Vendredi 29 avril 2011

Set one task

JON Spiro had not hired Pex and Chips for their debating skills. In the job interview they had only been set one task. A hundred applicants were handed a walnut and asked to smash it however they could. Only two succeeded. Pex had shouted at the walnut for a few minutes, then flattened it between his giant palms. Chips opted for a more controversial method. He placed the walnut on the table, grabbed his interviewer by the ponytail and used the man’s forehead to smash the nut. Both men were hired on the spot. They quickly established themselves as Arno Blunt’s most reliable lieutenants for in-house work. They were not allowed outside Chicago as this could involve map reading - something Pex and Chips were not very good at. Mulch was laughing so much that he nearly choked on the first mouthful of soil. What a pair of clowns! Then again, it was lucky for them that they had been clowns, otherwise they might have chosen their own method of execution. Jaw unhinged, Mulch tunnelled straight down for five metres and then veered north to the cover of some abandoned warehouses. His beard hair sent out sonar signals in all directions. You couldn’t be too careful in built-up areas. There was always some wildlife, and Mud People had a habit of burying things in places you wouldn’t expect them. Pipes, septic tanks and barrels of industrial waste were all things he had taking an unwitting bite of in his day. And there is nothing worse than finding something in your mouth that you weren’t expecting to be there, especially if it’s wriggling. It felt good to be tunnelling again. This was what dwarfs were born to do. The earth felt right between his fingers, and he soon settled into his distance rhythm. Scooping muck between his grinding teeth, breathing through slitted nostrils, and pumping waste material out the other end. Mulch’s hair antennae informed him that there were no vibrations on the surface, so he kicked upwards using the last vestiges of dwarf gas to propel him from his hole. Holly caught him a metre from the ground. Artemis stepped into the shower, allowing the jet of hot water to pound him on the forehead. In truth, he felt a little anxious. It was one thing to formulate a plan in the safety of one’s own home. It was quite another to execute that plan while trapped in the lion’s den. And even though he would never admit it, his confidence had taken quite a pounding in the last few days. Spiro had outwitted him back in London, and without apparent effort. He had strolled into the entrepreneur’s trap as naively as a tourist down a back alley. Artemis was well aware of his talents. He was a plotter, a schemer, a planner of dastardly deeds. There was no thrill greater than the execution of a perfect plan. But lately his victories had been tainted by guilt, especially over what had happened to Butler. Artemis had been so close to losing his old friend that it made him queasy just thinking about it. Things had to change. His father would be watching soon, hoping that Artemis would make the right choices. And if he didn’t, Artemis Senior would quite possibly take those choices away from him. He remembered his father’s words. ‘And what about you, Arty? Will you make the journey with me? When the moment comes will you take your chance to he a hero?’ Artemis still did not have the answer to that question.

