THE HARE
Now I have done with myself, or rather with my own insignificant presenthistory, and come to that of the Hare. It impressed me a good deal atthe time, which is not long ago, so much indeed that I communicated thefacts to Jorsen. He ordered me to publish them, and what Jorsen ordersmust be done. I don't know why this should be, but it is so. He hasauthority of a sort that I am unable to define.
One night after the usual aspirations and concentration of mind, whichby the way are not always successful, I passed into what occultists callspirit, and others a state of dream. At any rate I found myself uponthe borders of the Great White Road, as near to the mighty Gates as I amever allowed to come. How far that may be away I cannot tell. Perhaps itis but a few yards and perhaps it is the width of this great world, forin that place which my spirit visits time and distance do not exist.There all things are new and strange, not to be reckoned by ourmeasures. There the sight is not our sight nor the hearing our hearing.I repeat that all things are different, but that difference I cannotdescribe, and if I could it would prove past comprehension.
There I sat by the borders of the Great White Road, my eyes fixed uponthe Gates above which the towers mount for miles on miles, outlinedagainst an encircling gloom with the radiance of the world beyond theworlds. Four-square they stand, those towers, and fourfold the gatesthat open to the denizens of other earths. But of these I have noknowledge beyond the fact that it is so in my visions.
I sat upon the borders of the Road, my eyes fixed in hope upon theGates, though well I knew that the hope would never be fulfilled, andwatched the dead go by.
They were many that night. Some plague was working in the East andunchaining thousands. The folk that it loosed were strange to me who inthis particular life have seldom left England, and I studied them withcuriosity; high-featured, dark-hued people with a patient air. Theknowledge which I have told me that one and all they were very ancientsouls who often and often had walked this Road before, and therefore,although as yet they did not know it, were well accustomed to thejourney. No, I am wrong, for here and there an individual did know.Indeed one deep-eyed, wistful little woman, who carried a baby in herarms, stopped for a moment and spoke to me.
"The others cannot see you as I do," she said. "Priest of the Queen ofqueens, I know you well; hand in hand we climbed by the seven stairwaysto the altars of the moon."
"Who is the Queen of queens?" I asked.
"Have you forgotten her of the hundred names whose veils we lifted oneby one; her whose breast was beauty and whose eyes were truth? In a dayto come you will remember. Farewell till we walk this Road no more."
"Stay--when did we meet?"
"When our souls were young," she answered, and faded from my ken like ashadow from the sea.
After the Easterns came many others from all parts of the earth. Thensuddenly appeared a company of about six hundred folk of every age andEnglish in their looks. They were not so calm as are the majority ofthose who make this journey. When I read the papers a few days later Iunderstood why. A great passenger ship had sunk suddenly in mid oceanand they were all cut off unprepared.
When, followed by a few stragglers, these had passed and gatheredthemselves in the red shadow beneath the gateway towers waiting for thesummons, an unusual thing occurred. For a few moments the Road was leftquite empty. After that last great stroke Death seemed to be resting onhis laurels. When thus unpeopled it looked a very vast place like to ahuge arched causeway, bordered on either side by blackness, but itselfgleaming with a curious phosphorescence such as once or twice I haveseen in the waters of a summer sea at night.
Presently in the very centre of this illuminated desolation, whilst itwas as yet far away, something caught my eye, something so strange tothe place, so utterly unfamiliar that I watched it earnestly, wonderingwhat it might be. Nearer and nearer it came, with curious, uncertainhops; yes, a little brown object that hopped.
"Well," I said to myself, "if I were not where I am I should say thatyonder thing was a hare. Only what would a hare be doing on the GreatWhite Road? How could a hare tread the pathway of eternal souls? I mustbe mistaken."
So I reflected whilst still the thing hopped on, until I became certainthat either I suffered from delusions, or that it was a hare; indeed aparticularly fine hare, much such a one as a friend of my old landlady,Mrs. Smithers, had once sent her as a Christmas present from Norfolk,which hare I ate.
