Bevis: The Story of a Boy

the field upon all fours and hadhoisted himself upright with difficulty. Something in the position, inthe hoary tree, and the greyish hue of his dress gave the impression ofan arboreal animal.

  But against the tree there leaned also a long slender pole, "teeled up"as "Jumps" would have said, and at the end of the pole was a hook. Theold man had permission to collect the dead wood, and the use of hiscrook was to tear down the decaying branches for which he was nowlooking. A crook is a very simple instrument--the mere branch of a treewill often serve as a crook--but no arboreal animal has ever used acrook. Ah! "Jumps," poor decaying "Jumps," with lengthened narrowexperience like a long footpath, with glazing eyes, crooked knee, andstiffened back, there was a something in thee for all that, the unseendifference that is all in all, the wondrous mind, the soul.

  Up in the sunshine a lark sung fluttering his wings; he arose from theearth, his heart was in the sky. Shall not the soul arise?

  Past the oak Bevis and Mark walked beside the hedge upon their way.Frost, and sunshine after had reddened the hawthorn sprays, and alreadythey could see through the upper branches--red with haws--for the grasswas strewn with the leaves from the exposed tops of the bushes. On theorange maples there were bunches of rosy-winged keys. There was a glosson the holly leaf, and catkins at the tips of the leafless birch. Asthe leaves fell from the horse-chestnut boughs the varnished sheaths ofthe buds for next year appeared; so there were green buds on thewillows, black tips to the ash saplings, green buds on the sycamores.They waited asleep in their sheaths till Orion strode the southern skyand Arcturus rose in the East.

  Slender larch boughs were coated with the yellow fluff of the decayingneedles. Brown fern, shrivelled rush tip, grey rowen grass at the vergeof the ditch showed that frost had wandered thither in the night. Bythe pond the brown bur-marigolds drooped, withering to seed, their dulldisks like lesser sunflowers without the sunflower's colour. There wasa beech which had been orange, but was now red from the topmost branchto the lowest, redder than the squirrels which came to it. Two or threelast buttercups flowered in the grass, and on a furze bush there were afew pale yellow blossoms not golden as in spring, but pale.

  Thin threads of gossamer gleamed, the light ran along their loops asthey were lifted by the breeze, and the sky was blue over the buff oaks.Jays screeched in the oaks looking for acorns, and there came themuffled tinkle of a sheep-bell. A humble-bee buzzed across their path,warmed into aimless life by the sun from his frost-chill of the night--buzzed across and drifted against a hawthorn branch. There he clung andcrept about the branch, his raft in the sunshine, as men chilled at seacling and creep about their platform of beams in the waste of waves.His feeble force was almost spent.

  The sun shone and his rays fell on red hawthorn spray, on yellow larchbough, on brown fern, rush tip, and grey grass, on red beech and yellowgorse, on broad buff oaks and orange maple, and on the gleaming pond.Wheresoever there was the least colour the sun's rays flew like a bee toa flower, and drew from it a beauty as they drew the song from the lark.

  The wind came from the blue sky with drifting skeins of mist in it likethose which curled in summer's dawn over the waters of the New Sea, thewind came and their blood glowed as they walked. King October reigned,and the wind of his mantle as he drew it about him puffed the leavesfrom the trees. June is the queen of the months, and October is king."Busk ye and bowne ye my merry men all:" sharpen your arrows and stringyour bows; set ye in order and march, march to the woods away.

  The wind came and rippled their blood into a glow, as it rippled thewater. A lissom steely sense strung their sinews; their backs felt likeoak-plants, upright, sturdy but not rigid; their frames charged withforce. This fierce sense of life is like the glow in the furnace wherethe draught comes; there's a light in the eye like the first starthrough the evening blue.

  Afar above a flock of rooks soared, winding round and round ageometrical staircase in the air, with outstretched wings like leavesupborne and slowly rotating edge first. The ploughshare was at workunder them planing the stubble and filling the breeze with the scent ofthe earth. Over the ploughshare they soared and danced in joyousmeasure.

