The Bird Watcher in the Shetlands/Chapter 33

by Edmund Selous

CHAPTER XXXIII

GULLS AND GIBBON

ALL doubt as to the real nature of these horrid feastings of the herring-gulls on floating carcases of kittiwakes is now at an end. I had been watching the seals in one pool, when, turning to the other, I saw, as I thought, two gulls fighting together on one of the great rocks in the midst of it—a smaller "stack" one might almost call it. Raising the glasses, the truth was revealed. It was a herring-gull murdering a young kittiwake, and very soon it would have been "got done"—as Carlyle says with such a gusto—if I had not, in rising to follow it more closely, alarmed the murderer, who at once flew away. The poor little kittiwake got up—for it had been thrown on its back—and stood without moving on the rock, presenting a sick and sorry appearance, though there was as yet no blood about it, and it did not appear to have been seriously hurt. Its only chance now was to have flown away, but it stayed and stayed, seeming to doze after a while—the certain victim of the returning gull, as soon as the latter should have watched me off.

Turning my eyes from this disquieting spectacle—one brick in God's architecture—I looked over the water, and there, in this quiet little bay, which seems such a haven of rest and peace—il mio retiro, one would think, to every creature in it—I saw another kittiwake being savagely murdered by another herring-gull. This was a repulsive sight, and through the glasses I could watch it closely, not a detail escaping. The gull, with the hook of its bill fixed in the kittiwake's throat, pressed it down on the water, shook it with violence, paused, got a better purchase, shook it again, then, opening and gobbling up with the mandibles, seemed to be trying to crush the head, or compress the throat, between them. By this the young bird's struggles, which had been of an innocent and quite ineffectual kind, had almost ceased, but its legs still kicked in the air as it lay on its back in the water—just as the other had lain on the rock. The gull now, having managed the preliminaries, ceased to be so rough and violent, but, backing a little out from the body, so as to get the proper swing, began, in a cold, deliberate manner, to pickaxe down into the exposed breast, each blow ending in a bite and tear. A crimson spot, becoming gradually larger and larger till it represented almost the whole upper surface, as the body cavity was laid open, responded to this treatment; and now the gull, seizing upon entrail and organ, helped each backward pull with a flap or two of the wings, feasting redly and royally.

So it goes on, and, in time, both the part-players in this little sample fragment of an infinitely great whole are drifted by the waves to that same towering "stack" which has lately been the scene of the puffin tragedy. On it the gull lands, and, having dragged the carcase some way up, flings his head into the air, and exults with a wild, vociferous cry, in which his mate, who has now joined him, takes part. Then there is more feasting; but in spite of the community of feeling which this duet implies, the second gull is not allowed to partake of the good cheer, but must wait till the provider of it has finished. Should she approach too near, such intrusion is vigorously repelled. Well, thank God for the touch of poetry, whenever it appears! There is something picturesquely wild, as well as savage, in the latter part of this sea-scene—the gull's te deum, flung out to sea and sky; but anything more horrid, more ignobly, sordidly vile than what has preceded it, it would be hard to imagine. A kittiwake in its first full plumage, which differs much from the parents', is a very pretty bird, dove-like and innocent-looking. To see it savagely shaken and flung about, a huge hooked implement fastened in its slender throat, and that soft little head towzled, bitten on, mumbled, the wings all the while flapping in helpless and quite futile efforts to escape, is sickening. It is not the worst scene in nature certainly—serious deliberation amongst enlightened statesmen can produce things a good deal more horrible—but it is bad enough, bad enough. It looks like the negation of God, but a much better case can be made out for its being the affirmation, so here is the consolatory reflection for which optimists are never at a loss. "There's comfort yet," as Macbeth says.

