CHAPTER III

“He prayeth well who loveth well

Both men and bird and beast;

He prayeth best who loveth best

All things both great and small:

For the dear God who loveth us,

He made and loveth all.”

COLERIDGE.

[Picture: Mermaid] TOM was now quite amphibious. You do not know what

that means? You had better, then, ask the nearest Government

pupil-teacher, who may possibly answer you smartly enough, thus—

“Amphibious. Adjective, derived from two Greek words, _amphi_, a fish,

and _bios_, a beast. An animal supposed by our ignorant ancestors to be

compounded of a fish and a beast; which therefore, like the hippopotamus,

can’t live on the land, and dies in the water.”

However that may be, Tom was amphibious: and what is better still, he was

clean. For the first time in his life, he felt how comfortable it was to

have nothing on him but himself. But he only enjoyed it: he did not know

it, or think about it; just as you enjoy life and health, and yet never

think about being alive and healthy; and may it be long before you have

to think about it!

He did not remember having ever been dirty. Indeed, he did not remember

any of his old troubles, being tired, or hungry, or beaten, or sent up

dark chimneys. Since that sweet sleep, he had forgotten all about his

master, and Harthover Place, and the little white girl, and in a word,

all that had happened to him when he lived before; and what was best of

all, he had forgotten all the bad words which he had learned from Grimes,

and the rude boys with whom he used to play.

That is not strange: for you know, when you came into this world, and

became a land-baby, you remembered nothing. So why should he, when he

became a water-baby?

Then have you lived before?

My dear child, who can tell? One can only tell that, by remembering

something which happened where we lived before; and as we remember

nothing, we know nothing about it; and no book, and no man, can ever tell

us certainly.

There was a wise man once, a very wise man, and a very good man, who

wrote a poem about the feelings which some children have about having

lived before; and this is what he said—

“_Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting_;

_The soul that rises with us_, _our life’s star_,

_Hath elsewhere had its setting_,

_And cometh from afar_:

_Not in entire forgetfulness_,

_And not in utter nakedness_,

_But trailing clouds of glory_, _do we come_

_From God_, _who is our home_.”

[Picture: Woman teacher]

There, you can know no more than that. But if I was you, I would believe

that. For then the great fairy Science, who is likely to be queen of all

the fairies for many a year to come, can only do you good, and never do

you harm; and instead of fancying with some people, that your body makes

your soul, as if a steam-engine could make its own coke; or, with some

people, that your soul has nothing to do with your body, but is only

stuck into it like a pin into a pincushion, to fall out with the first

shake;—you will believe the one true,

_orthodox_, _inductive_,

_rational_, _deductive_,

_philosophical_, _seductive_,

_logical_, _productive_,

_irrefragable_, _salutary_,

_nominalistic_, _comfortable_,

_realistic_,

_and

on-all-accounts-to-be-received_

doctrine of this wonderful fairy tale; which is, that your soul makes

your body, just as a snail makes his shell. For the rest, it is enough

for us to be sure that whether or not we lived before, we shall live

again; though not, I hope, as poor little heathen Tom did. For he went

downward into the water: but we, I hope, shall go upward to a very

different place.

[Picture: Tom in the stream]

But Tom was very happy in the water. He had been sadly overworked in the

land-world; and so now, to make up for that, he had nothing but holidays

in the water-world for a long, long time to come. He had nothing to do

now but enjoy himself, and look at all the pretty things which are to be

seen in the cool clear water-world, where the sun is never too hot, and

the frost is never too cold.

[Picture: Insect] And what did he live on? Water-cresses, perhaps; or

perhaps water-gruel, and water-milk; too many land-babies do so likewise.

But we do not know what one-tenth of the water-things eat; so we are not

answerable for the water-babies.

Sometimes he went along the smooth gravel water-ways, looking at the

crickets which ran in and out among the stones, as rabbits do on land; or

he climbed over the ledges of rock, and saw the sand-pipes hanging in

thousands, with every one of them a pretty little head and legs peeping

out; or he went into a still corner, and watched the caddises eating dead

sticks as greedily as you would eat plum-pudding, and building their

houses with silk and glue. Very fanciful ladies they were; none of them

would keep to the same materials for a day. One would begin with some

pebbles; then she would stick on a piece of green wood; then she found a

shell, and stuck it on too; and the poor shell was alive, and did not

like at all being taken to build houses with: but the caddis did not let

him have any voice in the matter, being rude and selfish, as vain people

are apt to be; then she stuck on a piece of rotten wood, then a very

smart pink stone, and so on, till she was patched all over like an

Irishman’s coat. Then she found a long straw, five times as long as

herself, and said, “Hurrah! my sister has a tail, and I’ll have one too;”

and she stuck it on her back, and marched about with it quite proud,

though it was very inconvenient indeed. And, at that, tails became all

the fashion among the caddis-baits in that pool, as they were at the end

of the Long Pond last May, and they all toddled about with long straws

sticking out behind, getting between each other’s legs, and tumbling over

each other, and looking so ridiculous, that Tom laughed at them till he

cried, as we did. But they were quite right, you know; for people must

always follow the fashion, even if it be spoon-bonnets.

