His reply was that it was
the skull of an adult gorilla - a fine large specimen.
It was then sent on to the young collector of skulls - who will, alas!
collect no more, having now given his life to his country. It saddened
me a little to part with it, certainly not because it was a pretty
object to possess, but only because that bleached dome beneath which
brains were once housed, and those huge black cavities which were once
the windows of a strange soul, and that mouth that once had a fleshy
tongue that youled and clicked in an unknown language could not tell me
its own life-and-death history from the time of its birth in the
African forest to its final translation to a wall over a stable door in
an old house near London.
There are now several writers on animals who are not exactly
naturalists, nor yet mere fictionists, but who, to a considerable
knowledge of animal psychology and extraordinary sympathy with all
wildness, unite an imaginative insight which reveals to them much of
the inner, the mind life of brutes. No doubt the greatest of these is
Charles Roberts, the Canadian, and I only wish it had been he who had
discovered the old gorilla skull above the stable door, and that the
incident had fired the creative brain which gave us Red Fox and
many another wonderful biography.
Now here is an odd coincidence. After writing the skull story it came
into my head to relate it to a lady I was dining with, and I also told
her of my intention of putting it in this book of Little Things. She
said it was funny that she too had a story of a skull which she had
thought of telling in her volume of Little Things; but no, she would
not venture to do so, although it was a better story than mine.
She was good enough to let me hear it, and as it is not to appear
elsewhere I can't resist the temptation of bringing it in here.
On her return to Europe after travelling and residing for some years in
the Far East, she established herself in Paris and proceeded to
decorate her apartment with some of the wonderful rich and rare objects
she had collected in outlandish parts. Gorgeous fabrics, embroideries,
pottery, metal and woodwork, and along with these products of an
ancient civilisation, others of rude or primitive tribes, quaint
headgear and plumes, strings and ropes of beads, worn as garments
by people who run wild in woods, with arrows, spears and other
weapons. These last were arranged in the form of a wheel over the
entrance, with the bleached and polished skull of an orang-utan in the
centre. It was a very perfect skull, with all the formidable teeth
intact and highly effective.
She lived happily for some months in her apartment and was very popular
in Parisian society and visited by many distinguished people, who all
greatly admired her Eastern decorations, especially the skull, before
which they would stand expressing their delight with fervent
exclamations.
One day when on a visit at a friend's house, her host brought up a
gentleman who wished to be introduced to her. He made himself extremely
agreeable, but was a little too effusive with his complimentary
speeches, telling her how delighted he was to meet her, and how much he
had been wishing for that honour.
After hearing this two or three times she turned on him and asked him
in the directest way why he had wished to see her so very much; then,
anticipating that the answer would be that it was because of what he
had heard of her charm, her linguistic, musical and various other
accomplishments, and so on, she made ready to administer a nice little
snub, when he made this very unexpected reply:
"O madame, how can you ask? You must know we all admire you because you
are the only person in all Paris who has the courage and originality to
decorate her salon with a human skull."
XXVII
A STORY OF A WALNUT
He was a small old man, curious to look at, and every day when I came
out of my cottage and passed his garden he was there, his crutches
under his arms, leaning on the gate, silently regarding me as I went
by. Not boldly; his round dark eyes were like those of some shy animal
peering inquisitively but shyly at the passer-by. His was a tumble-down
old thatched cottage, leaky and miserable to live in, with about three-
quarters of an acre of mixed garden and orchard surrounding it. The
trees were of several kinds - cherry, apple, pear, plum, and one big
walnut; and there were also shade trees, some shrubs and currant and
gooseberry bushes, mixed with vegetables, herbs, and garden flowers.
The man himself was in harmony with his disorderly but picturesque
surroundings, his clothes dirty and almost in rags; an old jersey in
place of a shirt, and over it two and sometimes three waistcoats of
different shapes and sizes, all of one indeterminate earthy colour; and
over these an ancient coat too big for the wearer. The thin hair, worn
on the shoulders, was dust-colour mixed with grey, and to crown all
there was a rusty rimless hat, shaped like an inverted flowerpot. From
beneath this strange hat the small strange face, with the round,
furtive, troubled eyes, watched me as I passed.
The people I lodged with told me his history. He had lived there many
years, and everybody knew him, but nobody liked him, - a cunning, foxy,
grabbing old rascal; unsocial, suspicious, unutterably mean.