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There was a knock at the door. Mulch crawled out of his tunnel bed and checked the video buzzer. Carla Frazetti was checking her hair in the brass knocker. The boss’s god-daughter? In person. This must be a big job. Perhaps the commission would be enough to set him up in another state. He’d been in Chicago for nearly three months now, and it was only a matter of time before the LEP picked up his trail. He would never leave the US though. If you had to live above ground, it might as well be somewhere with cable TV and a lot of rich people to steal from. Mulch pressed the intercom panel. ‘Just a minute, Miss Frazetti, I’m getting dressed.’ ‘Hurry it up, Mo,’ snapped Carla, her voice crackly through the cheap speakers. ‘I’m getting old here.’ Mulch threw on a robe he had fashioned from old potato sacks. He found the texture of the cloth, reminiscent of Haven Penitentiary pyjamas, to be weirdly comforting. He gave his beard a quick comb to dislodge any straggling beetles, and answered the door. Carla Frazetti swept past him into the lounge, settling into the room’s only armchair. There was another person on the doorstep, hidden beneath the camera’s field. Mulch made a mental note. Redirect the CCTV lens. A fairy could sneak right in under it, even if he or she wasn’t shielded. The man gave Mulch a dangerous squint. Typical Mob behaviour. Just because these people were murdering gangsters, didn’t mean they had to be rude. ‘Don’t you have another chair?’ asked the small human, following Miss Frazetti into the lounge. Mulch closed the door. ‘I don’t get many visitors. Actually, you’re the first. Usually Bruno beeps me and I come into the chop shop.’ Bruno the Cheese was the Mob’s local supervisor. He ran his business from a local hot-car warehouse. Legend had it that he hadn’t been out from behind his desk during work hours in fifteen years. ‘Quite a look you’ve got going here,’ said Loafers sarcastically. ‘Mould and woodlice. I like it.’ Mulch ran a fond finger along a green strip of damp. ‘That mould was just sitting behind the wallpaper when I moved in. Amazing what people cover up.’ Carla Frazetti took a bottle of White Petals perfume from her bag and sprayed the air around her person. ‘OK, enough conversation. I have a special job for you, Mo.’ Mulch forced himself to stay calm. This was his big chance. Maybe he could find a nice damp hell hole and settle down for a while. ‘Is this the kind of job where there’s a big pay-off if you do it right?’ ‘No,’ replied Carla. ‘This is the kind of job where there’s a painful pay-off if you do it wrong.’ Mulch sighed. Didn’t anyone talk nicely any more? ‘So why me?’ he asked. Carla Frazetti smiled, her ruby winking in the gloom. ‘I’m going to answer that question, Mo. Even though I’m not used to explaining myself to the hired help. Especially not a monkey like yourself.’ Mulch swallowed. Sometimes he forgot how ruthless these people were. Never for long. ‘You’ve been chosen for this assignment, Mo, because of the outstanding job you did with that Van Gogh.’ Mulch smiled modestly. The museum alarm had been child’s play. There hadn’t even been any dogs. ‘But also because you have an Irish passport.’ A gnome fugitive hiding out in NYC had run him up some Irish papers on a stolen LEP copier. The Irish had always been Mulch’s favourite humans, so he had decided to be one. He should have known it would lead to trouble. ‘This particular job is in Ireland, which might be a problem, generally. But for you two it’ll be like a paid holiday.’ Mulch nodded at Loafers. ‘Who’s the mutt?’ Loafers’ squint narrowed. Mulch knew that if Miss Frazetti gave the word, the man would kill him on the spot. ‘The mutt is Loafers McGuire, your partner. He’s a metal man. It’s a two-tiered job. You open the doors. Loafers escorts the mark back here.’ Escorting the mark. Mulch understood what that term meant, and he didn’t want any part of it. Robbery was one thing, but kidnapping was another. Mulch knew that he couldn’t actually turn down this assignment. What he could do was ditch the metal man at the first opportunity and head to one of the southern states. Apparently Florida had some lovely swamps. ‘So, who’s the mark?’ said Mulch, pretending that it mattered. ‘That’s need-to-know information,’ said Loafers. ‘And let me guess, I don’t need to know.’ Carla Frazetti pulled a photograph from her coat pocket. ‘The less you know, the less you have to feel guilty about. This is all you need. The house. This photograph is all we have for the moment; you can case the joint when you get there.’ Mulch took the photo. What he saw on the paper hit him like a gas attack. It was Fowl Manor. Therefore Artemis was the target. This little psychopath was being sent to kidnap Artemis. Frazetti sensed his discomfort. ‘Something wrong, Mo?’ Don’t let it show on your face, thought Mulch. Don’t let them see. ‘No. It’s . . . eh . . . That’s quite a set-up. I can see alarm boxes and outdoor spots. It’s not going to be easy.’ ‘If it was easy, I’d do it myself,’ said Carla. Loafers took a step forward, looking down at Mulch. What’s the matter, little man? Too tough for you?’ Mulch was forced to think on his feet. If Carla Frazetti thought he wasn’t up to the job, then they would send somebody else. Somebody with no qualms about leading the Mob to Artemis’s door. Mulch was surprised to realize that he couldn’t let that happen. The Irish boy had saved his life during the goblin rebellion, and was the closest thing he had to a friend — which was pretty pathetic when you thought about it. He had to take the job, if only to make sure that it didn’t go according to plan. ‘Hey, don’t worry about me. A building hasn’t been built that Mo Digence can’t crack. I just hope Loafers is man enough for the job.’ Loafers grabbed the dwarf by the lapels. ‘What’s that supposed to mean, Digence?’ Mulch generally avoided insulting people who were likely to kill him, but it might be useful to establish Loafers as a hothead now. Especially if he was going to blame him for things going wrong later. ‘It’s one thing being a midget monkey, but a midget metal man? How good can you be at close quarters?’ Loafers dropped the dwarf and ripped open his shirt to reveal a chest rippling with a tapestry of tattoos. ‘That’s how good I am, Digence. Count the tattoos. Count ‘em.’
Par lucyshanxu - 0 commentaire(s)le 29 avril 2011