[Picture: Lady in 1862 bonnet] Then sometimes he came to a deep still

reach; and there he saw the water-forests. They would have looked to you

only little weeds: but Tom, you must remember, was so little that

everything looked a hundred times as big to him as it does to you, just

as things do to a minnow, who sees and catches the little water-creatures

which you can only see in a microscope.

And in the water-forest he saw the water-monkeys and water-squirrels

(they had all six legs, though; everything almost has six legs in the

water, except efts and water-babies); and nimbly enough they ran among

the branches. There were water-flowers there too, in thousands; and Tom

tried to pick them: but as soon as he touched them, they drew themselves

in and turned into knots of jelly; and then Tom saw that they were all

alive—bells, and stars, and wheels, and flowers, of all beautiful shapes

and colours; and all alive and busy, just as Tom was. So now he found

that there was a great deal more in the world than he had fancied at

first sight.

There was one wonderful little fellow, too, who peeped out of the top of

a house built of round bricks. He had two big wheels, and one little

one, all over teeth, spinning round and round like the wheels in a

thrashing-machine; and Tom stood and stared at him, to see what he was

going to make with his machinery. And what do you think he was doing?

Brick-making. With his two big wheels he swept together all the mud

which floated in the water: all that was nice in it he put into his

stomach and ate; and all the mud he put into the little wheel on his

breast, which really was a round hole set with teeth; and there he spun

it into a neat hard round brick; and then he took it and stuck it on the

top of his house-wall, and set to work to make another. Now was not he a

clever little fellow?

Tom thought so: but when he wanted to talk to him the brick-maker was

much too busy and proud of his work to take notice of him.

Now you must know that all the things under the water talk; only not such

a language as ours; but such as horses, and dogs, and cows, and birds

talk to each other; and Tom soon learned to understand them and talk to

them; so that he might have had very pleasant company if he had only been

a good boy. But I am sorry to say, he was too like some other little

boys, very fond of hunting and tormenting creatures for mere sport. Some

people say that boys cannot help it; that it is nature, and only a proof

that we are all originally descended from beasts of prey. But whether it

is nature or not, little boys can help it, and must help it. For if they

have naughty, low, mischievous tricks in their nature, as monkeys have,

that is no reason why they should give way to those tricks like monkeys,

who know no better. And therefore they must not torment dumb creatures;

for if they do, a certain old lady who is coming will surely give them

exactly what they deserve.

But Tom did not know that; and he pecked and howked the poor water-things

about sadly, till they were all afraid of him, and got out of his way, or

crept into their shells; so he had no one to speak to or play with.

The water-fairies, of course, were very sorry to see him so unhappy, and

longed to take him, and tell him how naughty he was, and teach him to be

good, and to play and romp with him too: but they had been forbidden to

do that. Tom had to learn his lesson for himself by sound and sharp

experience, as many another foolish person has to do, though there may be

many a kind heart yearning over them all the while, and longing to teach

them what they can only teach themselves.

At last one day he found a caddis, and wanted it to peep out of its

house: but its house-door was shut. He had never seen a caddis with a

house-door before: so what must he do, the meddlesome little fellow, but

pull it open, to see what the poor lady was doing inside. What a shame!

How should you like to have any one breaking your bedroom-door in, to see

how you looked when you where in bed? So Tom broke to pieces the door,

which was the prettiest little grating of silk, stuck all over with

shining bits of crystal; and when he looked in, the caddis poked out her

head, and it had turned into just the shape of a bird’s. But when Tom

spoke to her she could not answer; for her mouth and face were tight tied

up in a new night-cap of neat pink skin. However, if she didn’t answer,

all the other caddises did; for they held up their hands and shrieked

like the cats in Struwelpeter: “_Oh_, _you nasty horrid boy_; _there you

are at it again_! _And she had just laid herself up for a fortnight’s

sleep_, _and then she would have come out with such beautiful wings_,

_and flown about_, _and laid such lots of eggs_: _and now you have broken

her door_, _and she can’t mend it because her mouth is tied up for a

fortnight_, _and she will die_. _Who sent you here to worry us out of

our lives_?”

[Picture: Tom and a fish]

So Tom swam away. He was very much ashamed of himself, and felt all the

naughtier; as little boys do when they have done wrong and won’t say so.

Then he came to a pool full of little trout, and began tormenting them,

and trying to catch them: but they slipped through his fingers, and

jumped clean out of water in their fright. But as Tom chased them, he

came close to a great dark hover under an alder root, and out floushed a

huge old brown trout ten times as big as he was, and ran right against

him, and knocked all the breath out of his body; and I don’t know which

was the more frightened of the two.

Then he went on sulky and lonely, as he deserved to be; and under a bank

he saw a very ugly dirty creature sitting, about half as big as himself;

which had six legs, and a big stomach, and a most ridiculous head with

two great eyes and a face just like a donkey’s.

“Oh,” said Tom, “you are an ugly fellow to be sure!” and he began making

faces at him; and put his nose close to him, and halloed at him, like a

very rude boy.

When, hey presto; all the thing’s donkey-face came off in a moment, and

out popped a long arm with a pair of pincers at the end of it, and caught

Tom by the nose. It did not hurt him much; but it held him quite tight.

