regretted now that he had made any difficulty."No, it's your turn; you shall have it."
"I shan't," said Mark. "Look here,"--showing the mushrooms--"splendidfor supper, and I've found some rabbits!"
"Rabbits!"
"And a little green hill, and a kingfisher, and a jack. Come and getthe gun, and let's shoot him. Quick."
Mark began to run for the matchlock, and they left the duck to itself.Bevis ran with him, and Mark told him all about it as they went.
They talked so much by sign and mere monosyllables in this short run tothe hut that I cannot transcribe it in words, though they
Bevis: The Story of a Boy Page 62