A few more hops brought it opposite to my post of observation. Here ithalted as though it seemed to see me. At any rate it sat up in the alertfashion that hares have, its forepaws hanging absurdly in front of it,with one ear, on which there was a grey blotch, cocked and one dragging,and sniffed with its funny little nostrils. Then it began to talk to me.I do not mean that it really talked, but the thoughts which were in itsmind were flashed on to my mind so that I understood perfectly, yes, andcould answer them in the same fashion. It said, or thought, thus:--
"You are real. You are a man who yet lives beneath the sun, though howyou came here I do not know. I hate men, all hares do, for men are cruelto them. Still it is a comfort in this strange place to see somethingone has seen before and to be able to talk even to a man, which I couldnever do until the change came, the dreadful change--I mean because ofthe way of it," and it seemed to shiver. "May I ask you some questions?"
"Certainly," I said or rather thought back.
"You are sure that they won't make you angry so that you hurt me?"
"I can't hurt you, even if I wished to do so. You are not a hare anylonger, if you ever were one, but only the shadow of a hare."
"Ah! I thought as much, and that's a good thing anyhow. Tell me, Man,have you ever been torn to pieces by dogs?"
"Good gracious! no."
"Or coursed, or hunted, or caught in a trap, or shot all over your back,or twisted up in nets and choked in snares? Or have you swum out to seato die more easily, or seen your mate and mother and father killed?"
"No, no. Please stop, Hare; your questions are very unpleasant."
"Not half so unpleasant as the things are themselves, I can assureyou, Man. I will tell you my story if you like; then you can judge foryourself. But first, if you will, do you tell me why I am here. Have youseen more hares about this place?"
"Never, nor any other animals. No, I am wrong, once I saw a dog."
The Hare looked about it anxiously.
"A dog. How horrible! What was it doing? Hunting? If there are no hareshere what could it be hunting? A rabbit, or a pheasant with a brokenwing, or perhaps a fox? I should not mind so much if it were a fox. Ihate foxes; they catch young hares when they are asleep and eat them."
"None of these things. I was told that it belonged to a little girl whodied. That broke its heart, so that it died also when they shut her upin a box. Therefore it was allowed to accompany her here because it hadloved so much. Indeed I saw them together, both very happy, and togetherthey went through those gates."
"If dogs love little girls why don't they love hares, at least asanything likes to be loved, for the dog didn't want to eat the littlegirl, did it? I see you can't answer me. Now would you like me to tellyou my story? Something inside of me is saying that I am to do so if youwill listen; also that there is plenty of time, for I am not wanted atpresent, and when I am I can run to those gates much quicker than youcould."
"I should like it very much, Hare. Once a prophet heard an ass speak inorder to warn him. But since then, except very, very rarely in dreams,no creature has talked to a man, so far as I know. Perhaps you wishto warn me about something, or others through me, as the ass warnedBalaam."
"Who is Balaam? I never heard of Balaam. He wasn't the man who fetchesdead pheasants in the donkey-cart, was he? If so, I've seen him make theass talk--with a thick stick. No? Well, never mind, I daresay I shouldnot understand about him if you told me. Now for my story."
Then the Hare sat itself down, planting its forepaws firmly in front ofit, as these animals do when they are on the watch,
looked up at me andbegan to pour the contents of its mind into mine.
*****
I was born, it said, or rather told me by thought transference, in afield of growing corn near to a big wood. At least I suppose I was bornthere, though the first thing I remember is playing about in the wheatwith two other little ones of my own size, a brother and a sister thatwere born with me. It was at night, for a great, round, shining thingwhich I now know was the moon, hung in the sky above us. We gambolledtogether and were very happy, till presently my mother came--I rememberhow big she looked--and cuffed me with her paw because I had led theothers away from the place where she had told us to stop, and given hera great hunt to find us. That is the first thing I remember about mymother. Afterwards she seemed sorry because she had hurt me, and nursedus all three, letting me have the most milk. My mother always loved methe best of us, because I was such a fine leveret, with a pretty greypatch on my left ear. Just as I had finished drinking another hare camewho was my father. He was very large, with a glossy coat and big shiningeyes that always seemed to see everything, even when it was behind him.
