Chapter 6
chapter six of man and nature on the broads june in broadland and the wavy swell of the sowing reeds and the wave-worn horns of the echoing bank and the silvery marsh flowers that throng the desolate creeks and pools among were flooded over with eddying song gayest of the months of the year smiling june dawns upon us garlanded with roses the fields and woods and hedges are glowing with the warm touch of her fingers and all nature seems joyous and light-hearted there is the slightest ripple upon the surface of old ocean and a faint murmur falls on the ear as the tiny wavelets crowd each other as if in play upon the shingly shore in broadland there is quietude save as the birds make merry music and the lowing kine join in with deeper bass and the bleating of sheep is heard or save when the playful wind whispers in the tree-tops
that here and there fling their shadows upon the placid waters below and it bustles up and down the crowded ranks of pale green reeds until from among their leafy stems waving and rustling arises a murmur that reminds us of the gentle plashing of the wavelets upon the sea-beach on such a morning we find ourselves at the railway station securing tickets for a jolly day's outing in broadland ere long we are being borne through furzy and bracken covered sandhills beyond the valleys of which are caught glimpses of the deep blue sea now across fields where the dark green corn is growing sometimes shut in for a brief space by trees and tall hedgerows but more often rumbling along in the open with miles and miles of landscape stretching away on either side of us with the distance softened off into foliage from among which here and there
peers out a grey church tower like an aged sentinel keeping watch upon the quiet village which clusters round the hallowed pile we have fallen in with genial company to-day a genuine broadland naturalist has chosen the same compartment he is bent on a day's hard work among the insects and wild flowers if such a labour of love deserves the title and for the capture and accommodation of which he appears amply provided which buzz and bloom in the fens and wildernesses of broadland he is certainly a character in his way a small spare-built man past the middle of life with shoulders bent and betokening that some sedentary occupation has for long been his lot in life and years of hard honest toil have made his large hands gaunt and bony
we are not long edging him into a pleasant confab and the hard lines upon his intelligent face relax somewhat as he instinctively feels himself in company with kindred spirits he waxes eloquent upon the delights of broadland you may have your rugged awe-inspiring mountain scenery your wild rocky fastnesses if you choose not that i have ever been amongst them except in books of travel but i can pretty well reckon what they'd be like but give me my low-lying marsh-covered reedy broadland where the redshank the coot the grebe and the lapwing ring out their strange weird cries the land of the bulrush and the water-lily has delights for me that i am positive no other could possess these fifty years have i spent boy and man amongst snips of leather lars and lapstone were my toys in childhood and they get me my living now thump thump thump
snobbing is dull monotonous labour to be sure from morning to night with the smell of leather beneath your olfactories but a man must live by the sweat of his brow but then sir when one does manage to get his leg loose from the boot-strap and let it and the other stride and scamper out in the open country on such a day as this why how much lighter becomes the burden of life and what a pleasant little oasis in its dreary routine to be sure it is not that i am unhappy or discontented by any means for the fruits of many a jaunt in broadland surround me when at my labour in the shape of well-preserved specimens which stir up many a pleasant recollection of sunny days and jolly doings among the flowers and insects the birds and mollusks in times gone by to accomplish much real work as a naturalist a man needs to be above the necessity of earning his daily bread and the time should be his own
but then sir there's this about it when one's destined to earn his livelihood by close hard grinding labour because fortune failed to smile upon his predecessors he cannot afford to quarrel with her labour well one has got used to it by this time without the comfort or inconvenience of having grown any the richer for competency is not won you know by snobbing but there's this to be said of it it's more a matter of hand than head-work you can sit and thump and think and thump and plan and meditate between them to your heart's content which can't be said of every occupation it comes hard where a man hasn't a hobby or any mental employment and nothing to anticipate in event of a holiday then the humdrum becomes a bore that's why so many of my fraternity grumble about life's monotony over their pipe and pot and engender discontent against their fellow-men and the good god above us all
who never destined man i am quite convinced to be unhappy whatever sphere of life he placed him in sir there is dignity in labour such is a sample of the interesting chat our loquacious friend unreels and we regret our paths diverge as we step out from the village platform whistling a merry song away high is the little man with the nets and wallet which contains his store boxes and bottles and the hundred other little knick-knacks that go to form a naturalist's outfit it is well for him that his captures will be light even if numerous for the paraphernalia he carries is sufficient weight of itself the lanes are now in the zenith of their beauty the humble bee and his kindred and a host of meadow-brown tortoiseshell and other butterflies dance and gossip and glean among the bright flowers which dot the hedge-banks and push out their gay petals
from between the stouter growth that would obscure them in their quest of sunshine there is a wealth of colouration on every hand the yellow hawkweeds have opened their starry flowers and are smiling in the scraggiest of places where sweet air stirs the bluebells lightly and where prickly firs buds lavish gold a hundred others lend their charms to make the countryside beautiful above them all tower the sweet-scented honeysuckle and the pale pink flowers of the dog-rose the meadows beyond are made gay with sorrel and many other familiar wild plant while lazy bovines wading amid luxuriant grasses are enjoying their brief existence eyeing yonder farmer and the butcher's man in blue without the slightest suspicion that their happy days are numbered the ditches are brimful of life from sluggish tadpoles and flashing sticklebacks down to the tiny volvox and the unseen rotiferia and other animal