Pagan centre of worship

Two LEP chutes emerged in the south of England. One in London itself, but that was closed to the public due to the fact that Chelsea Football Club had built their grounds five hundred metres above the shuttle port. The other port was in Wiltshire, beside what humans referred to as Stonehenge. Mud People had several theories as to the origins of the structure. These ranged from spaceship landing port to pagan centre of worship. The truth was far less glamorous. Stonehenge had actually been an outlet for a flat-bread-based food. Or, in human terms, a pizza parlour. A gnome called Bog had realized how many tourists forgot their sandwiches on above-ground jaunts, and so had set up shop beside the terminal. It was a smooth operation. You drove up to one of the windows, named your toppings, and ten minutes later you were stuffing your face. Of course, Bog had to shift his operation below ground once humans began talking in full sentences. And anyway, all that cheese was making the ground soggy. A couple of the service windows had even collapsed. It was difficult for fairy civilians to get visas to visit Stonehenge because of the constant activity on the surface. Then again, hippies saw fairies every day and it never made the front page. As a police officer, Holly didn’t have a visa problem; one flash of the Recon badge opened a hole right through to the surface. But being a Recon officer didn’t help if there was no magma flare scheduled. And the Stonehenge chute had been dormant for over three centuries. Not a spark. In the absence of a hotshot to ride, Holly was forced to travel aboard a commercial shuttle. The first available shuttle was heavily booked, but luckily there was a late cancellation so Holly wasn’t forced to bump a passenger. The shuttle was a fifty-seater luxury cruiser. It had been commissioned especially by the Brotherhood of Bog to visit their patron’s site. These fairies, mostly gnomes, dedicated their lives to pizza and every year on the anniversary of Bog’s first day in business, they chartered a shuttle and took a picnic above ground. The picnic consisted of pizza, tuber beer and pizza-flavoured ice cream. Needless to say, they did not remove their rubber pizza bonnets for the entire day. So, for sixty-seven minutes, Holly sat wedged between two beer-swilling gnomes singing the pizza song:

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Artemis left through the back door, mingling with the crowds of locals and sightseers. The police would have someone photographing the crowd, so he did not linger at the cordon, or even glance back towards the restaurant. Instead, he made his way to Harrods and found himself a table at the gallery cafe. Once he had assured the waitress that he was not looking for his mummy, and produced sufficient cash to pay for his pot of Earl Grey tea, Artemis pulled out his mobile, selecting a number from the speed-dial menu. A man answered on the second ring. ‘Hello. Make it quick, whoever you are. I’m very busy at the moment.’ The man was Detective Inspector Justin Barre of New Scotland Yard. Barre’s gravelly tones were caused by a hunting knife across the gullet during a bar fight in the nineties. If Butler hadn’t been on hand to stop the bleeding, Justin Barre would never have risen beyond Sergeant. It was time to call in the debt. ‘Detective Inspector Barre. This is Artemis Fowl.’ ‘Artemis, how are you? And how’s my old partner, Butler?’ Artemis kneaded his forehead. ‘Not well at all, I’m afraid. He needs a favour.’ ‘Anything for the big man. What can I do?’ ‘Did you hear something about a disturbance in Knightsbridge?’ There was a pause. Artemis heard paper rip as a fax was torn off the roll. ‘Yes, it just came in. A couple of windows were shattered in some restaurant. Nothing major. Some tourists are a bit shell-shocked. Preliminary reports say it was some kind of localized earthquake, if you can believe that. We’ve got two cars there right now. Don’t tell me Butler was behind it?’ Artemis took a breath. ‘I need you to keep your men away from the freezers.’ ‘That’s a strange request, Artemis. What’s in the freezers that I shouldn’t see?’ ‘Nothing illegal,’ promised Artemis. ‘Believe me when I say this is life or death for Butler.’ Barre didn’t hesitate. ‘This is not exactly in my jurisdiction, but consider it done. Do you need to get whatever I’m not supposed to see out of the freezers?’ The officer had read his mind. ‘As soon as possible. Two minutes are all I need.’ Barre chewed it over. ‘OK. Let’s synchronize schedules. The forensics team is going to be in there for a couple of hours. Nothing I can do about that. But at six-thirty precisely, I can guarantee there won’t be anyone on duty. You have five minutes.’ ‘That will be more than sufficient.’ ‘Good. And tell the big man that we’re quits.’ Artemis kept his voice even. ‘Yes, Detective Inspector. I’ll tell him.’ If I get the opportunity, he thought. ICE AGE CRYOGENICS INSTITUTE, OFF HARLEY STREET, LONDON The Ice Age Cryogenics Institute was not actually on London’s Harley Street. Technically, it was tucked away in Dickens Lane, a side alley on the famous medical boulevard’s southern end. But this did not stop the facility’s MD, one Doctor Constance Lane, from putting Harley Street on all Ice Age stationery. You couldn’t buy credibility like that. When the upper classes saw those magic words on a business card they fell over themselves to have their frail frames frozen. Artemis Fowl was not so easily impressed. But then he had little choice; Ice Age was one of three cryogenic centres in the city, and the only one with free units. Though Artemis did consider the neon sign a bit much: ‘Pods to Rent’. Honestly. The building itself was enough to make Artemis squirm. The facade was lined with brushed aluminium, obviously designed to resemble a spaceship, and the doors were of the whoosh Star Trek variety. Where was culture? Where was art? How did a monstrosity like this get planning permission in historic London?
Par lucyshanxu - 0 commentaire(s)le 29 avril 2011
Jeudi 28 avril 2011

