There is many a slip between the cup and the lip. The old saw was illustrated in the case of the shikaree while endeavouring to ensnare the storks; though it was not the snare, but the birds that now illustrated the adage.
After the attempt had been made, the snare could be still seen in its place, stiffly projecting from the point of the long bamboo rod; while the adjutants were soaring in the air, mounting still higher upward, their slender necks outstretched, their beaks cracking like castanets, and their throats emitting an angry sound like the roaring of a brace of lions.
The failure was not to be attributed to Ossaroo; but to the imprudence of one of his companions—an individual of the party close treading upon his heels. That individual was Fritz!
Just as Ossaroo was about casting his loop over the shoulders of a sleeping adjutant, Fritz—who had followed the party from the hut—now for the first time perceiving the birds, rushed forward and seized the tail of one of them between his teeth. Then, as if determined on securing the beautiful marabout feathers, he pulled a large mouthful of them clean out by the roots.
This was not exactly the motive that impelled Fritz to make such an unexpected attack—unexpected, because the well-trained animal would have known better than to fright the game which his masters were in the act of stalking; and such imprudence had never before been displayed by him. It was the particular kind of game that had provoked Fritz to act contrary to his usual habit of caution; for of all the creatures which he had encountered, since his arrival in the counted there, was none that had inspired him with a more profound feeling of hostility than these same adjutants. During Fritz’s sojourn in the Botanic Gardens of Calcutta—where his masters, it will be remembered, were for some time entertained as guests—Fritz had often come in contact with a brace of these gigantic birds, that were also guests of that justly celebrated establishment: they habitually made their stay within the enclosure, where they were permitted to stalk about unmolested, and pick up such stray scraps as were cast out by the domestics of the curator’s mansion.
These birds had grown so tame, as to take food freely out of the hand of anyone who offered it to them; and with like freedom, to take it where it was not offered, but found within reach of their long prehensile beaks. Often had they pilfered provisions to which they were anything but welcome; and, among other acts of their rapacity, there was one of which Fritz had been an interested spectator, and for which he was not likely ever to forgive them. That was, their robbing him of a dainty piece of meat, which one of the cooks had presented to Fritz himself; and upon which he had been going to make his dinner. One of the birds had the audacity to seize the meat in its mandibles, jerk it out of the dog’s very teeth, and swallow it, before the latter had time to offer either interruption or remonstrance.
The consequence was, that, from that time, Fritz had conceived a most rancorous antipathy towards all birds of the genus Ciconia—and the species Argala in particular; and this it was that impelled him, on first perceiving the adjutant—for being by the hut on their arrival he had not seen them before,—to rush open-mouthed towards them, and seize the tail of one of them between his teeth.
It is not necessary to add that the bird, thus indecorously assailed, took to instant flight, followed by its more fortunate though not less frightened mate—leaving Fritz in a temper to treat Marabout feathers as they had never been treated before—even when by the hands of some scorned and jealous vixen they may have been torn from the turban of some hated rival!