When the noisy groups of disputants at last quieted down, the squire, hoarse from his efforts, said: ‘It is my custom, as you know, to distribute the pads, mask and rudder, and fling the carcass to the hounds. To-day, however, I mean to depart from the rule. I will tell you why, and I hope every one of you will agree that I am right. My view is that this fine beast’—and here he lifted the otter clear of the sand as if to emphasize his words—‘which has excited so much interest and afforded a hunt we can never expect to see the like of, ought not to be broken up, but should be preserved for ourselves and others to look at in the years to come. Now, if any man has got anything to say, let him speak out.’
‘Say, sir,’ replied the parish clerk, after casting his quick eyes round the circle of approving faces, ‘why, that we’re one and all of the same way of thinkin’ as yoursel’! What’s a pad here or a pad there? To say nawthin’ as to who’s to have ’em. By all manner o’ means let the otter be set up, and let un be given pride of place again’ the wainscot; for if ever wild crittur deserved the honour, this one do, if only for the good he’s done the landlord.’
So the otter was set up in the hall in a handsome case, with a picture of the marsh for background. Of the many trophies that adorn the walls there is not one the squire was so proud of, none whose story he liked so well to relate. It alone bears no inscription; for, as he always said, ‘There is no need; my people will never let the record die!’ His words have proved true.
Though the wild promontory is steeped in legend and romance, though tales of giants, fairies, smugglers and shipwrecked sailors, abound, there is no story the crofters so often repeat by the firelight as the story of the otter, none the children listen to with closer attention. Mary’s three boys never wearied of hearing their mother tell how she stood on the rick and watched the hounds stream through the Fairies’ Gap; they always insisted on her giving the squire’s ‘Tally-ho!’ and hung on every word when she came to the message brought by the steward, that old John and his grandchild were to have their little place rent free for the rest of their days.
‘Again, again!’ they would cry, clapping their little hands; and generally Mary yielded to their entreaties. And when the time comes they will repeat the tale to their own children, as indeed do the miller’s and the moorman’s sons and daughters to-day. Thus the tradition of the otter bids fair to be handed on by generation after generation for long years to come, and to win an imperishable place amongst the hearthside stories of the West.
INDEX
Allotment of waters, [155]
Badger, [15], [65], [74], [83]
Bass, [36]
Bittern, [140]