Water was warmest

One old hunter who has a dry tongue, who used to come to bathe in Walden once every year when the water was warmest, and at such times looked in upon me, told me that many years ago he took his gun one afternoon and went out for a cruise in Walden Wood; and as he walked the Wayland road he heard the cry of hounds approaching, and ere long a fox leaped the wall into the road, and as quick as thought leaped the other wall out of the road, and his swift bullet had not touched him. Some way behind came an old hound and her three pups in full pursuit, hunting on their own account, and disappeared again in the woods. Late in the afternoon, as he was resting in the thick woods south of Walden, he heard the voice of the hounds far over toward Fair Haven still pursuing the fox; and on they came, their hounding cry which made all the woods ring sounding nearer and nearer, now from Well Meadow, now from the Baker Farm. For a long time he stood still and listened to their music, so sweet to a hunter's ear, when suddenly the fox appeared, threading the solemn aisles with an easy coursing pace, whose sound was concealed by a sympathetic rustle of the leaves, swift and still, keeping the round, leaving his pursuers far behind; and, leaping upon a rock amid the woods, he sat erect and listening, with his back to the hunter. For a moment compassion restrained the latter's arm; but that was a short-lived mood, and as quick as thought can follow thought his piece was levelled, and whang! -- the fox, rolling over the rock, lay dead on the ground. The hunter still kept his place and listened to the hounds. Still on they came, and now the near woods resounded through all their aisles with their demoniac cry. At length the old hound burst into view with muzzle to the ground, and snapping the air as if possessed, and ran directly to the rock; but, spying the dead fox, she suddenly ceased her hounding as if struck dumb with amazement, and walked round and round him in silence; and one by one her pups arrived, and, like their mother, were sobered into silence by the mystery. Then the hunter came forward and stood in their midst, and the mystery was solved. They waited in silence while he skinned the fox, then followed the brush a while, and at length turned off into the woods again. That evening a Weston squire came to the Concord hunter's cottage to inquire for his hounds, and told how for a week they had been hunting on their own account from Weston woods. The Concord hunter told him what he knew and offered him the skin; but the other declined it and departed. He did not find his hounds that night, but the next day learned that they had crossed the river and put up at a farmhouse for the night, whence, having been well fed, they took their departure early in the morning.