“Yah, ah! Oh, let me go!” cried Tom.

“Then let me go,” said the creature. “I want to be quiet. I want to

split.”

Tom promised to let him alone, and he let go.

“Why do you want to split?” said Tom.

“Because my brothers and sisters have all split, and turned into

beautiful creatures with wings; and I want to split too. Don’t speak to

me. I am sure I shall split. I will split!”

Tom stood still, and watched him. And he swelled himself, and puffed,

and stretched himself out stiff, and at last—crack, puff, bang—he opened

all down his back, and then up to the top of his head.

And out of his inside came the most slender, elegant, soft creature, as

soft and smooth as Tom: but very pale and weak, like a little child who

has been ill a long time in a dark room. It moved its legs very feebly;

and looked about it half ashamed, like a girl when she goes for the first

time into a ballroom; and then it began walking slowly up a grass stem to

the top of the water.

Tom was so astonished that he never said a word but he stared with all

his eyes. And he went up to the top of the water too, and peeped out to

see what would happen.

And as the creature sat in the warm bright sun, a wonderful change came

over it. It grew strong and firm; the most lovely colours began to show

on its body, blue and yellow and black, spots and bars and rings; out of

its back rose four great wings of bright brown gauze; and its eyes grew

so large that they filled all its head, and shone like ten thousand

diamonds.

“Oh, you beautiful creature!” said Tom; and he put out his hand to catch

it.

But the thing whirred up into the air, and hung poised on its wings a

moment, and then settled down again by Tom quite fearless.

[Picture: Tom and the dragon-fly]

“No!” it said, “you cannot catch me. I am a dragon-fly now, the king of

all the flies; and I shall dance in the sunshine, and hawk over the

river, and catch gnats, and have a beautiful wife like myself. I know

what I shall do. Hurrah!” And he flew away into the air, and began

catching gnats.

“Oh! come back, come back,” cried Tom, “you beautiful creature. I have

no one to play with, and I am so lonely here. If you will but come back

I will never try to catch you.”

“I don’t care whether you do or not,” said the dragon-fly; “for you

can’t. But when I have had my dinner, and looked a little about this

pretty place, I will come back, and have a little chat about all I have

seen in my travels. Why, what a huge tree this is! and what huge leaves

on it!”

It was only a big dock: but you know the dragon-fly had never seen any

but little water-trees; starwort, and milfoil, and water-crowfoot, and

such like; so it did look very big to him. Besides, he was very

short-sighted, as all dragon-flies are; and never could see a yard before

his nose; any more than a great many other folks, who are not half as

handsome as he.

The dragon-fly did come back, and chatted away with Tom. He was a little

conceited about his fine colours and his large wings; but you know, he

had been a poor dirty ugly creature all his life before; so there were

great excuses for him. He was very fond of talking about all the

wonderful things he saw in the trees and the meadows; and Tom liked to

listen to him, for he had forgotten all about them. So in a little while

they became great friends.

And I am very glad to say, that Tom learned such a lesson that day, that

he did not torment creatures for a long time after. And then the

caddises grew quite tame, and used to tell him strange stories about the

way they built their houses, and changed their skins, and turned at last

into winged flies; till Tom began to long to change his skin, and have

wings like them some day.

[Picture: Acrobat] And the trout and he made it up (for trout very soon

forget if they have been frightened and hurt). So Tom used to play with

them at hare and hounds, and great fun they had; and he used to try to

leap out of the water, head over heels, as they did before a shower came

on; but somehow he never could manage it. He liked most, though, to see

them rising at the flies, as they sailed round and round under the shadow

of the great oak, where the beetles fell flop into the water, and the

green caterpillars let themselves down from the boughs by silk ropes for

no reason at all; and then changed their foolish minds for no reason at

all either; and hauled themselves up again into the tree, rolling up the

rope in a ball between their paws; which is a very clever rope-dancer’s

trick, and neither Blondin nor Leotard could do it: but why they should

take so much trouble about it no one can tell; for they cannot get their

living, as Blondin and Leotard do, by trying to break their necks on a

string.

And very often Tom caught them just as they touched the water; and caught

the alder-flies, and the caperers, and the cock-tailed duns and spinners,

yellow, and brown, and claret, and gray, and gave them to his friends the

trout. Perhaps he was not quite kind to the flies; but one must do a

good turn to one’s friends when one can.

And at last he gave up catching even the flies; for he made acquaintance

with one by accident and found him a very merry little fellow. And this

was the way it happened; and it is all quite true.

He was basking at the top of the water one hot day in July, catching duns

and feeding the trout, when he saw a new sort, a dark gray little fellow

with a brown head. He was a very little fellow indeed: but he made the

most of himself, as people ought to do. He cocked up his head, and he

cocked up his wings, and he cocked up his tail, and he cocked up the two

whisks at his tail-end, and, in short, he looked the cockiest little man

of all little men. And so he proved to be; for instead of getting away,

he hopped upon Tom’s finger, and sat there as bold as nine tailors; and

he cried out in the tiniest, shrillest, squeakiest little voice you ever

heard,

“Much obliged to you, indeed; but I don’t want it yet.”