  Upon the tops of the elms the redwings sat--high-flying thrushes with aspeck of blood under each wing--and called "kuck--quck" as theyapproached. When they came to the mound Bevis went one side of thehedge and Mark the other. Then at a word Pan rushed into the mound likea javelin, splintering the dry hollow "gix" stalks, but a thorn piercedhis shaggy coat and drew a "yap" from him.

  At that the hare waited no longer, but lightly leaped from the moundthirty yards ahead. Bound! Bound! Bevis poised his gun, got the doton the fleeting ears, and the hare rolled over and was still. So theypassed October, sometimes seeing a snipe on a sandy shallow of the brookunder a willow as they came round a bend. The wild-fowl began to cometo the New Sea, but these were older and wilder, and not easy to shoot.

  One day as they were out rowing in the Pinta they saw the magic wave,and followed it up, till Mark shot the creature that caused it, andfound it to be a large diving bird. Several times Bevis fired at heronsas they came over. Towards the evening as they were returning homewardsnow and then one would pass, and though he knew the height was too muchhe could not resist firing at such a broad mark as the wide wingsoffered. The heron, perhaps touched, but unharmed by the pellets whosesting had left them, almost tumbled with fright, but soon recovered hisgravity and resumed his course.

  Somewhat later the governor having business in London took Bevis andMark with him. They stayed a week at Bevis's grandpa's, and whilethere, for Bevis's special pleasure, the governor went with them oneevening to see a celebrated American sportsman shoot. This pale-facefrom the land of the Indians quite upset and revolutionised all theirideas of how to handle a gun.

  The perfection of first-rate English weapons, their accuracy and almostabsolute safety, has obtained for them pre-eminence over all otherfire-arms. It was in England that the art of shooting was slowlybrought to the delicate precision which enables the sportsman to killright and left in instantaneous succession. But why then did this onething escape discovery? Why have so many thousands shot season afterseason without hitting upon it? The governor did not like hisphilosophy of the gun upset in this way; his cherished traditionsoverthrown.

  There the American stood on the stage as calm as a tenor singer, andevery time the glass ball was thrown up, smash! a single rifle-bulletbroke it. A single bullet, not shot, not a cartridge which opens outand makes a pattern a foot in diameter, but one single bullet. It wasshooting flying with a rifle. It was not once, twice, thrice, but tensand hundreds. The man's accuracy of aim seemed inexhaustible.

  Never was there any exhibition so entirely genuine: never anything sobewildering to the gunner bred in the traditionary system of shooting.A thousand rifle-bullets pattering in succession on glass balls jerkedin the air would have been past credibility if it had not been witnessedby crowds. The word of a few spectators only would have beendisbelieved.

  "It is quite upside down, this," said the governor. "Really one wouldthink the glass balls burst of themselves."

  "He could shoot partridges flying with his rifle," said Mark.

  Bevis said nothing but sat absorbed in the exhibition till the last shotwas fired and they rose from their seats, then he said, "I know how hedid it!"

  "Nonsense."

  "I'm sure I do: I saw it in a minute."

  "Well, how then?"

  "I'll tell you when we get home."

  "Pooh!"

  "Wait and see."

  Nothing more was said till they reached home, when half scornfully theyinquired in what the secret lay?

  "The secret is in this," said Bevis, holding out his left arm. "That'sthe secret."

  "How? I don't see."

  "He puts his left arm out nearly as far as he can reach," said Bevis,"and holds the gun almost by the muzzle. That's how he does it. Here,see--like this."

  He took up his grandfather
's gun which was a muzzle-loader and had notbeen shot off these thirty years, and put it to his shoulder, stretchingout his left arm and grasping the barrels high up beyond the stock. Hislong arm reached within a few inches of the muzzle.

  "There!" he said.

  "Well, it was like that," said Mark. "He certainly did hold the gunlike that."

  "But what is the difference?" said the governor. "I don't see how it'sdone now."