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At length the jays arrive, whose discordant screams were heard long before, as they were warily making their approach an eighth of a mile off, and in a stealthy and sneaking manner they flit from tree to tree, nearer and nearer, and pick up the kernels which the squirrels have dropped. Then, sitting on a pitch pine bough, they attempt to swallow in their haste a kernel which is too big for their throats and chokes them; and after great labor they disgorge it, and spend an hour in the endeavor to crack it by repeated blows with their bills. They were manifestly thieves, and I had not much respect for them; but the squirrels, though at first shy, went to work as if they were taking what was their own. Meanwhile also came the chickadees in flocks, which, picking up the crumbs the squirrels had dropped, flew to the nearest twig and, placing them under their claws, hammered away at them with their little bills, as if it were an insect in the bark, till they were sufficiently reduced for their slender throats. A little flock of these titmice came daily to pick a dinner out of my woodpile, or the crumbs at my door, with faint flitting lisping notes, like the tinkling of icicles in the grass, or else with sprightly day day day, or more rarely, in spring-like days, a wiry summery phe-be from the woodside. They were so familiar that at length one alighted on an armful of wood which I was carrying in, and pecked at the sticks without fear. I once had a sparrow alight upon my shoulder for a moment while I was hoeing in a village garden, and I felt that I was more distinguished by that circumstance than I should have been by any epaulet I could have worn. The squirrels also grew at last to be quite familiar, and occasionally stepped upon my shoe, when that was the nearest way. When the ground was not yet quite covered, and again near the end of winter, when the snow was melted on my south hillside and about my wood-pile, the partridges came out of the woods morning and evening to feed there. Whichever side you walk in the woods the partridge bursts away on whirring wings, jarring the snow from the dry leaves and twigs on high, which comes sifting down in the sunbeams like golden dust, for this brave bird is not to be scared by winter. It is frequently covered up by drifts, and, it is said, "sometimes plunges from on wing into the soft snow, where it remains concealed for a day or two." I used to start them in the open land also, where they had come out of the woods at sunset to "bud" the wild apple trees. They will come regularly every evening to particular trees, where the cunning sportsman lies in wait for them, and the distant orchards next the woods suffer thus not a little. I am glad that the partridge gets fed, at any rate. It is Nature's own bird which lives on buds and diet drink. In dark winter mornings, or in short winter afternoons, I sometimes heard a pack of hounds threading all the woods with hounding cry and yelp, unable to resist the instinct of the chase, and the note of the hunting-horn at intervals, proving that man was in the rear. The woods ring again, and yet no fox bursts forth on to the open level of the pond, nor following pack pursuing their Actaeon. And perhaps at evening I see the hunters returning with a single brush trailing from their sleigh for a trophy, seeking their inn. They tell me that if the fox would remain in the bosom of the frozen earth he would be safe, or if be would run in a straight line away no foxhound could overtake him; but, having left his pursuers far behind, he stops to rest and listen till they come up, and when he runs he circles round to his old haunts, where the hunters await him. Sometimes, however, he will run upon a wall many rods, and then leap off far to one side, and he appears to know that water will not retain his scent. A hunter told me that he once saw a fox pursued by hounds burst out on to Walden when the ice was covered with shallow puddles, run part way across, and then return to the same shore. Ere long the hounds arrived, but here they lost the scent. Sometimes a pack hunting by themselves would pass my door, and circle round my house, and yelp and hound without regarding me, as if afflicted by a species of madness, so that nothing could divert them from the pursuit. Thus they circle until they fall upon the recent trail of a fox, for a wise hound will forsake everything else for this. One day a man came to my hut from Lexington to inquire after his hound that made a large track, and had been hunting for a week by himself. But I fear that he was not the wiser for all I told him, for every time I attempted to answer his questions he interrupted me by asking, "What do you do here?" He had lost a dog, but found a man.
Par lucyshanxu - 0 commentaire(s)le 28 avril 2011