“Want what?” said Tom, quite taken aback by his impudence.

“Your leg, which you are kind enough to hold out for me to sit on. I

must just go and see after my wife for a few minutes. Dear me! what a

troublesome business a family is!” (though the idle little rogue did

nothing at all, but left his poor wife to lay all the eggs by herself).

“When I come back, I shall be glad of it, if you’ll be so good as to keep

it sticking out just so;” and off he flew.

Tom thought him a very cool sort of personage; and still more so, when,

in five minutes he came back, and said—“Ah, you were tired waiting?

Well, your other leg will do as well.”

And he popped himself down on Tom’s knee, and began chatting away in his

squeaking voice.

“So you live under the water? It’s a low place. I lived there for some

time; and was very shabby and dirty. But I didn’t choose that that

should last. So I turned respectable, and came up to the top, and put on

this gray suit. It’s a very business-like suit, you think, don’t you?”

“Very neat and quiet indeed,” said Tom.

“Yes, one must be quiet and neat and respectable, and all that sort of

thing for a little, when one becomes a family man. But I’m tired of it,

that’s the truth. I’ve done quite enough business, I consider, in the

last week, to last me my life. So I shall put on a ball dress, and go

out and be a smart man, and see the gay world, and have a dance or two.

Why shouldn’t one be jolly if one can?”

“And what will become of your wife?”

“Oh! she is a very plain stupid creature, and that’s the truth; and

thinks about nothing but eggs. If she chooses to come, why she may; and

if not, why I go without her;—and here I go.”

And, as he spoke, he turned quite pale, and then quite white.

“Why, you’re ill!” said Tom. But he did not answer.

“You’re dead,” said Tom, looking at him as he stood on his knee as white

as a ghost.

“No, I ain’t!” answered a little squeaking voice over his head. “This is

me up here, in my ball-dress; and that’s my skin. Ha, ha! you could not

do such a trick as that!”

And no more Tom could, nor Houdin, nor Robin, nor Frikell, nor all the

conjurors in the world. For the little rogue had jumped clean out of his

own skin, and left it standing on Tom’s knee, eyes, wings, legs, tail,

exactly as if it had been alive.

“Ha, ha!” he said, and he jerked and skipped up and down, never stopping

an instant, just as if he had St. Vitus’s dance. “Ain’t I a pretty

fellow now?”

And so he was; for his body was white, and his tail orange, and his eyes

all the colours of a peacock’s tail. And what was the oddest of all, the

whisks at the end of his tail had grown five times as long as they were

before.

“Ah!” said he, “now I will see the gay world. My living, won’t cost me

much, for I have no mouth, you see, and no inside; so I can never be

hungry nor have the stomach-ache neither.”

No more he had. He had grown as dry and hard and empty as a quill, as

such silly shallow-hearted fellows deserve to grow.

But, instead of being ashamed of his emptiness, he was quite proud of it,

as a good many fine gentlemen are, and began flirting and flipping up and

down, and singing—

“_My wife shall dance_, _and I shall sing_,

_So merrily pass the day_;

_For I hold it for quite the wisest thing_,

_To drive dull care away_.”

And he danced up and down for three days and three nights, till he grew

so tired, that he tumbled into the water, and floated down. But what

became of him Tom never knew, and he himself never minded; for Tom heard

him singing to the last, as he floated down—

“_To drive dull care away-ay-ay_!”

And if he did not care, why nobody else cared either.

But one day Tom had a new adventure. He was sitting on a water-lily

leaf, he and his friend the dragon-fly, watching the gnats dance. The

dragon-fly had eaten as many as he wanted, and was sitting quite still

and sleepy, for it was very hot and bright. The gnats (who did not care

the least for their poor brothers’ death) danced a foot over his head

quite happily, and a large black fly settled within an inch of his nose,

and began washing his own face and combing his hair with his paws: but

the dragon-fly never stirred, and kept on chatting to Tom about the times

when he lived under the water.

Suddenly, Tom heard the strangest noise up the stream; cooing, and

grunting, and whining, and squeaking, as if you had put into a bag two

stock-doves, nine mice, three guinea-pigs, and a blind puppy, and left

them there to settle themselves and make music.

He looked up the water, and there he saw a sight as strange as the noise;

a great ball rolling over and over down the stream, seeming one moment of

soft brown fur, and the next of shining glass: and yet it was not a ball;

for sometimes it broke up and streamed away in pieces, and then it joined

again; and all the while the noise came out of it louder and louder.

Tom asked the dragon-fly what it could be: but, of course, with his short

sight, he could not even see it, though it was not ten yards away. So he

took the neatest little header into the water, and started off to see for

himself; and, when he came near, the ball turned out to be four or five

beautiful creatures, many times larger than Tom, who were swimming about,

and rolling, and diving, and twisting, and wrestling, and cuddling, and

kissing and biting, and scratching, in the most charming fashion that

ever was seen. And if you don’t believe me, you may go to the Zoological

Gardens (for I am afraid that you won’t see it nearer, unless, perhaps,

you get up at five in the morning, and go down to Cordery’s Moor, and

watch by the great withy pollard which hangs over the backwater, where

the otters breed sometimes), and then say, if otters at play in the water

are not the merriest, lithest, gracefullest creatures you ever saw.