He was frightened about something, and hustled my mother and us littleones out of the wheat-field into the big wood by which it is bordered.As we left the field I saw two tall creatures that afterwards I came toknow were men. They were placing wire-netting round the field--you see Iunderstand now what all these things were, although of course I did notat the time. The two ends of the wire netting had nearly come together.There was only a little gap left through which we could run. Anotheryoung hare, or it may have been a rabbit, had got entangled in it, andone of the men was beating it to death with a stick. I remember that thesound of its screams made me feel cold down the back, for I had neverheard anything like that before, and this was the first that I had seenof pain and death.
The other man saw us slipping through and ran at us with his stick. Mymother went first and escaped him. Then came my sister, then I, then mybrother. My father was last of all. The man hit with his stick and itcame down thud along side of me, just touching my fur. He hit again andbroke the foreleg of my brother. Still we all managed to get throughinto the wood, except my father who was behind.
"There's the old buck!" cried one of the men (I understand what hesaid now, though at the time it meant nothing to me). "Knock him on thehead!"
So leaving us alone they ran at him. But my father was much too quickfor them. He rushed back into the corn and afterwards joined us in thewood, for he had seen wire before and knew how to escape it. Still hewas terribly frightened and made us keep in the wood till the followingevening, not even allowing my mother to go to her form in the roughpasture on its other side and lie up there.
Also we were in trouble because my brother's forepaw was broken. It gavehim a great deal of pain, so that he could not rest or sleep. After awhile, however, it mended up in a fashion, but he was never able to runas fast as we could, nor did he grow so big. In the end the mother foxkilled him, as I shall tell.
My mother asked my father what the men with the sticks were doing--for,you know, many animals can talk to each other in their own way, even ifthey are of different kinds. He told her that they were protecting thewheat to prevent us from eating it, to which she answered angrily thathares must live somehow, especially when they had young ones to nurse.My father replied that men did not seem to think so, and perhaps theyhad young ones also. I see now that my father was a philosophic hare.But are you tired of my story?
"Not at all," I answered; "go on, please. It is very interesting to hearthings described from the animal's point of view, especially when thatanimal has grown wise and learned to understand."
"Ah," answered the Hare. "I see what you mean. And it is odd, but I dounderstand. All has become clear to me. I don't know what happened whenI died, but there came a change, and I knew that I who was but a beastalways have been and still am a necessary part of everything as much asyou are, though more helpless and humble. Yes, I am as ancient and asfar-reaching as yourself, but how I began and how I shall end is dark tome. Well, I will go on with my story."
It must have been a moon or so later, after my mother had given upnursing me, that I went to lie out by myself. There was a big house onthe hillside overlooking the sea, and near to it were gardens surroundedby a wall. Also outside of this wall was another patch of garden wherecabbages grew. I found a way to those cabbages and kept it secret, forI was greedy and wanted them all for myself. I used to creep in at nightand eat them, also some flowers with spiky leaves that grew round themwhich had a very fine flavour. Then after the dawn came I went to a formwhich I had made under a furze bush on the slope that ran down to thesea, and slept there.
One day I was awakened by something white, hard, and round which rolledgently and stopped still quite close to me. It was not alive, althoughit had a queer smell, and I wondered why it moved at all. Presently Iheard voices and there appeared a little man, and with him somebody whowas not a man because it was differently dressed and spoke in a highervoice. I saw that they had sticks in their hands and thought of runningaway, then that it would be safer to lie quite close. They came up to meand the little man said--
"There's the ball; pick it up, Ella, the lie is too bad."
She, for now I know it was what is called a girl, stooped to obey andsaw my back.
"Tom," she said in a whisper, "here's a young hare on its form."