House was not on fire

Hard green wood just cut, though I used but little of that, answered my purpose better than any other. I sometimes left a good fire when I went to take a walk in a winter afternoon; and when I returned, three or four hours afterward, it would be still alive and glowing. My house was not empty though I was gone. It was as if I had left a cheerful housekeeper behind. It was I and Fire that lived there; and commonly my housekeeper proved trustworthy. One day, however, as I was splitting wood, I thought that I would just look in at the window and see if the house was not on fire; it was the only time I remember to have been particularly anxious on this score; so I looked and saw that a spark had caught my bed, and I went in and extinguished it when it had burned a place as big as my hand. But my house occupied so sunny and sheltered a position, and its roof was so low, that I could afford to let the fire go out in the middle of almost any winter day. The moles nested in my cellar, nibbling every third potato, and making a snug bed even there of some hair left after plastering and of brown paper; for even the wildest animals love comfort and warmth as well as man, and they survive the winter only because they are so careful to secure them. Some of my friends spoke as if I was coming to the woods on purpose to freeze myself. The animal merely makes a bed, which he warms with his body, in a sheltered place; but man, having discovered fire, boxes up some air in a spacious apartment, and warms that, instead of robbing himself, makes that his bed, in which he can move about divested of more cumbrous clothing, maintain a kind of summer in the midst of winter, and by means of windows even admit the light, and with a lamp lengthen out the day. Thus he goes a step or two beyond instinct, and saves a little time for the fine arts. Though, when I had been exposed to the rudest blasts a long time, my whole body began to grow torpid, when I reached the genial atmosphere of my house I soon recovered my faculties and prolonged my life. But the most luxuriously housed has little to boast of in this respect, nor need we trouble ourselves to speculate how the human race may be at last destroyed. It would be easy to cut their threads any time with a little sharper blast from the north. We go on dating from Cold Fridays and Great Snows; but a little colder Friday, or greater snow would put a period to man's existence on the globe.

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Gilpin, in his account of the forest borderers of England, says that "the encroachments of trespassers, and the houses and fences thus raised on the borders of the forest," were "considered as great nuisances by the old forest law, and were severely punished under the name of purprestures, as tending ad terrorem ferarum -- ad nocumentum forestae, etc.," to the frightening of the game and the detriment of the forest. But I was interested in the preservation of the venison and the vert more than the hunters or woodchoppers, and as much as though I had been the Lord Warden himself; and if any part was burned, though I burned it myself by accident, I grieved with a grief that lasted longer and was more inconsolable than that of the proprietors; nay, I grieved when it was cut down by the proprietors themselves. I would that our farmers when they cut down a forest felt some of that awe which the old Romans did when they came to thin, or let in the light to, a consecrated grove (lucum conlucare), that is, would believe that it is sacred to some god. The Roman made an expiatory offering, and prayed, Whatever god or goddess thou art to whom this grove is sacred, be propitious to me, my family, and children, etc. It is remarkable what a value is still put upon wood even in this age and in this new country, a value more permanent and universal than that of gold. After all our discoveries and inventions no man will go by a pile of wood. It is as precious to us as it was to our Saxon and Norman ancestors. If they made their bows of it, we make our gun-stocks of it. Michaux, more than thirty years ago, says that the price of wood for fuel in New York and Philadelphia "nearly equals, and sometimes exceeds, that of the best wood in Paris, though this immense capital annually requires more than three hundred thousand cords, and is surrounded to the distance of three hundred miles by cultivated plains." In this town the price of wood rises almost steadily, and the only question is, how much higher it is to be this year than it was the last. Mechanics and tradesmen who come in person to the forest on no other errand, are sure to attend the wood auction, and even pay a high price for the privilege of gleaning after the woodchopper. It is now many years that men have resorted to the forest for fuel and the materials of the arts: the New Englander and the New Hollander, the Parisian and the Celt, the farmer and Robin Hood, Goody Blake and Harry Gill; in most parts of the world the prince and the peasant, the scholar and the savage, equally require still a few sticks from the forest to warm them and cook their food. Neither could I do without them. Every man looks at his wood-pile with a kind of affection. I love to have mine before my window, and the more chips the better to remind me of my pleasing work. I had an old axe which nobody claimed, with which by spells in winter days, on the sunny side of the house, I played about the stumps which I had got out of my bean-field. As my driver prophesied when I was plowing, they warmed me twice -- once while I was splitting them, and again when they were on the fire, so that no fuel could give out more heat. As for the axe, I was advised to get the village blacksmith to "jump" it; but I jumped him, and, putting a hickory helve from the woods into it, made it do. If it was dull, it was at least hung true. A few pieces of fat pine were a great treasure. It is interesting to remember how much of this food for fire is still concealed in the bowels of the earth. In previous years I had often gone prospecting over some bare hillside, where a pitch pine wood had formerly stood, and got out the fat pine roots. They are almost indestructible. Stumps thirty or forty years old, at least, will still be sound at the core, though the sapwood has all become vegetable mould, as appears by the scales of the thick bark forming a ring level with the earth four or five inches distant from the heart. With axe and shovel you explore this mine, and follow the marrowy store, yellow as beef tallow, or as if you had struck on a vein of gold, deep into the earth. But commonly I kindled my fire with the dry leaves of the forest, which I had stored up in my shed before the snow came. Green hickory finely split makes the woodchopper's kindlings, when he has a camp in the woods. Once in a while I got a little of this. When the villagers were lighting their fires beyond the horizon, I too gave notice to the various wild inhabitants of Walden vale, by a smoky streamer from my chimney, that I was awake.--
Par lucyshanxu - 0 commentaire(s)le 28 avril 2011

