Here Was
Something Not The Serpent, Yet So Much More Than A Mere Picture Of It;
A Dead And Cast-
Off part of it, but in its completeness, from the
segmented mask with the bright unseeing eyes, to the fine
Whip-like
tail end, so like the serpent itself; I could handle it, handle the
serpent as it were, yet be in no danger from venomous tooth or
stinging tongue. True, it was colourless, but silvery bright, soft as
satin to the touch, crinkling when handled with a sound that to the
startled fancy recalled the dangerous living hiss from the dry
rustling grass! I would clutch my prize with a fearful joy, as if I
had picked up a strange feather dropped in passing from the wing of
one of the fallen but still beautiful angels. And it always increased
my satisfaction when, on exhibiting my treasure at home, the first
sight of it caused a visible start or an exclamation of alarm.
When my courage and strength were sufficient I naturally began to take
an active part in the persecution of serpents; for was not I also of
the seed of Eve? Nor can I say when my feelings towards our bruised
enemy began to change; but an incident which I witnessed at this time,
when I was about eight, had, I think, a considerable influence on me.
At all events it caused me to reflect on a subject which had not
previously seemed one for reflection. I was in the orchard, following
in the rear of a party of grown-up persons, mostly visitors to the
house; when among the foremost there were sudden screams, gestures of
alarm, and a precipitate retreat: a snake had been discovered lying in
the path and almost trodden upon. One of the men, the first to find a
stick or perhaps the most courageous, rushed to the front and was
about to deal a killing blow when his arm was seized by one of the
ladies and the blow arrested. Then, stooping quickly, she took the
creature up in her hands, and going away to some distance from the
others, released it in the long green grass, green in colour as its
glittering skin and as cool to the touch. Long ago as this happened it
is just as vivid to my mind as if it had happened yesterday. I can see
her coming back to us through the orchard trees, her face shining with
joy because she had rescued the reptile from imminent death, her
return greeted with loud expressions of horror and amazement, which
she only answered with a little laugh and the question, "Why should
you kill it?" But why was she glad, so innocently glad as it seemed to
me, as if she had done some meritorious and no evil thing? My young
mind was troubled at the question, and there was no answer.
Nevertheless, I think that this incident bore fruit later, and taught
me to consider whether it might not be better to spare than to kill;
better not only for the animal spared, but for the soul.
And the woman who did this unusual thing and in doing it unknowingly
dropped a minute seed into a boy's mind, who was she? Perhaps it would
be as well to give a brief account of her, although I thought that I
had finished with the subject of our neighbours. She and her husband,
a man named Matthew Blake, were our second nearest English neighbours,
but they lived a good deal further than the Royds and were seldom
visited by us. To me there was nothing interesting in them and their
surroundings, as they had no family and no people but the native peons
about them, and, above all, no plantation where birds could be seen.
They were typical English people of the lower middle class, who read
no books and conversed, with considerable misuse of the aspirate,
about nothing but their own and their neighbours' affairs. Physically
Mr. Blake was a very big man, being six feet three in height and
powerfully built. He had a round ruddy face, clean-shaved except for a
pair of side-whiskers, and pale-blue shallow eyes. He was invariably
dressed in black cloth, his garments being home-made and too large for
him, the baggy trousers thrust into his long boots. Mr. Blake was
nothing to us but a huge, serious, somewhat silent man who took no
notice of small boys, and was clumsy and awkward and spoke very bad
Spanish. He was well spoken of by his neighbours, and was regarded as
a highly respectable and dignified person, but he had no intimates and
was one of those unfortunate persons, not rare among the English, who
appear to stand behind a high wall and, whether they desire it or not,
have no power to approach and mix with their fellow-beings.
I think he was about forty-five to fifty years old when I was eight.
His wife looked older and was a short ungraceful woman with a stoop,
wearing a sun-bonnet and sack and a faded gown made by herself. Her
thin hair was of a yellowish-grey tint, her eyes pale blue, and there
was a sunburnt redness on her cheeks, but the face had a faded and
weary look. But she was better than her giant husband and was glad to
associate with her fellows, and was also a lover of animals - horses,
dogs, cats, and any and every wild creature that came in her way.
The Blakes had been married a quarter of a century or longer and had
spent at least twenty years of their childless solitary life in a mud-
built ranch, sheep-farming on the pampas, and had slowly accumulated a
small fortune, until now they were possessed of about a square league
of land with 25,000 or 30,000 sheep, and had built themselves a big
ugly brick house to live in.
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