But, when the biggest of them saw Tom, she darted out from the rest, and

cried in the water-language sharply enough, “Quick, children, here is

something to eat, indeed!” and came at poor Tom, showing such a wicked

pair of eyes, and such a set of sharp teeth in a grinning mouth, that

Tom, who had thought her very handsome, said to himself, _Handsome is

that handsome does_, and slipped in between the water-lily roots as fast

as he could, and then turned round and made faces at her.

“Come out,” said the wicked old otter, “or it will be worse for you.”

But Tom looked at her from between two thick roots, and shook them with

all his might, making horrible faces all the while, just as he used to

grin through the railings at the old women, when he lived before. It was

not quite well bred, no doubt; but you know, Tom had not finished his

education yet.

[Picture: The otter]

“Come, away, children,” said the otter in disgust, “it is not worth

eating, after all. It is only a nasty eft, which nothing eats, not even

those vulgar pike in the pond.”

“I am not an eft!” said Tom; “efts have tails.”

“You are an eft,” said the otter, very positively; “I see your two hands

quite plain, and I know you have a tail.”

“I tell you I have not,” said Tom. “Look here!” and he turned his pretty

little self quite round; and, sure enough, he had no more tail than you.

The otter might have got out of it by saying that Tom was a frog: but,

like a great many other people, when she had once said a thing, she stood

to it, right or wrong; so she answered:

“I say you are an eft, and therefore you are, and not fit food for

gentlefolk like me and my children. You may stay there till the salmon

eat you (she knew the salmon would not, but she wanted to frighten poor

Tom). Ha! ha! they will eat you, and we will eat them;” and the otter

laughed such a wicked cruel laugh—as you may hear them do sometimes; and

the first time that you hear it you will probably think it is bogies.

“What are salmon?” asked Tom.

“Fish, you eft, great fish, nice fish to eat. They are the lords of the

fish, and we are lords of the salmon;” and she laughed again. “We hunt

them up and down the pools, and drive them up into a corner, the silly

things; they are so proud, and bully the little trout, and the minnows,

till they see us coming, and then they are so meek all at once, and we

catch them, but we disdain to eat them all; we just bite out their soft

throats and suck their sweet juice—Oh, so good!”—(and she licked her

wicked lips)—“and then throw them away, and go and catch another. They

are coming soon, children, coming soon; I can smell the rain coming up

off the sea, and then hurrah for a fresh, and salmon, and plenty of

eating all day long.”

[Picture: Tom and the otter]

And the otter grew so proud that she turned head over heels twice, and

then stood upright half out of the water, grinning like a Cheshire cat.

“And where do they come from?” asked Tom, who kept himself very close,

for he was considerably frightened.

“Out of the sea, eft, the great wide sea, where they might stay and be

safe if they liked. But out of the sea the silly things come, into the

great river down below, and we come up to watch for them; and when they

go down again we go down and follow them. And there we fish for the bass

and the pollock, and have jolly days along the shore, and toss and roll

in the breakers, and sleep snug in the warm dry crags. Ah, that is a

merry life too, children, if it were not for those horrid men.”

“What are men?” asked Tom; but somehow he seemed to know before he asked.

“Two-legged things, eft: and, now I come to look at you, they are

actually something like you, if you had not a tail” (she was determined

that Tom should have a tail), “only a great deal bigger, worse luck for

us; and they catch the fish with hooks and lines, which get into our feet

sometimes, and set pots along the rocks to catch lobsters. They speared

my poor dear husband as he went out to find something for me to eat. I

was laid up among the crags then, and we were very low in the world, for

the sea was so rough that no fish would come in shore. But they speared

him, poor fellow, and I saw them carrying him away upon a pole. All, he

lost his life for your sakes, my children, poor dear obedient creature

that he was.”

And the otter grew so sentimental (for otters can be very sentimental

when they choose, like a good many people who are both cruel and greedy,

and no good to anybody at all) that she sailed solemnly away down the

burn, and Tom saw her no more for that time. And lucky it was for her

that she did so; for no sooner was she gone, than down the bank came

seven little rough terrier doors, snuffing and yapping, and grubbing and

splashing, in full cry after the otter. Tom hid among the water-lilies

till they were gone; for he could not guess that they were the

water-fairies come to help him.

But he could not help thinking of what the otter had said about the great

river and the broad sea. And, as he thought, he longed to go and see

them. He could not tell why; but the more he thought, the more he grew

discontented with the narrow little stream in which he lived, and all his

companions there; and wanted to get out into the wide wide world, and

enjoy all the wonderful sights of which he was sure it was full.

And once he set off to go down the stream. But the stream was very low;

and when he came to the shallows he could not keep under water, for there

was no water left to keep under. So the sun burned his back and made him

sick; and he went back again and lay quiet in the pool for a whole week

more.

And then, on the evening of a very hot day, he saw a sight.