At the point of a promontory

Already, by the first of September, I had seen two or three small maples turned scarlet across the pond, beneath where the white stems of three aspens diverged, at the point of a promontory, next the water. Ah, many a tale their color told! And gradually from week to week the character of each tree came out, and it admired itself reflected in the smooth mirror of the lake. Each morning the manager of this gallery substituted some new picture, distinguished by more brilliant or harmonious coloring, for the old upon the walls. The wasps came by thousands to my lodge in October, as to winter quarters, and settled on my windows within and on the walls overhead, sometimes deterring visitors from entering. Each morning, when they were numbed with cold, I swept some of them out, but I did not trouble myself much to get rid of them; I even felt complimented by their regarding my house as a desirable shelter. They never molested me seriously, though they bedded with me; and they gradually disappeared, into what crevices I do not know, avoiding winter and unspeakable cold. Like the wasps, before I finally went into winter quarters in November, I used to resort to the northeast side of Walden, which the sun, reflected from the pitch pine woods and the stony shore, made the fireside of the pond; it is so much pleasanter and wholesomer to be warmed by the sun while you can be, than by an artificial fire. I thus warmed myself by the still glowing embers which the summer, like a departed hunter, had left.

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In October I went a-graping to the river meadows, and loaded myself with clusters more precious for their beauty and fragrance than for food. There, too, I admired, though I did not gather, the cranberries, small waxen gems, pendants of the meadow grass, pearly and red, which the farmer plucks with an ugly rake, leaving the smooth meadow in a snarl, heedlessly measuring them by the bushel and the dollar only, and sells the spoils of the meads to Boston and New York; destined to be jammed, to satisfy the tastes of lovers of Nature there. So butchers rake the tongues of bison out of the prairie grass, regardless of the torn and drooping plant. The barberry's brilliant fruit was likewise food for my eyes merely; but I collected a small store of wild apples for coddling, which the proprietor and travellers had overlooked. When chestnuts were ripe I laid up half a bushel for winter. It was very exciting at that season to roam the then boundless chestnut woods of Lincoln -- they now sleep their long sleep under the railroad -- with a bag on my shoulder, and a stick to open burs with in my hand, for I did not always wait for the frost, amid the rustling of leaves and the loud reproofs of the red squirrels and the jays, whose half-consumed nuts I sometimes stole, for the burs which they had selected were sure to contain sound ones. Occasionally I climbed and shook the trees. They grew also behind my house, and one large tree, which almost overshadowed it, was, when in flower, a bouquet which scented the whole neighborhood, but the squirrels and the jays got most of its fruit; the last coming in flocks early in the morning and picking the nuts out of the burs before they fell, I relinquished these trees to them and visited the more distant woods composed wholly of chestnut. These nuts, as far as they went, were a good substitute for bread. Many other substitutes might, perhaps, be found. Digging one day for fishworms, I discovered the ground-nut (Apios tuberosa) on its string, the potato of the aborigines, a sort of fabulous fruit, which I had begun to doubt if I had ever dug and eaten in childhood, as I had told, and had not dreamed it. I had often since seen its crumpled red velvety blossom supported by the stems of other plants without knowing it to be the same. Cultivation has well-nigh exterminated it. It has a sweetish taste, much like that of a frost-bitten potato, and I found it better boiled than roasted. This tuber seemed like a faint promise of Nature to rear her own children and feed them simply here at some future period. In these days of fatted cattle and waving grain-fields this humble root, which was once the totem of an Indian tribe, is quite forgotten, or known only by its flowering vine; but let wild Nature reign here once more, and the tender and luxurious English grains will probably disappear before a myriad of foes, and without the care of man the crow may carry back even the last seed of corn to the great cornfield of the Indian's God in the southwest, whence he is said to have brought it; but the now almost exterminated ground-nut will perhaps revive and flourish in spite of frosts and wildness, prove itself indigenous, and resume its ancient importance and dignity as the diet of the hunter tribe. Some Indian Ceres or Minerva must have been the inventor and bestower of it; and when the reign of poetry commences here, its leaves and string of nuts may be represented on our works of art.
Par lucyshanxu - 0 commentaire(s)le 28 avril 2011

