Unexplored Spain Part 39

Numerous as they are, yet these night-rovers rarely come in evidence unless one goes expressly in search of them. In regular shooting, with organised parties, they are more or less ignored, or rather they pa.s.s unseen through the lines, moving so silently and stealthily and always choosing the thickest covert. With guns from 100 to 200 yards apart and upwards, each intent on the larger game, the secretive _alimanas_ easily get through--indeed, wolves and even big boars, though the crash of brushwood may be heard, often pa.s.s unseen.

Many unconventional days have the authors enjoyed in express pursuit of these keen-eyed creatures--call them vermin if you will. There are four methods which we have found effective:

1. Short drives of individual jungles where sufficient open s.p.a.ces occur to leeward to enable the game to be seen.

2. Long drives of extensive jungles, converging on guns placed at points that either command the probable lines of retreat, or cover some other favourite resort wherein the quarry is likely to seek refuge.

3. Calling--in Spanish, _chillando_.

4. Watching at dawn or dusk, either with or without a "drag."

1. The first plan is, of course, the simplest; but it must be borne in mind that this is essentially close-quarters' work--hence the utmost silence is necessary. Horses must be picketed at least a mile back, for the clank of hoof on rock or the clas.h.i.+ng of the bucket-like Spanish stirrups in bush will awaken even a dormouse. All proceed on foot; and the whole plan having been arranged beforehand, not a word need now be spoken, each gun taking his allotted place in silence. Guns may be as far as 100 yards apart (since mould-shot is effective up to nearly that range) and each man should station himself looking into the beat, so as to command the intervening "opens," while himself absolutely concealed and still as a stone G.o.d, since he is now competing with some of the keenest eyes on earth. All the cats, moreover, come on so stealthily, making good their advance yard by yard, that quite possibly a great tawny lynx may be coolly surveying your position ere your eye has caught the slightest movement ahead.

Nothing emphasises the amazing stealth of these silent creatures more than such incidents: when suddenly you find, within twenty yards, a wild beast, standing nearly two feet at shoulder, slowly approaching through quite thin bush; how, in wonder's name, did it get so near unseen?

Foxes, as a rule, come bundling along with far less precaution and no such vigilant look-out ahead, though they will instantly detect the least _movement_ in front. A fox will often appear so deep in thought as to be absolutely thunderstruck when he finds himself face to face with a gun at six yards distance. In direst consternation he fairly bounds around, describing a complete circle of fur; whereas a cat in like circ.u.mstance merely deflects her course with coolest deliberation and never a sign of alarm or increase of speed. But within six more yards she will have vanished from view--covert or none. Adepts all are the cats, alike in appearing one knows not whence, and in disappearing one knows not how.

Yonder goes a fox, slowly trotting along below the crest, in his self-sufficient, nonchalant style. His upstanding fur, long bushy brush, and swollen neck appear to double his bulk and lend him quite an imposing figure. But let a rifle-ball sing past his ears or dash up a cloud of the sand below--what a transformation! One hardly now recognises the long lean streak that whips up and over the ridge.

A handsome trophy is the Spanish lynx, especially those more brightly coloured examples spa.r.s.ely spotted with big black splotches arranged, more or less, in interrupted lines. The ear-tufts--indeed in adults the extreme tips of the ears themselves--point inwards and backwards; and the narrow irides are pale yellow (between lemon and hazel), the pupil being full, round, and black, nearly filling the circle. In the wild-cat the pupil is a thin upright, set in a cruel pale-green iris.

We have tried FIRE as a means of securing the smaller _alimanas_, such as mongoose, but it is seldom a thicket or _mancha_ can be so completely isolated as to leave no line of escape. The animals, moreover, are astute enough to retire under cover of the clouds of smoke that roll away to leeward.