He had been very stupid all day, and so had the trout; for they would not

move an inch to take a fly, though there were thousands on the water, but

lay dozing at the bottom under the shade of the stones; and Tom lay

dozing too, and was glad to cuddle their smooth cool sides, for the water

was quite warm and unpleasant.

But toward evening it grew suddenly dark, and Tom looked up and saw a

blanket of black clouds lying right across the valley above his head,

resting on the crags right and left. He felt not quite frightened, but

very still; for everything was still. There was not a whisper of wind,

nor a chirp of a bird to be heard; and next a few great drops of rain

fell plop into the water, and one hit Tom on the nose, and made him pop

his head down quickly enough.

And then the thunder roared, and the lightning flashed, and leapt across

Vendale and back again, from cloud to cloud, and cliff to cliff, till the

very rocks in the stream seemed to shake: and Tom looked up at it through

the water, and thought it the finest thing he ever saw in his life.

But out of the water he dared not put his head; for the rain came down by

bucketsful, and the hail hammered like shot on the stream, and churned it

into foam; and soon the stream rose, and rushed down, higher and higher,

and fouler and fouler, full of beetles, and sticks; and straws, and

worms, and addle-eggs, and wood-lice, and leeches, and odds and ends, and

omnium-gatherums, and this, that, and the other, enough to fill nine

museums.

Tom could hardly stand against the stream, and hid behind a rock. But

the trout did not; for out they rushed from among the stones, and began

gobbling the beetles and leeches in the most greedy and quarrelsome way,

and swimming about with great worms hanging out of their mouths, tugging

and kicking to get them away from each other.

And now, by the flashes of the lightning, Tom saw a new sight—all the

bottom of the stream alive with great eels, turning and twisting along,

all down stream and away. They had been hiding for weeks past in the

cracks of the rocks, and in burrows in the mud; and Tom had hardly ever

seen them, except now and then at night: but now they were all out, and

went hurrying past him so fiercely and wildly that he was quite

frightened. And as they hurried past he could hear them say to each

other, “We must run, we must run. What a jolly thunderstorm! Down to

the sea, down to the sea!”

And then the otter came by with all her brood, twining and sweeping along

as fast as the eels themselves; and she spied Tom as she came by, and

said “Now is your time, eft, if you want to see the world. Come along,

children, never mind those nasty eels: we shall breakfast on salmon

to-morrow. Down to the sea, down to the sea!”

[Picture: Tom with the eels]

Then came a flash brighter than all the rest, and by the light of it—in

the thousandth part of a second they were gone again—but he had seen

them, he was certain of it—Three beautiful little white girls, with their

arms twined round each other’s necks, floating down the torrent, as they

sang, “Down to the sea, down to the sea!”

“Oh stay! Wait for me!” cried Tom; but they were gone: yet he could hear

their voices clear and sweet through the roar of thunder and water and

wind, singing as they died away, “Down to the sea!”

“Down to the sea?” said Tom; “everything is going to the sea, and I will

go too. Good-bye, trout.” But the trout were so busy gobbling worms

that they never turned to answer him; so that Tom was spared the pain of

bidding them farewell.

And now, down the rushing stream, guided by the bright flashes of the

storm; past tall birch-fringed rocks, which shone out one moment as clear

as day, and the next were dark as night; past dark hovers under swirling

banks, from which great trout rushed out on Tom, thinking him to be good

to eat, and turned back sulkily, for the fairies sent them home again

with a tremendous scolding, for daring to meddle with a water-baby; on

through narrow strids and roaring cataracts, where Tom was deafened and

blinded for a moment by the rushing waters; along deep reaches, where the

white water-lilies tossed and flapped beneath the wind and hail; past

sleeping villages; under dark bridge-arches, and away and away to the

sea. And Tom could not stop, and did not care to stop; he would see the

great world below, and the salmon, and the breakers, and the wide wide

sea.

And when the daylight came, Tom found himself out in the salmon river.

And what sort of a river was it? Was it like an Irish stream, winding

through the brown bogs, where the wild ducks squatter up from among the

white water-lilies, and the curlews flit to and fro, crying

“Tullie-wheep, mind your sheep;” and Dennis tells you strange stories of

the Peishtamore, the great bogy-snake which lies in the black peat pools,

among the old pine-stems, and puts his head out at night to snap at the

cattle as they come down to drink?—But you must not believe all that

Dennis tells you, mind; for if you ask him:

“Is there a salmon here, do you think, Dennis?”

“Is it salmon, thin, your honour manes? Salmon? Cartloads it is of

thim, thin, an’ ridgmens, shouldthering ache out of water, av’ ye’d but

the luck to see thim.”

Then you fish the pool all over, and never get a rise.

“But there can’t be a salmon here, Dennis! and, if you’ll but think, if

one had come up last tide, he’d be gone to the higher pools by now.”

[Picture: Dennis with pigs]

“Shure thin, and your honour’s the thrue fisherman, and understands it

all like a book. Why, ye spake as if ye’d known the wather a thousand

years! As I said, how could there be a fish here at all, just now?”

“But you said just now they were shouldering each other out of water?”