"NATURE RED IN TOOTH AND CLAW"

I suppose it sounds like a truism to say that the actual witnessing of nature's ruthlessness—of her "red tooth and claw"—has a very different effect upon one than is produced by the mere reading of it, however powerful the description may be. Judging by my own sensations, however, the difference is not merely of degree, but of kind, for such accounts, with the reflections made upon them, have in them a certain tone and tinting of the mind through which they pass, so that we get, not nature, but man softening her. "Why softening?" it may be asked. I am here speaking only of civilised man—who alone, perhaps, reflects about such matters—and it is my firm conviction that civilised man, in unconscious deference to his own peace of mind, does soften everything of a disagreeable nature, or if he cannot soften the thing itself—and it is difficult sometimes—yet, at least, his hopes and faith and longings fling a balm upon it, which, rather than the sore, is what we receive. So, too, in all general reference. Man, not nature, is what we get. Thus, when Tennyson speaks of "nature red in tooth and claw," it is not only—or so much—this stern and horrid truth, that the line calls up. Tennyson himself, if we recognise it as his, immediately comes into our mind, and with him the idea of one who, though he can admit so much, yet sees comfort and hope through it all, who believes, or at least trusts—

That somehow good
Will be the final goal of ill.

Other nobly optimistic lines slide into the memory, sunlight passes over the desolate landscape, and the discomforting words, almost as they are uttered, are atoned for by the comforting personality of the poet who penned them. Thus nature, passing through the lips of man, is tempered and dulcified in the passage.

But supposing that such lines as the ones quoted, because their source is unknown to the hearer, can have no such comfort annexed to them, or supposing that the poet does not trust, but is a gloomy pessimist, or, which is more to the point, that instead of lines, with their music and generalisation, we have an actual horrid description, merely, of an actual horrid thing, all in the plainest prose, from some one whose personality we neither know, nor is worth the knowing—I have supplied an example—what softening influence is there here? Is not this but one degree better, in the sense I mean, than seeing the horror itself? I believe that here, too, the difference is of kind, and that a consolation is extracted which we cannot extract when brought face to face with nature herself, because the truth, then, is too overwhelming. The comfort, in such cases, comes not through the mind of the individual who is telling us, but through the general mind of which his is but a part, through the human ocean, rather than the human drop in it. For their own comfort, as I believe—in self-defence, to exclude misery—the great mass of mankind are optimistic, nor can any unit of the mass impart, or suggest, to us, ideas which are in opposition to this view, without suggesting, by association, the more popular and disseminated one, which we instantly lay hold of for our relief. If A can see no bright side to the thing he has witnessed, and can extract no comforting reflections out of it, yet B, C, D, etc., who have not witnessed it, can, and to the general alphabet, as against some exceptional letters of it, we immediately turn, and, enrolling ourselves amongst "les gros bataillons" feel that we are "in tune with the infinite," and of course that the infinite is in tune. But when, alone and amidst gloomy and stern scenery, we see a disagreeable little piece of this infinite, suggesting the whole, in actual manufacture before us, it is wonderful how little of music we find, either in it or ourselves. All seems "jangled, out of tune and harsh"; but for the "sweet bells," where are they? and were they ever there? We hear them not, even as a something behind, an undersong of hope. No, for there are no faces about us now, no comfortable looks and smiles, no good dinner or snug little circle round the fireside; no volumes of the poets either, and not a line of them, not one "smooth comfort false," comes to assist us. Man and his distortions are gone, and we have only nature—hard, stern, cold, uncompromising, truth-telling nature—before us. We look one way, and there are the huge cliffs and the iron rocks: another, and there is the great, wide, desolate sea: upwards, and there is the cold, grey sky—stern and cheerless as either. Nothing else but the birds in their thousands; and there, on the insensate wave or rocks, amidst spectators as indifferent as they, one of them is slowly, methodically, almost fastidiously, hacking, hewing, and picking another to death. You see the struggles, the flights of escape, the horrid, remorseless re-catchings; you see it proceeding and proceeding, see the wound growing larger and larger, the blood running redder and redder, and reason, with an impetuous inrush, says to you, suddenly, and as though for the first time, "This is nature—this is your God of Love—His scheme, His plan!"