2. LONG DRIVES, extending over, say, a couple of miles of brush-wood (which may contain half-a-dozen patches of thicker jungle, all separate), give wide scope for skilled fieldcraft and demand no small local knowledge. The first essential is "an eye for a country." There are men to whom this faculty is denied; some seem incapable of acquiring it. Others, again, appear correctly to diagnose even a difficult country, with its chances, almost at a first experience. The favoured haunts of game, together with their accustomed lines of retreat when disturbed, must be studied. Each day, though engaged on other pursuit, one's eye should be reading those lessons that are written in "spoor,"

and noting each commanding point and salient angle or other local "advantage" in the terrain.

Such drives necessarily occupy more time; moreover, the precise lines of entry along which game may approach are less restricted--hence follows an even greater demand on that vigilance already emphasised. But to the hunter the mental gratification, the sense of dominion achieved, is ample reward when his deep-laid plans succeed and when along one or more of his ambushed lines the cunning carnivorae pursue an unsuspecting course.

Nature herself may a.s.sist by signs which set the expectant hunter yet more instantly alert. A distant kite suddenly swerving or checking its flight has seen _something_. The chattering of a band of magpies may only mean that they have struck a "find," say a dead rabbit--_tacitus pasci si posset corvus_, etc. But it may easily indicate a moving nocturnal, and such signs should never be ignored. Similarly a covey of partridges springing with continued cackling is a certain token of the presence of an enemy; while a terrified-looking rabbit, with staring eye and ears laid back, means that an interview is then instantly impending.

It may be necessary (as where a desert-stretch flanks the beat) to place "stops" far outside. These are as important as in a grouse-drive, but quite tenfold more difficult to array.

In these more extensive operations the lynx, in evading the guns, is sometimes intercepted by the advancing pack behind. Then, if by luck the cat can be forced into the open, she goes off at fine speed in great bounds, as a leopard covers the veld, and (the horses in this case being picketed close by) may sometimes be "tree'd" or run to bay in some distant thicket. In that case the a.s.sistance of the hunters is needed, for a lynx at bay will hold-up a whole pack of _podencos_, sitting erect on her haunches with her back to the bush and dealing half-arm blows with lightning speed. These _podencos_, it should be explained, are not intended to close, since all high-couraged dogs, we find, meet a speedy death from the tusks of wild-boars.

When pressed in the open, we have seen a lynx deliberately pa.s.s through deep water that lay in her line of flight.

3. CALLING.--The coney was ever a puny folk, yet in Tars.h.i.+sh he thrives and multiplies amidst numberless foes aloft and alow. From the heavens above fierce eyes directing hooked beaks and clenched talons survey his every movement; on the earth lynxes, cats, and foxes subsist chiefly on him; while below ground foumart and mongoose penetrate his farthest retreats year in and year out. He seems to possess absolutely no protection, yet he endures all this, supports his enemies, and increases, ever, to appearance, gaily unconscious of the perils that beset him. Once, however, let misfortune overtake the rabbit, and his cry of distress brings instant response--from scrub and sky, from thicket and lurking lair, a.s.semble the fiercer folk, each intent on his flesh.

It is upon this fact that the system of calling, or, in Spanish, _chillando_, is based. The instrument is simple. A crab's claw, or the green bark of a two-inch twig slipped off its stalk, will, in the lips of an adept, produce just such a cry of cunicular distress. Armed with this, and observing the wind, one takes post concealed by bush but commanding some open glade in front. The most favourable time is dawn and dusk--the latter for choice, since then predatory animals are waking up hungry. The first "call" by our Spanish companion almost startles by its lifelike verisimilitude. At short intervals these ringing distress-signals resound through the silent bush; if no response follows, we try another spot. First, a distant kite or buzzard, hearing the call, comes wheeling this way, but naturally the birds-of-prey from their lofty point of view detect the human presence and pursue their quest elsewhere. The rabbits themselves, from some inexplicable cause, are among the first to respond.

Within that opposite wall of jungle you detect a furtive movement; presently with jerky, spasmodic gait a rabbit darts out; it sits trembling with staring eyes and ears laid aback; another rolls over on its side and performs strange antics as though under hypnotic influence.

