104



Mr. W. E. Teschemakeh.



and is doing well in that groove. For one thing bird-society is very

cruel to the stranger within its gates—as cruel as human society is

to the woman with a past. Moreover, a bird never forgets anything;

it pines for the old faces, the old ways; it becomes unhappy and, in

next to no time, it becomes ill, though its food, mark you, has not

been varied in the smallest particular. In two or three days the

Whinchat’s wings began to droop and I made a mental note that it

required watching. One morning the Whinchat did not come to

greet me as usual : I found it in a dark corner leaning against the

wire-screen encircling the hot-water pipes. This generally means

one of three things. Usually it means that the sufferer is dying,

and in that case, if handled, its temperature will be found to he lower

than that of one’s hand. Or it may mean that the bird has made

up its mind to commit hari-kari. It is a well-established fact that

when the untutored savage has had a little too much of the noble

white man—of his stock-whip, his six-shooter and his whisky—he

sometimes squats upon the ground, bends his head, closes his eyes

and in a very few hours he has entered the great darkness : all birds

have the same faculty, This is one of Mother Nature’s good gifts

to her children—her happy release.


But the noble white man, having deserted Mother Nature for

the tinsel and paint of a strange and deadly thing called Civilization,

is no longer the recipient of her good gifts and, when he wishes to

commit hari-kari, generally has to make a horrid mess of himself

and his immediate surroundings.


The third case I never fully understood until quite recently.

One evening I found myself in a sumptuous new Restaurant ; every¬

thing of the best was there—every thing except customers, who had

apparently not yet discovered its merits. I sat in one corner

and in the dim distance was one other solitary diner. Standing by

their appointed tables were the trim waitresses, each a picture of dull

apathy and utter weariness: probably they had been standing there

all day with absolutely nothing to do. In the centre was one of

those artistic hot-water radiators in cream enamel and, leaning

against it, was a motionless and pathetic little figure in dainty cap

and apron. I shall always remember that picture — the splendid hall

with its vaulted ceiling, its oak-panelled walls and oriental carpets,.



