Creatures of the Night: A Book of Wild Life in Western Britain

by Alfred Wellesley Rees

Since, under the care of his mother, he made his earliest visit to the reed-bed, Brighteye had seen hundreds of giant salmon; the restless fish, however, did not stay long in the pool, but after a brief sojourn passed upward. Often at dusk the salmon would leap clear into the air just as Brighteye came to the surface after his first dive, and once so near was a sportive fish that the vole became confused for the moment by the sudden turmoil of the “rise,” and rocked on the swell of the back-wash like a boat on the waves of a tossing sea. During the summer Brighteye had suffered nothing, beyond this one sudden fright, from the visits of the great silvery fish to the neighbourhood of his home; and, notwithstanding his experience, he was accustomed to dive boldly into the depths of the “hovers,” and even to regard without fear the approach of an unusually inquisitive salmon. Late in the autumn, however, Brighteye noticed, with unaccountable misgiving, a distinct change in the appearance of these passing visitors. The silvery sheen had died away from their scales, and had been succeeded by a dark, dull red; and the fish were sluggish and ill-tempered. Besides, they were so numerous, especially after a heavy rainfall, that the stream seemed barely able to afford them room in their favourite “hovers,” and the old trout, previously an easy master of the situation, found it almost beyond his powers to keep trespassers from his particular haunt in mid-current at the throat of the pool. So occupied was he with this duty that he seldom roamed into the little bays beneath the alder-fringes; and Brighteye, so long as he avoided the rapid, was fairly safe from his attack. The reed-bed, though partly submerged, still yielded the vole sufficient food; and to reach it straight from his home he had to pass through the shallows, which extended for a considerable distance up-stream and down-stream from the gravelly stretch immediately outside the reeds.

About the beginning of winter, when the migration of the salmon had become intermittent, and the sea-trout had all passed upward beyond the pool, two of the big, ugly “red fish,” late arrivals at the “hover” nearest the burrow, made a close inspection of the pool; then, instead of following their kindred to the further reaches, they fell back toward the tail of the stream and there remained. After the first week of their stay, Brighteye found them so ill-tempered that he dared not venture anywhere near the tail of the stream; and, as the big trout at the top of the pool showed irritation at the least disturbance, the vole was forced to wander down the bank, to a spot below the salmon, before crossing the river on his periodical journeys to the reed-bed. His kindred, still living in the burrow where he had been born, were similarly daunted; while the shrew became the object of such frequent attack—especially from the bigger of the two salmon, an old male with a sinister, pig-like countenance and a formidable array of teeth—that escape from disaster was little short of miraculous.

Having calculated to a nicety his chances of escape, and having decided to avoid at all times the haunts of the pugnacious fish, Brighteye was seldom inconvenienced, except that he had to pass further than hitherto along the bank before taking to the water, and thus had to risk attack from weasels and owls. But soon, to his dismay, he discovered that the salmon had shifted their quarters to the shallow close by the reeds. He was swimming one night as usual into the quiet water by the reed-bed, and, indeed, had entered a narrow, lane-like opening among the stems, when he felt a quick, powerful movement in the water, and saw a mysterious form turn in pursuit of him, and glide swiftly away with a mighty effort that caused a wave to ripple through the reeds, while the outer stalks bent and recoiled as if from the force of a powerful blow. On the following night he was chased almost to the end of the opening among the reeds, and barely escaped; but this time he recognised his pursuer. Afterwards, having unexpectedly met the shrew, he crept with his companion along by the water's edge as far as the ford, and spent the dark hours in a strange place, till at dawn he crossed the rough water, and sought his home by a path the further part of which he had not previously explored.

IV.

SAVED BY AN ENEMY.

The days were dim and the nights long, and thick, drenching mists hung over the gloomy river. The salmon's family affairs had reached an important stage; and the “redd,” furrowed in the gravel by the mated fish, contained thousands of newly deposited eggs. And, as many of the river-folk, from the big trout to the little water-shrew, continually threatened a raid on the spawn, the salmon guarded each approach to the shallows with unremitting vigilance.

It happened, unfortunately for Brighteye, that, while the construction of the “redd” was in progress, some of the eggs—unfertilised and therefore not heavy enough to sink to the bottom of the water—were borne slowly by the current to the ford below the pool, just as the shrew was occupied there in vain attempts to teach the vole how to hunt for insects among the pebbles.

If Brighteye had been at all inclined to vary his diet, he would at that moment have yielded to temptation. Everywhere around him the trout were exhibiting great eagerness, snapping up the delicacies as they drew near, and then moving forward on the scent in the direction of the “redd.” The shrew joined in the quest; and Brighteye, full of curiosity, swam beside his playmate in the wake of the hungry trout. The vole found quite a shoal of fish collected near the reeds; and for a few moments he frolicked about the edge of the shallow. He could see nothing of the old male salmon, though he caught a glimpse of the female busy with her maternal duties at the top of the “redd.”

After diving up-stream and along by the line of the eager trout, he rose to breathe at the surface, when, suddenly, the river seemed alive with trout scattering in every direction, a great upheaval seemed to part the water, and he himself was gripped by one of his hind-feet and dragged violently down and across to the deep “hover” near his home. The salmon had at last outwitted the vole. The current was strong, and beneath its weight Brighteye's body was bent backwards till his fore-paws rested on the salmon's head. Mad with rage and fright, he clawed and bit at the neck of his captor. Gradually his strength was giving way, and for want of air he was losing consciousness, when, like a living bolt, Lutra, the otter, to save unwittingly a life that she had erstwhile threatened, shot from the darkness of the river-bed, and fixed her teeth in the neck of the salmon scarcely more than an inch from the spot to which the vole held fast in desperation. In the struggle that ensued, and ended only when Lutra had carried her prey to shore, Brighteye, half suffocated and but faintly apprehending what had taken place, was released. Like a cork he rose to the surface, where he lay outstretched and gasping, while the current carried him swiftly to the ford, and thence to the pool beneath the village gardens. Having recovered sufficiently to paddle feebly ashore, he sat for a time in the safe shelter of a rocky ledge, unnoticed by the brown rats as they wandered through the tall, withered grass-clumps high above his hiding place. At last he got the better of his sickness and fright; and, notwithstanding the continued pain of his scarred limbs, he brushed his furry coat and limped homeward just as the dawn was silvering the grey, silent pool where the lonely salmon guarded the “redd” and waited in vain for the return of her absent mate.