our naturalist has by this time doubtless filled some of his bottles with specimens for we noted him groping and dredging at a ditch-side soon after we parted company this very dyke trends away broadwards and possesses in miniature many of the features which characterise those great lagoons here are some yellow water-lilies neufar lutea their small golden cups contrasting prettily with the dark ovate leaves from which they lift their heads forget-me-nots are sprinkled along the edge of the crowding reeds and taller irises with spangles of yellow and blue look down upon them whilst above all nod and rustle the green spear-leaves of the reeds and around them tiny insects sport and play to the profit of many a swallow and sand-martin that are dashing to and fro
a kingfisher hurries away from a willow bowl at our approach the ruddy hues of his breast reflecting in the water below him his emerald wing and tail-coverts appearing like streaks of burnished metal as he flies in a bee-line to some shady nook he knows of some tiny black animals too quickly for the eye to follow them plunge into the still waters like so many stones they are water shrews and are of all our british mammalia the most secretive in their ways and habits we have not time to loiter longer or we would certainly try and steal a march upon them we have noticed many a young bird of the year as we came along for the first birds have been started off to earn a livelihood on their own account little tits and larger finches not nearly so brightly plumaged as they hope to be next springtime dot the hedgerows forage in the herbage below them or fly on hasty wing hither and thither
insects are swarming and well it is that they are so or the insectivorous birds would go to roost hungry and the seed-eaters are now revelling in plenty it is pleasant to glide softly on the rippling waters scarce dipping the oars beneath the surface the hum of life and the rustle of vegetation are soothing to the jaded toiler a day's outing like this is rest and balm to both body and mind let the boat drift whither she will we are not tied to any special doing to-day not that we would kill time but it is delightful to feel ourselves once more away from the worry and the bustle and the conventionalities of town life and for the nonce to leave ledgers and hammers and scales and yard-sticks away in that chaos of brick and mortar where even the sparrows are sooty and the flowers and trees are dusty
and what little of nature is forced to breathe and grow in such uncongenial atmosphere seems pining for the purer air and sunlight of the country there certainly is not much that is awe-inspiring in these great solitudes and there is a strange sameness about them all but they are lovely with a beauty peculiarly their own grand indeed are these great indented ovals of silvery water apparently shut out from the rest of the busy workaday world by an interminable belt of reed and sedge and bulrush and an environment of stunted woodland where you might almost imagine dull care and the strife of life would scarce find a loophole for an entrance yonder is our friend the fenman's cottage standing upon the higher ground with its foreshore sloping to the water's edge in autumn
the trees on one side shake their leaves into it great white ducks are guarding their young broods in the sluice which trends towards the house and several geese are cropping the grass near by them Givantide we may expect the return of the master, for this morning Jem trets at Hazel. He is yet hale and hearty, and the old lady has something in the cupboard to which he will do ample justice on his return in the evening, with his boat piled up with gladden and other coarse herbage, to be used as litter in the pigsty, and bed for the ancient donkey, whose scraggy appearance
would suggest him to be as aged as his patron. Yonder is an artist at work with brush and maul stick. Let us run the boat ashore and saunter towards him. A moorhen flutters out of the little reed bed as our roar sweeps through it. Beneath, a shoal of small roach dash away in a fright, all making for the open broad. Our friend of the easel is throwing on his canvas, a delightful bit of scenery in the foreground big broad-leaved sedges dip their reflex in a pool of crystal above them is a willows drooping foliage tall graceful reeds on the right lose themselves in the background in a cul-de-sac of olders whilst a plank bridge with a rustic fencing is thrown across the pool
a trio of black-headed gulls show up boldly against a bit of blue sky was ever such a lovely little corner piece our artist friend is loud in the praises of broadland an aged man bent with many years wending his way from the fenman's cottage sidles up to us and expresses his opinion upon the picture as well as upon the state of things in general well boar you'll ha done that a suffen proper what nimble fingers some foot hev to be sure i might ha tried these seventy year an more to ha done that an couldn't says jem trett's elder brother for the merest trio of a physiognomist could have told his relationship to the old man of the fens ah boar these ere broads he continues aren't what they were fifty year ago not at all they ain't like the sam
not as the water is different or the bards and other critters ha altered although there's summat wrong with em there ain't so many on em as there was by a wery long chalk talk of carryin a gun nowadays why it ain't no use at all but a waste of good powder an time time was when i wur a youngster we could do a bit o shootin in this wery neighbourhood i hur put up five bottle bumps or bittins in a day an shot three on em an thought nothin on it now if one is heerd on every man jack has shoulders a shootin iron is on the rampage arter it why cos they're scarce and gents ha got a craze for em for stuffin em like as they hev them pretty black and white avocets i've heerd my father say as how them long-legged critters built their nests and bind them trees out hinder and a lot of old herons built in the tree-tops which seems a funny thing for a water-bard to do
why are the bitterns and them no longer plentiful why ain't they drained the mashers or marshes and the lowlands turnin thousands of acres into pastures and cultivation i've heerd my old dad say and true it were too for we shall rue it if t be true that fens be under takin an where we feed in fen an reed they'll feed both beef an bacon and don't they besides there ain't the lay or shelter for the bards there was would yow come here mr paynter if yow couldn't git a place worth of daubin on that ere pitcher well that's the way with em as to them clinkers or avocets i've heerd the old man say them chaps as fish for salmon up in newcastle was the cause that they are leavin indeed they were wiped out clean for the sake of their feathers as was made up into artificial flies we see one now and again so we do a bitten but they are foreigners as only come over in april and may
if they don't stop they get killed and then they're obliged to surely lor gentlemen times has altered altogether see them geese hinder years ago we used to rear thousands afore iron and brass pens was made we bred em for their quills and feathers and gossards or gooseherds were as much thought on and wanted as shepherds is to-day We plucked them alive four or five times a year. Fussed at Lady Dave for body and wing feathers, t'other times for body feathers only.