And it is for the first time if you have not seen the same thing, or something like it, before, and even then, if there has been anything of an interval. You have got a fact at first hand, from nature herself, instead of through the falsifying medium of humanity—truth strained through benevolent minds—and the difference is so great that it is, I maintain, one of kind, and not merely of degree. You cannot, whilst actually seeing these things, get that sort of comfort that you can and do get when only hearing or reading about them. It is nature that is speaking to you, not a man, whose voice, be it ever so harsh, is mild and puny in comparison, and which, moreover, calls up, by association, the extenuating voices of a host of other men, that sea of human comfort on whose waves you float off and escape. No, but you are, and you feel, alone. You forget, almost, for the time, your own personality, and no thoughts of other personalities come to relieve you. Afterwards, perhaps, as you walk away, they may; but for some time they have a strangely hollow ring about them. One quotation indeed, not of comfort, but as descriptive of the kind of impression made upon me by such sights as these, has often since come into my mind. It is not, however, from the poets, but out of the pages of a great historian—of Gibbon—that I get it, and it is this: "The son of Arcadius, who was accustomed only to the voice of flattery, heard with astonishment the severe language of truth; he blushed and trembled." This, I think, describes more nearly the sort of effect which getting away from man and his optimistic chirruppings, and seeing gulls kill kittiwakes, by myself, has had upon me. I have heard, all at once, the severe language of truth, and I have blushed and trembled—trembled at what I saw—blushed for what I had tried to believe. Afterwards, as I reflect upon it, there come to me with sterner meaning, even, than they had before, those words of Shakespeare—pointed by your friends, through life—

From Rumour's tongues
They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true wrongs.

Well, there are pleasanter sights than the one that has called forth this rigmarole, and I have just seen a seal playing with the long brown seaweed growing at the bottom of the sea, in a very delicious manner. He seized it in his mouth, and, rolling over and over, wrapped himself all round with it. Having thus put himself into mock fetters, his delight was to break out of them, which he did with consummate ease, and the grace of a merman. He did not keep hold of the seaweed all the while, but grasped it now and again, often opening his mouth and making pretence to bite. He acted like a very playful dog, but had a distinct idea of thus entangling himself with the seaweed. No one could have mistaken this. The design was perfectly evident. Two other seals, on a rock, played together most humorously, or rather one kept playing with the other, teasing him, but in a kindly way, by which it differed from most teasing. He would scratch him softly on the chest with one of his fore-flippers, and when this was parried, with a protest in look and action, he got farther down and scratched, or, as I think one may say, tickled him on the belly, beyond the reach of his guard. This caused the poor animal to flounce about in a very absurd way, and, at last, to half rise, and put on that funny, expostulatory look, half appealing, half resenting, and wholly humorous, which I have noted before. Most playful and humorously playful animals these are.

Could we see something of the inner life—the domestics—of many animals, the record of it might be very interesting. This is what is really wanted. But who has done so? Who has cared to do so? Instead, we have a few bald, jejune facts—habitat, diet, time of bringing forth young, period of gestation (on which latter point a good deal of prurient curiosity is manifested), etc. But the heart of a wild animal is seldom explored, for it needs a heart to explore it. She bears and tigresses have been robbed of their cubs, but who has waited by their cubs to see them return and fondle them? To do so might be both dangerous and difficult; but what danger is not undergone, what difficulty is not overcome, when merely to kill is the object? The zoologist of the future should be a different kind of man altogether: the present one is not worthy of the name. He should go out with glasses and notebook, prepared to see and to think. He should stalk the gorilla, follow up the track of the elephant, steal on the bear, get to windward of the moose or antelope, and lie in wait for the tiger returning to his kill; but it should be to biographise these animals, not to shoot them. The real naturalist should be a Boswell, and every creature should be, for him, a Dr. Johnson. He should think of nothing but his hero's doings; he should love a beast and hate a gun. That is the naturalist that I believe in, or that I would believe in if ever he appeared on earth; and I would rather found a school of such than establish a triumphant religion, or make the bloodiest war that ever delighted a people or rolled a statesman into Westminster Abbey. Every man has his ambition. To make a naturalist who shall use neither a gun nor a cabinet, is mine.