In two minutes you have a _seance_ of mesmerised rabbits.

My companion touches me on the arm; away beyond, and half behind him (almost on the wind), stands a fox intently gazing. Before the gun can be brought to bear it is necessary to step round the keeper's front, and one expects that that first movement will mean the instant disappearance of the vulpine. Not so! There he stands, statuesque, while the manoeuvre is executed. Is he, too, hypnotised? On one occasion the authors, standing shoulder to shoulder with the keeper behind them, were only concealed by a single bush in front. At the third or fourth call a wild-cat sprang from the thicket beyond, fairly flew the intervening thirty yards at a bound, and landed in the single bush at our feet (precisely where the "rabbit" should have been) before a gun could be raised. What a marvellous exhibition of wild hunting!

In this case, too, we had had notice in advance by the noisy rising of a pair of partridges sixty yards away in the bush. That cat scaled 12-1/2 lbs. dead-weight.

All the beasts-of-prey can be secured in this manner. February is their pairing-season; but the best time for "calling" is a month or so later--in March and April--when young rabbits appear and when the _alimanas_ themselves have their litters to feed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: IMPERIAL EAGLE Pa.s.sING OVERHEAD

(The spectator is presumed to be lying on his back!)]

Feathered raptores, such as eagles, kites, and buzzards, can also be obtained by "calling," but, as above indicated, their loftier position enables them to see the guns, and it is necessary in their case to prepare a covered shelter in which one can stand, concealed from above.

4. WATCHING.--The fourth and last system brings one face to face with wild nature in her nocturnal aspects. Such aspects (to the majority of mankind) are unknown; but night-work, whether at home, in Africa, or in Spain, has always strongly appealed to the writers. Wild creatures do not go to bed at night like lazy men; on the contrary, night is the period of fullest activity for a large proportion of G.o.d's creation, whether of fur or feather. To form an intimate personal acquaintance (however imperfect) with these, the comfort of the blankets must be sacrificed.

Where stretches of open country border or intersect jungle, or lie between the nocturnal hunting-grounds of carnivorae and the thickets where they lie-up by day, there one may enjoy hours of intense interest in watching what pa.s.ses under the moon. In the Coto Donana we have many such spots, some within an hour or two's ride of our shooting-lodges.

Here, when the moon s.h.i.+nes full, and the soft south wind blows towards the dark leagues of cistus and tree-heath behind us, we line-out three or four guns, each looking outwards across glittering sand-wastes on his front. There, on smooth expanse, one may detect every moving thing.

Those shadowy forms that seem to skim the surface without touching it are stone-curlews, and beyond them is a less mobile object, whose ident.i.ty none would guess by sight. That is a _tortuga_, or land-tortoise, tracing its singular double trail. Across the sand pa.s.ses a bigger shadow--rabbits and the rest all vanish. What was that shadow?

A strange growl overhead, and you see it is an eagle-owl that has scattered the ghost-like groups. Now there is something on the far skyline ahead--something that moves and puzzles--four mobile objects that were not there five seconds ago. These prove to be the ears of two hinds; presently the spiky horns of a stag appear behind them, and the trio move slowly across our front, stopping to nibble some tuft of bent.

None of these are what we seek, but as dawn approaches you may (or may not) detect the form of some beast-of-prey making for its lair in the jungle behind you. Foxes, as their habit is, trot straight in; the lynx comes with infinite caution. Should some starveling bush survive a hundred yards out, she may stop, squatting on her haunches, half-hidden in its shade. You can see there is something there, but the distance is just beyond a sure range, and seldom indeed will that cat come nearer.

However low and still you have laid the while, she will, by some subtle feline intuition, have gleaned (perhaps half unconsciously even to herself) a sense of danger. When day has dawned, you will find the retiring spoor winding backwards behind some gentle swell that leads to an unseen hollow beyond--and to safety. Truly you agree when the keeper says, "Lynxes see _best_ in the dark."