And then Dennis will look up at you with his handsome, sly, soft, sleepy,

good-natured, untrustable, Irish gray eye, and answer with the prettiest

smile:

“Shure, and didn’t I think your honour would like a pleasant answer?”

So you must not trust Dennis, because he is in the habit of giving

pleasant answers: but, instead of being angry with him, you must remember

that he is a poor Paddy, and knows no better; so you must just burst out

laughing; and then he will burst out laughing too, and slave for you, and

trot about after you, and show you good sport if he can—for he is an

affectionate fellow, and as fond of sport as you are—and if he can’t,

tell you fibs instead, a hundred an hour; and wonder all the while why

poor ould Ireland does not prosper like England and Scotland, and some

other places, where folk have taken up a ridiculous fancy that honesty is

the best policy.

Or was it like a Welsh salmon river, which is remarkable chiefly (at

least, till this last year) for containing no salmon, as they have been

all poached out by the enlightened peasantry, to prevent the _Cythrawl

Sassenach_ (which means you, my little dear, your kith and kin, and

signifies much the same as the Chinese _Fan Quei_) from coming bothering

into Wales, with good tackle, and ready money, and civilisation, and

common honesty, and other like things of which the Cymry stand in no need

whatsoever?

Or was it such a salmon stream as I trust you will see among the

Hampshire water-meadows before your hairs are gray, under the wise new

fishing-laws?—when Winchester apprentices shall covenant, as they did

three hundred years ago, not to be made to eat salmon more than three

days a week; and fresh-run fish shall be as plentiful under Salisbury

spire as they are in Holly-hole at Christchurch; in the good time coming,

when folks shall see that, of all Heaven’s gifts of food, the one to be

protected most carefully is that worthy gentleman salmon, who is generous

enough to go down to the sea weighing five ounces, and to come back next

year weighing five pounds, without having cost the soil or the state one

farthing?

Or was it like a Scotch stream, such as Arthur Clough drew in his

“Bothie”:—

“_Where over a ledge of granite_

_Into a granite bason the amber torrent descended_. . . . .

_Beautiful there for the colour derived from green rocks under_;

_Beautiful most of all_, _where beads of foam uprising_

_Mingle their clouds of white with the delicate hue of the

stillness_. . . .

_Cliff over cliff for its sides_, _with rowan and pendant birch

boughs_.” . . .

Ah, my little man, when you are a big man, and fish such a stream as

that, you will hardly care, I think, whether she be roaring down in full

spate, like coffee covered with scald cream, while the fish are swirling

at your fly as an oar-blade swirls in a boat-race, or flashing up the

cataract like silver arrows, out of the fiercest of the foam; or whether

the fall be dwindled to a single thread, and the shingle below be as

white and dusty as a turnpike road, while the salmon huddle together in

one dark cloud in the clear amber pool, sleeping away their time till the

rain creeps back again off the sea. You will not care much, if you have

eyes and brains; for you will lay down your rod contentedly, and drink in

at your eyes the beauty of that glorious place; and listen to the

water-ouzel piping on the stones, and watch the yellow roes come down to

drink and look up at you with their great soft trustful eyes, as much as

to say, “You could not have the heart to shoot at us?” And then, if you

have sense, you will turn and talk to the great giant of a gilly who lies

basking on the stone beside you. He will tell you no fibs, my little

man; for he is a Scotchman, and fears God, and not the priest; and, as

you talk with him, you will be surprised more and more at his knowledge,

his sense, his humour, his courtesy; and you will find out—unless you

have found it out before—that a man may learn from his Bible to be a more

thorough gentleman than if he had been brought up in all the

drawing-rooms in London.

[Picture: Scotsman]

No. It was none of these, the salmon stream at Harthover. It was such a

stream as you see in dear old Bewick; Bewick, who was born and bred upon

them. A full hundred yards broad it was, sliding on from broad pool to

broad shallow, and broad shallow to broad pool, over great fields of

shingle, under oak and ash coverts, past low cliffs of sandstone, past

green meadows, and fair parks, and a great house of gray stone, and brown

moors above, and here and there against the sky the smoking chimney of a

colliery. You must look at Bewick to see just what it was like, for he

has drawn it a hundred times with the care and the love of a true north

countryman; and, even if you do not care about the salmon river, you

ought, like all good boys, to know your Bewick.

At least, so old Sir John used to say, and very sensibly he put it too,

as he was wont to do:

“If they want to describe a finished young gentleman in France, I hear,

they say of him, ‘_Il sait son Rabelais_.’ But if I want to describe one

in England, I say, ‘_He knows his Bewick_.’ And I think that is the

higher compliment.”

But Tom thought nothing about what the river was like. All his fancy

was, to get down to the wide wide sea.

And after a while he came to a place where the river spread out into

broad still shallow reaches, so wide that little Tom, as he put his head

out of the water, could hardly see across.

And there he stopped. He got a little frightened. “This must be the

sea,” he thought. “What a wide place it is! If I go on into it I shall

surely lose my way, or some strange thing will bite me. I will stop here

and look out for the otter, or the eels, or some one to tell me where I

shall go.”

So he went back a little way, and crept into a crack of the rock, just

where the river opened out into the wide shallows, and watched for some

one to tell him his way: but the otter and the eels were gone on miles

and miles down the stream.