Some men have strange ambitions. I have one:
To make a naturalist without a gun.

"Pretty, i' faith."

The great seal is again asleep upon his rock (it seems to belong to him and the common one in turn), and looking down upon him, now, from the tops of the cliffs, through the glasses, there does not appear to be any admixture of brown whatever in the shade of his fur. Wherever the light falls upon it, it is an absolute silver, and, where in shadow, tends to shade a little into the colouring of a very light-skinned mole. But this last is merely an effect: the real colouring is, I believe, a uniform silver—very pretty indeed, where the light catches it. The fur seems close and thick—very mole-like in texture—the general appearance, indeed, is very much that of a gigantic mole, if only the head, the character of which is different, be not well seen. In the water, however, when more or less immersed, even the head partakes of this resemblance, or lends itself to it, and the whole animal becomes "perfect mole'' ("mine eye hath well examined his parts, and finds him perfect Richard"). In itself however, the head is not mole-like—as may well be believed—but, when held in some positions, looks remarkably like that of a polar-bear—a resemblance much more à la Richard. He seems extremely fat—Falstaff's "three fingers on the ribs," I should say, at the very least.

A common seal has now, once or twice, swum close round him, and looks a mere pigmy by comparison. This latter may not be a large seal—I do not think he is—still, the juxtaposition of the two gives me a better idea of Falstaff's proportions than I had before. He must be more than twice the weight, I think, of the very largest phoca—phoca Antiquarius, as I would call the latter: lovers of Scott will take me. It is the great barrel of the body that is so immense. The build and general appearance is much more that of a walrus than of an ordinary seal. The fore-feet seem more modified, are more fin-like in appearance, than those of the latter, which are rounded—soft, round, fat pads—muffin-shaped, more like little cushions than fins; but here there is an approach to the true fin, an elongation and narrowing, and the toes all point inwards and tailwards.

As the water steals imperceptibly upon him, Falstaff—as I shall now always call him—stretches himself enjoyably, and makes some leviathan-like movements of his hinder, or tail, parts, looking somnolently up, from time to time, seeming to say, "O ocean, let me rest." How consummately happy he looks! lazily, sleepily happy—a god-like condition. Heroics for those who enjoy them—they are generally all in falsetto. The "cycle of Cathay" for me, and the untroubled sea-sleep of this grand old Proteus here! A good deal of his lower surface, and the whole of the rock he lies on, is now quite hidden by the sea, but still he sleeps or dozes on—immense, immovable—as though he were life-anchored there. At length, with a mighty yawn and stretch, he turns full upon his vasty stomach, and immediately, by virtue of the different appearance which his fur has when wet or dry, becomes a much smaller seal that has climbed up upon a buoy—the lower, wet part of him looks like that; the upper, alone, is himself. Then gradually he soaks all over, till he is, again, huge and indivisible, a great, naked, blue, greasy, oiled bladder,—yet firm still, as though he grew to the rock. But the end is now near. Sparkling and gleaming, the waves come tumbling in; they dance about him like fairies, like little familiar elves; they slap him and pat him, lap up to—then over—his back, sway him this way and that, speak to him, call him by his familiar pet name, tell him it is time to go, until, at last, with a great somnolent heave, he floats, and they float him—it is done together—right off the now sunken rock: his body sinks down, his head, with the fur yet dry, remains, for a time, straight up in the water, then follows—his nose, to the last, still pointing, like the "stern finger" of "his duty"—not so stern as with us, though—"heavenwards." As he goes down, you see that his eyes are still shut—he continues to sleep.