  "But I do," said Bevis. "Just think: if you hold the gun out like this,and put your left arm high up as near the muzzle as you can, you put themuzzle on the mark directly instead of having to move it about to findit. And that's it, I'm sure. I saw that was how he held it directly,and then I thought it out."

  "Let me," said Mark. He had the gun and tried, aiming quickly at anobject on the mantelpiece. "So you can--you put the barrels right onit."

  "Give it to me," said the governor. He tried, twice, thrice, throwingthe gun up quickly.

  "Keep your left hand in one place," said Bevis. "Not two places--don'tmove it."

  "I do believe he's right," said the governor.

  "Of course I am," said Bevis in high triumph. "I'm sure that's it."

  "So am I," said Mark.

  "Well, really now I come to try, I think it is," said the governor.

  "It's like a rod on a pivot," said Bevis. "Don't you see the left handis the pivot: if you hold it out as far as you can, then the Long partof the rod is your side of the pivot, and the short little piece isbeyond it--then you've only got to move that little piece. If you shootin our old way then the long piece is the other side of the pivot, andof course the least motion makes such a difference. Here, where's somepaper--I can see it, if you can't."

  With his pencil he drew a diagram, being always ready to draw maps andplans of all kinds. He drew it on the back of a card that chanced tolie on the table.

  "There, that long straight stroke, that's the line of the gun--it'sthree inches long--now, see, put A at the top, and B at the bottom likethey do in geometry. Now make a dot C on the line just an inch above B.Now suppose B is where the stock touches your shoulder, and this dot Cis where your hand holds the gun in our old way at home. Then, don'tyou see, the very least mistake at C, ever so little, increases at A--ratio is the right word, increases in rapid ratio, and by the time theshot gets to the bird it's half a yard one side."

  "I see," said Mark. "Now do the other."

  "Rub out the dot at C," said Bevis. "I haven't got any indiarubber, yousuppose it's rubbed out: now put the dot, two inches above B, and onlyone inch from the top of the gun at A. That's how he held it with hishand at this dot, say D."

  "I think he did," said the governor.

  "Now you think," said Bevis. "It takes quite a sweep, quite a movementto make the top A incline much out of the perpendicular. I mean if thepivot, that's your hand, is at D a little mistake does not increaseanything like so rapidly. So its much more easy to shoot straightquick."

  They considered this some while till they got to understand it. All thetime Bevis's mind was working to try and find a better illustration, andat last he snatched up the governor's walking-stick. The knob or handlehe held in his right hand, and that represented the butt of the gunwhich is pressed against the shoulder. His right hand he rested on thetable, keeping it still as the shoulder would be still. Then he tookthe stick with the thumb and finger of his left hand about one third ofthe length of the stick up. That was about the place where a gun wouldbe held in the ordinary way.

  "Now look," he said, and keeping his right hand firm, he moved his leftan inch or so aside. The inch at his hand increased to three or four atthe point of the stick. This initial error in the aim would go onincreasing till at forty yards the widest spread of shot would miss themark.

  "And now this way," said Bevis. He slipped his left hand up the stickto within seven or eight inches of the point. This represented the newposition. A small error here--or lateral motion of the hand--onlyproduced a small divergence. The muzzle, the top of the stick, onlyvaried from the straight line the amount of the actual movement of theleft hand. In the former case a slight error of the hand multiplieditself at the muzzle. This convinced them.

  "How we shall shoot!" said Mark. "We shall beat Jack hollow!"

  They returned home two days afterwards, and immediately tried theexperiment with their double-barrels. It answered perfectly. As Bevissaid, the secret was in the left arm.

  When about to shoot grasp the gun at once with the left hand as high upthe barrel as possible without inconveniently straining the muscles, andso bring it to the shoulder. Push the muzzle up against the mark, as ifthe muzzle were going to actually touch it. The left hand aims,positively putting the muzzle on the game. All is centred in the lefthand. The left hand must at once with the very first movement take holdhigh up, and must not be slid there, it must take hold high up as nearthe muzzle as possible without straining. The left hand is thrust out,and as it were put on the game. Educate the left arm; teach it tocorrespond instantaneously with the direction of the glance; teach it tobe absolutely stable for the three necessary seconds; let the mind actthrough the left wrist. The left hand aims.