The young ends we broke in even at six weeks old by plucking out their tails. Cruel? Well, boy, I suppose you'd reckon it were, and perhaps it was. But you see, things were different then. Y'all can't whack a stubborn old dicky now
So I've heared say A throat a man in brass buttons Hevin' you afore the beaks Pretty hell to do And then there's everything else
As has gone wrong We used to burn dried cow dung And hovers Or peat Now we have coals
In course Them puffin' billies Or trains Had turned all that over Not as that matters much
There's a change too they ha' made We used to be quiet here once more But now see what swarms of folks a holiday mechan they turn in upon us Yachtin' I can do with Providin' them chaps in blazers on em don't overdo it
But I hate them steamers as upsets every mortal thing Tearing through the water like nobody knows what Frightening bards and scaring fish And playing the wary trundle up with everything There ain't the fish in the rivers there were
For how can the spawn Dashed and knocked about by the swell among the reeds Ever come to life Then them landowners as have been pulling the string Closing up the broads for shooting and fishing
and telling you you mustn't go here nor there. Why, it's sheer robbing of us, it is of our rights. I've heard say, the law locks up the man or woman as steals a goose from off a common,
but lets the bigger robber loose as nicks the common from the goose. And I don't know as that ain't the way things are going on everywhere else. Ah, gentlemen, things are going wrong, altogether wrong.
Much more does the ancient fellow unreal of his yarn of things that have long since vanished, regretting the passing away of old times as a calamity to be bewild. But we humour him, for an old man has his weaknesses. He loves to talk and grumble and ruminate, and why shouldn't he? he too like the old order of things will soon have stepped into the obscurity of the past with his quaint attire and quaint ways and his store of ancient history
we are once again afloat leaving the artist to listen to the rest of the old man's rhapsody coots moorhens swans grebes and various hedge birds are seen and watched in turn in a corner of the broad we come across a brace of young urchins busily catching small roach and tiny gudgeon and right merrily the truants for no doubt the schoolmaster will know them well as such are hauling out the hungry finners with a nosier twig and a bit of string upon which a bung is made to serve the purpose of a float with their towy heads plump naked legs and ruddy cheeks the youngsters look the very picture of health and carelessness they will trot home betimes to receive a drubbing no doubt and a hunk of bread for supper and make perhaps as little fuss over the one as they will ravenously enjoy the other may care sit as lightly on their shoulders in the days to come as it does to-day
hosts of black-headed gulls are making merry on the broad some are washing their spotless plumage in its cool waters others are apparently at rest while many are taking exercise on airy pinions for they have no doubt been spending long tiring hopeful hours upon their large brown speckled eggs not far away from here on a swampy island hundreds of nests may be found containing eggs in every stage of incubation and many of them already are tenanted by the yellow downy puffballs of chicks these birds at breeding time are strictly preserved many hundreds of the earlier eggs are taken by the keeper and realise a goodly sum they are not bad eating the eggs are laid in a cavity formed by trampling down the broken tops of the reeds and sedges and generally number three it is a sorry time for grubs and worms for miles around when the gulls come home to their breeding grounds
they scour the countryside for many a mile and farmer giles looks upon them with a kindly eye thick clouds have been piling up in the west and big raindrops dancing on the surface of the water warn us to seek shelter from the coming storm we pull away hard for the staithe and reach it not a little moist for the shower is pouting down in a seeming hurry right gladly we rub shoulders with our naturalist friend of the morning as we enter the village station and it is a right good time he treats us to over the luck he has had in his day's perambulation need we say we offer no negative to a pressing invite to turn over with him at nightfall the treasures he has been collecting chapter six Thank you.