In a wide country it is of course purely fortuitous should any of these animals approach within shot. To a.s.sure that result with greater certainty we have adopted the plan of a "drag." Two or three hours before taking our positions (that is, shortly after midnight), a keeper rides along far outside on the sand, trailing behind his horse a bunch of split-open rabbits. Upon arriving outside the intended position of each gun, he directs his course inwards, thus dragging the bait close up to the post. Then taking a fresh bunch of rabbits, he repeats the operation to each post in turn. Thus every incoming beast must strike the scented trail at one point or another. Occasionally one will follow the drag right into the expectant gun, more often (the animals being full at that hour) it will leave the trail after following it for a greater or less distance. Some ignore it altogether. This applies to all sorts. The sand, as day dawns, forms a regular lexicon of spoor. One can trace each movement of the night. There go the plantigrade tracks of a badger, and hard by the light-footed prints of mongoose, mice, and an infinity of minor creatures.

Foxes most frequently capture their prey in fair chase, running them down, as shown by the double spoor ending in blood. Lynxes never chase; they kill by stalking, and a crouching spoor ends in a spring. Both these habitually carry away or bury all they do not devour on the spot.

From the end of January onwards (that being the pairing-season) foxes may often be seen abroad by daylight in couples, and in such case, provided _they_ are _seen first_, are easily brought-up by "calling."

Lynxes never show-up so by daylight, but an hour or two before dawn their weird wailing cries may be heard in the bush from mid-February onwards.

The mongoose is perhaps the least easily secured, being absolutely nocturnal and running so low (like a giant weasel) as to be almost invisible, however slight the covert. It is, moreover, an adept at concealment, and will scarcely be detected even at thirty yards if stationary. The best way to secure specimens of badger and mongoose is by digging-out their breeding-earths or warrens. An initial difficulty is to find the earths amid leagues of scrub or rugged mountain-sides; and even when located it may be necessary to burn off half an acre of brushwood before the spade can be brought into action. From one set of earths we have succeeded in digging out five big mongoose alive. That night, though confined in strong wooden cases, they gnawed their way out, and were never seen more, albeit their prison was on board a yacht anch.o.r.ed in mid-stream and half-a-mile from sh.o.r.e.

A few such days and nights as these teach that wild Spain cherishes other animals besides the game, to the full as interesting and even more difficult to secure.

If we are asked (as we often have been before) why we molest creatures which have no value when killed, we reply that almost without exception our Spanish specimens have gone to enrich one collection or another, public or private, and that during the year in which we write this the authors spent a fortnight in obtaining a series of these animals for our National Museum at South Kensington, with the following results:--[56]

Four lynxes--two males, 30-1/4 and 31 lbs.; two females, 18-1/2 and 23 lbs.--representing both types, namely, (1) that with many small spots, and (2) the handsomer form with fewer large and conspicuous blotches.

One wild-cat (an exceptional specimen)--a male of 15 lbs., with yellow irides instead of the usual cold, cruel, pale-green eyes like an unripe gooseberry. This cat was what the Spanish keepers describe as _rayado_ = banded, _i.e._ the spots are arrayed in regular series or interrupted bands rather than scattered promiscuously. This race is distinguished as _gato clavo_, the ordinary wild-cat being known as _gato romano_.

Several other wild-cats (_Gatos romanos_)--males weighing from 10-3/4 to 12-1/2 lbs.; females weighing from 7-1/2 to 8-1/4 lbs.

In the sierras wild-cats run heavier than this, for we have killed in Morena a wild-cat that scaled 7-3/4 kilos, or upwards of 17 lbs.

Two badgers--male, 17-1/2 lbs.; female, 14-1/2 lbs. These Spanish badgers are blacker in the legs than British examples, and their fore-claws are more powerfully developed, possibly in this case through living in sand. Really big males weigh nearly double the above.