There he waited, and slept too, for he was quite tired with his night’s

journey; and, when he woke, the stream was clearing to a beautiful amber

hue, though it was still very high. And after a while he saw a sight

which made him jump up; for he knew in a moment it was one of the things

which he had come to look for.

Such a fish! ten times as big as the biggest trout, and a hundred times

as big as Tom, sculling up the stream past him, as easily as Tom had

sculled down.

Such a fish! shining silver from head to tail, and here and there a

crimson dot; with a grand hooked nose and grand curling lip, and a grand

bright eye, looking round him as proudly as a king, and surveying the

water right and left as if all belonged to him. Surely he must be the

salmon, the king of all the fish.

[Picture: Tom and the salmon]

Tom was so frightened that he longed to creep into a hole; but he need

not have been; for salmon are all true gentlemen, and, like true

gentlemen, they look noble and proud enough, and yet, like true

gentlemen, they never harm or quarrel with any one, but go about their

own business, and leave rude fellows to themselves.

The salmon looked at him full in the face, and then went on without

minding him, with a swish or two of his tail which made the stream boil

again. And in a few minutes came another, and then four or five, and so

on; and all passed Tom, rushing and plunging up the cataract with strong

strokes of their silver tails, now and then leaping clean out of water

and up over a rock, shining gloriously for a moment in the bright sun;

while Tom was so delighted that he could have watched them all day long.

And at last one came up bigger than all the rest; but he came slowly, and

stopped, and looked back, and seemed very anxious and busy. And Tom saw

that he was helping another salmon, an especially handsome one, who had

not a single spot upon it, but was clothed in pure silver from nose to

tail.

“My dear,” said the great fish to his companion, “you really look

dreadfully tired, and you must not over-exert yourself at first. Do rest

yourself behind this rock;” and he shoved her gently with his nose, to

the rock where Tom sat.

You must know that this was the salmon’s wife. For salmon, like other

true gentlemen, always choose their lady, and love her, and are true to

her, and take care of her and work for her, and fight for her, as every

true gentleman ought; and are not like vulgar chub and roach and pike,

who have no high feelings, and take no care of their wives.

Then he saw Tom, and looked at him very fiercely one moment, as if he was

going to bite him.

“What do you want here?” he said, very fiercely.

“Oh, don’t hurt me!” cried Tom. “I only want to look at you; you are so

handsome.”

“Ah?” said the salmon, very stately but very civilly. “I really beg your

pardon; I see what you are, my little dear. I have met one or two

creatures like you before, and found them very agreeable and

well-behaved. Indeed, one of them showed me a great kindness lately,

which I hope to be able to repay. I hope we shall not be in your way

here. As soon as this lady is rested, we shall proceed on our journey.”

What a well-bred old salmon he was!

“So you have seen things like me before?” asked Tom.

“Several times, my dear. Indeed, it was only last night that one at the

river’s mouth came and warned me and my wife of some new stake-nets which

had got into the stream, I cannot tell how, since last winter, and showed

us the way round them, in the most charmingly obliging way.”

“So there are babies in the sea?” cried Tom, and clapped his little

hands. “Then I shall have some one to play with there? How delightful!”

“Were there no babies up this stream?” asked the lady salmon.

“No! and I grew so lonely. I thought I saw three last night; but they

were gone in an instant, down to the sea. So I went too; for I had

nothing to play with but caddises and dragon-flies and trout.”

“Ugh!” cried the lady, “what low company!”

“My dear, if he has been in low company, he has certainly not learnt

their low manners,” said the salmon.

“No, indeed, poor little dear: but how sad for him to live among such

people as caddises, who have actually six legs, the nasty things; and

dragon-flies, too! why they are not even good to eat; for I tried them

once, and they are all hard and empty; and, as for trout, every one knows

what they are.” Whereon she curled up her lip, and looked dreadfully

scornful, while her husband curled up his too, till he looked as proud as

Alcibiades.

“Why do you dislike the trout so?” asked Tom.

“My dear, we do not even mention them, if we can help it; for I am sorry

to say they are relations of ours who do us no credit. A great many

years ago they were just like us: but they were so lazy, and cowardly,

and greedy, that instead of going down to the sea every year to see the

world and grow strong and fat, they chose to stay and poke about in the

little streams and eat worms and grubs; and they are very properly

punished for it; for they have grown ugly and brown and spotted and

small; and are actually so degraded in their tastes, that they will eat

our children.”

“And then they pretend to scrape acquaintance with us again,” said the

lady. “Why, I have actually known one of them propose to a lady salmon,

the little impudent little creature.”

[Picture: Trout and salmon]

“I should hope,” said the gentleman, “that there are very few ladies of

our race who would degrade themselves by listening to such a creature for

an instant. If I saw such a thing happen, I should consider it my duty

to put them both to death upon the spot.” So the old salmon said, like

an old blue-blooded hidalgo of Spain; and what is more, he would have

done it too. For you must know, no enemies are so bitter against each

other as those who are of the same race; and a salmon looks on a trout,

as some great folks look on some little folks, as something just too much

like himself to be tolerated.