This was habit

Moreover, when at the pond, I wished sometimes to add fish to my fare for variety. I have actually fished from the same kind of necessity that the first fishers did. Whatever humanity I might conjure up against it was all factitious, and concerned my philosophy more than my feelings. I speak of fishing only now, for I had long felt differently about fowling, and sold my gun before I went to the woods. Not that I am less humane than others, but I did not perceive that my feelings were much affected. I did not pity the fishes nor the worms. This was habit. As for fowling, during the last years that I carried a gun my excuse was that I was studying ornithology, and sought only new or rare birds. But I confess that I am now inclined to think that there is a finer way of studying ornithology than this. It requires so much closer attention to the habits of the birds, that, if for that reason only, I have been willing to omit the gun. Yet notwithstanding the objection on the score of humanity, I am compelled to doubt if equally valuable sports are ever substituted for these; and when some of my friends have asked me anxiously about their boys, whether they should let them hunt, I have answered, yes -- remembering that it was one of the best parts of my education -- make them hunters, though sportsmen only at first, if possible, mighty hunters at last, so that they shall not find game large enough for them in this or any vegetable wilderness -- hunters as well as fishers of men. Thus far I am of the opinion of Chaucer's nun, who "yave not of the text a pulled hen That saith that hunters ben not holy men."

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As I came home through the woods with my string of fish, trailing my pole, it being now quite dark, I caught a glimpse of a woodchuck stealing across my path, and felt a strange thrill of savage delight, and was strongly tempted to seize and devour him raw; not that I was hungry then, except for that wildness which he represented. Once or twice, however, while I lived at the pond, I found myself ranging the woods, like a half-starved hound, with a strange abandonment, seeking some kind of venison which I might devour, and no morsel could have been too savage for me. The wildest scenes had become unaccountably familiar. I found in myself, and still find, an instinct toward a higher, or, as it is named, spiritual life, as do most men, and another toward a primitive rank and savage one, and I reverence them both. I love the wild not less than the good. The wildness and adventure that are in fishing still recommended it to me. I like sometimes to take rank hold on life and spend my day more as the animals do. Perhaps I have owed to this employment and to hunting, when quite young, my closest acquaintance with Nature. They early introduce us to and detain us in scenery with which otherwise, at that age, we should have little acquaintance. Fishermen, hunters, woodchoppers, and others, spending their lives in the fields and woods, in a peculiar sense a part of Nature themselves, are often in a more favorable mood for observing her, in the intervals of their pursuits, than philosophers or poets even, who approach her with expectation. She is not afraid to exhibit herself to them. The traveller on the prairie is naturally a hunter, on the head waters of the Missouri and Columbia a trapper, and at the Falls of St. Mary a fisherman. He who is only a traveller learns things at second-hand and by the halves, and is poor authority. We are most interested when science reports what those men already know practically or instinctively, for that alone is a true humanity, or account of human experience. They mistake who assert that the Yankee has few amusements, because he has not so many public holidays, and men and boys do not play so many games as they do in England, for here the more primitive but solitary amusements of hunting, fishing, and the like have not yet given place to the former. Almost every New England boy among my contemporaries shouldered a fowling-piece between the ages of ten and fourteen; and his hunting and fishing grounds were not limited, like the preserves of an English nobleman, but were more boundless even than those of a savage. No wonder, then, that he did not oftener stay to play on the common. But already a change is taking place, owing, not to an increased humanity, but to an increased scarcity of game, for perhaps the hunter is the greatest friend of the animals hunted, not excepting the Humane Society.
Par lucyshanxu - 0 commentaire(s)le 28 avril 2011
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