"Get out of the light," he answered, "and I'll kill it," and he liftedthe stick he held, which had a twisted iron end.
"No," she said, "catch it alive; I want a hare to be a friend to myrabbit, which has lost all its little ones."
"Lost them? Eaten them, you mean, because you would always go and stareat it," said Tom. "Where's the leveret? Oh! I see. Now, look out!"
A moment later and I was in darkness. Tom had thrown himself upon thetop of me and was grabbing at me with his hands. I nearly got away, butas my head poked up under his arm the girl caught hold of it.
"Oh! it's scratching," she cried, as indeed I was with all my might."Hold it, Tom, hold it!"
"Hold it yourself," said Tom, "my face is full of furze prickles." Soshe held and presently he helped her, till in the end I was tied up in apocket-handkerchief and carried I knew not whither. Indeed I was almostmad with fear.
When I came to myself I found that I was within a kind of wire run whichsmelt foully, as though hundreds of things had lived in it for years.There was a hutch at the end of the run in which sat an enormousshe-rabbit, quite as big as my mother, a fierce-looking brute with longyellow teeth. I was afraid of that rabbit and got as far from it as Icould. Presently it hopped out and looked at me.
"What are you doing here?" it asked. "Can't you talk? Well, it doesn'tmatter. If I get hungry I'll eat you! Do you hear that? I'll eat you,as I did all the others," and it showed its big yellow teeth and hoppedback into the hutch.
After that Tom and the girl came and gave us plenty of food which thebig rabbit ate, for I could touch nothing. For two days they came, andthen I think they forgot all about us. I grew very hungry, and at nightfilled myself with some of the remaining food, such as stale cabbageleaves. By next morning all was gone, and the big rabbit grew hungryalso. All that day it hopped about sniffing at me and showing its yellowteeth.
"I shall eat you to-night," it said.
I ran round and round the pen in terror, till at last I found a placewhere rats had been working under the wire, almost big enough for me tosqueeze through, but not quite.
The sun went down and the big she-rabbit came out.
"Now I am going to eat you," it said, "as I ate all the others. I amhungry, very hungry," and it prodded me about with its nose and rolledme over.
At last with a little squeal it drove its big yellow teeth into mebehind. Oh! how they hurt! I was near the rat-hole. I rushed atit, scrabbling and wriggling. The big rabbit pounced on me with itsfore-feet, trying to hold me, but too late, for I was through, leavingsome of my fur behind me. I ran, how I ran! withou
t stopping, till atlength I found my mother in the rough pasture by the wood and told hereverything.
"Ah!" she said, "that's what comes of greediness and of trying to be tooclever. Now, perhaps, you will learn to stop at home."
So I did for a long while.
*****
The summer went by without anything particular happening, except that mybrother with the lame foot was eaten by the mother fox. That great redbeast was always prowling about, and at night surprised us in a fieldnear the wood where we were feeding on some beautiful turnips. The restof us got away, but my brother being lame, was not quick enough. The foxcaught him, and I heard her sharp white teeth crunch into his bones.The sound made me quite sick, and my mother was very sad afterwards. Shecomplained to my father of the cruelty of foxes, but he, who, as I havesaid, was a philosopher, answered her almost in her own words.
"Foxes must live, and this one has young to feed, and therefore isalways hungry. There are three of them in a hole at the top of thewood," he remarked. "Also our son was lame and would certainly have beencaught when the hunting begins."
"What's the hunting?" I asked.
"Never mind," said my father sharply. "No doubt you'll find out in time,that is if you live through the shooting."
"What's the shooting?" I began, but my father cuffed me over the headand I was silent.
I may tell you that my mother soon got over the loss of my brother, forjust about that time she had four new little ones, after which neithershe nor my father seemed to think any more about us. My sister andI hated those little ones. We two alone remembered my brother, andsometimes wondered whether he was quite gone or would one day come back.The fox, I am glad to say, got caught in a trap. At least I am not gladnow--I was glad because, you see, I was so much afraid of her.