  This is with the double-barrel shot gun; with the rifle at shortsporting ranges the only modification is that as there is but one pelletinstead of two hundred, the sight must be used and the dot put on themark, while with the shot gun in time you scarcely use the sight at all.With the rifle the sight must never be forgotten. The left hand putsthe sight on the mark, and the quicker the trigger is pressed thebetter, exactly reversing tradition. A slow deliberative rifleman wasalways considered the most successful, but with the new system the firecannot be delivered too quickly, the very instant the sight is on themark, thus converting the rifleman into a snap-shooter. Of course it isalways understood that this applies to short sporting ranges, the methodis for sporting only, and does not apply to long range.

  One caution is necessary in shooting like this with the double-barrel.Be certain that you use a first-class weapon, quite safe. The left handbeing nearly at the top of the barrel, the left hand itself, and thewhole length of the left arm are exposed in case of the gun bursting. Ifeel that some cheap guns are not quite safe. With a good gun by aknown maker there is no danger.

  The American has had many imitators, but no one has reached his degreeof excellence in the new art which he invented. Perhaps it is fortunatethat it is not every one who can achieve such marvellous dexterity, forsuch shooting would speedily empty every cover in this country.

  Big Jack learned the trick from them in a very short time. His strongleft arm was as steady as a rock. He tried it with his little rifle,and actually killed a hare, which he started from a furze bush, as itran with a single bullet. But the governor though convinced would notadopt the new practice. He adhered to the old way, the way he hadlearned as a boy. What we learn in youth influences us through life.

  But Bevis and Mark, and Big Jack used it with tremendous effect insnap-shooting in lanes where the game ran or flew across, in ferretingwhen the rabbits bolted from hole to hole, in snipe shooting, inhedge-hunting, one each side--the best of all sport, for you do not knowwhat may turn out next, a hare, a rabbit, a partridge from the dryditch, or a woodcock from the dead leaves.

  Volume Three, Chapter XVIII.

  THE ANTARCTIC EXPEDITION--CONCLUSION.

  The winter remained mild till early in January when the first greenleaves had appeared on the woodbine. One evening Polly announced thatit was going to freeze, for the cat as he sat on the hearthrug had puthis paw over his ear. If he sat with his back to the fire, that was asign of rain. If he put his paw over his ear that indicated frost.

  It did freeze and hard. The wind being still, the New Sea was soonfrozen over except in two places. There was a breathing-hole inFir-Tree Gulf about fifty or sixty yards from the mouth of the Nile.The channel between New Formosa and Serendib did not "catch," perhapsthe current from Sweet River
Falls was the cause, and though they couldskate up within twenty yards, they could not land on the islands. Jackand Frances came to skate day after day; Bevis and Mark with Ted, Cecil,and the rest fought hockey battles for hours together.

  One afternoon, being a little tired, Bevis sat on the ice, and presentlylay down for a moment at full length, when looking along the ice--as helooked along his gun--he found he could see sticks or stones or anythingthat chanced to be on it a great distance off. Trying it again he couldsee the skates of some people very nearly half a mile distant, thoughhis eyes were close to the surface, even if he placed the side of hishead actually on the ice. The skates gleamed in the sun, and he couldsee them distinctly; sticks lying on the ice were not clearly seen sofar as that, but a long way, so that the ice seemed perfectly level.

  As the sun sank the ice became rosy, reflecting the light in the sky;the distant Downs too were tinted the same colour. After it was darkBevis got a lantern which Mark took five or six hundred yards up theice, and then set it down on the surface. Bevis put his face on the iceas he had done in the afternoon and looked along. His idea was to tryand see for how far the lantern would be visible, as the sticks andskates had been visible a good way, he supposed the light would beapparent very much farther.

  Instead of which, when he had got into position and looked along the icewith his face touching it, the lantern had quite disappeared, yet it wasnot so far off as he had seen the skates--skates are only an inch or