The Wind in the Willows
there’s Badger, of course. He lives right in the heart of it; wouldn’t
live anywhere else, either, if you paid him to do it. Dear old Badger!
Nobody interferes with _him_. They’d better not,” he added
significantly.
“Why, who _should_ interfere with him?” asked the Mole.
“Well, of course—there—are others,” explained the Rat in a hesitating
sort of way.
“Weasels—and stoats—and foxes—and so on. They’re all right in a way—I’m
very good friends with them—pass the time of day when we meet, and all
that—but they break out sometimes, there’s no denying it, and
then—well, you can’t really trust them, and that’s the fact.”
The Mole knew well that it is quite against animal-etiquette to dwell
on possible trouble ahead, or even to allude to it; so he dropped the
subject.
“And beyond the Wild Wood again?” he asked: “Where it’s all blue and
dim, and one sees what may be hills or perhaps they mayn’t, and
something like the smoke of towns, or is it only cloud-drift?”
“Beyond the Wild Wood comes the Wide World,” said the Rat. “And that’s
something that doesn’t matter, either to you or me. I’ve never been
there, and I’m never going, nor you either, if you’ve got any sense at
all. Don’t ever refer to it again, please. Now then! Here’s our
backwater at last, where we’re going to lunch.”
Leaving the main stream, they now passed into what seemed at first
sight like a little land-locked lake. Green turf sloped down to either
edge, brown snaky tree-roots gleamed below the surface of the quiet
water, while ahead of them the silvery shoulder and foamy tumble of a
weir, arm-in-arm with a restless dripping mill-wheel, that held up in
its turn a grey-gabled mill-house, filled the air with a soothing
murmur of sound, dull and smothery, yet with little clear voices
speaking up cheerfully out of it at intervals. It was so very beautiful
that the Mole could only hold up both forepaws and gasp, “O my! O my! O
my!”
The Rat brought the boat alongside the bank, made her fast, helped the
still awkward Mole safely ashore, and swung out the luncheon-basket.
The Mole begged as a favour to be allowed to unpack it all by himself;
and the Rat was very pleased to indulge him, and to sprawl at full
length on the grass and rest, while his excited friend shook out the
table-cloth and spread it, took out all the mysterious packets one by
one and arranged their contents in due order, still gasping, “O my! O
my!” at each fresh revelation. When all was ready, the Rat said, “Now,
pitch in, old fellow!” and the Mole was indeed very glad to obey, for
he had started his spring-cleaning at a very early hour that morning,
as people _will_ do, and had not paused for bite or sup; and he had
been through a very great deal since that distant time which now seemed
so many days ago.
“What are you looking at?” said the Rat presently, when the edge of
their hunger was somewhat dulled, and the Mole’s eyes were able to
wander off the table-cloth a little.
“I am looking,” said the Mole, “at a streak of bubbles that I see
travelling along the surface of the water. That is a thing that strikes
me as funny.”
“Bubbles? Oho!” said the Rat, and chirruped cheerily in an inviting
sort of way.
A broad glistening muzzle showed itself above the edge of the bank, and
the Otter hauled himself out and shook the water from his coat.
“Greedy beggars!” he observed, making for the provender. “Why didn’t
you invite me, Ratty?”
“This was an impromptu affair,” explained the Rat. “By the way—my
friend Mr. Mole.”
“Proud, I’m sure,” said the Otter, and the two animals were friends
forthwith.
“Such a rumpus everywhere!” continued the Otter. “All the world seems
out on the river to-day. I came up this backwater to try and get a
moment’s peace, and then stumble upon you fellows!—At least—I beg
pardon—I don’t exactly mean that, you know.”
There was a rustle behind them, proceeding from a hedge wherein last
year’s leaves still clung thick, and a stripy head, with high shoulders
behind it, peered forth on them.
“Come on, old Badger!” shouted the Rat.
The Badger trotted forward a pace or two; then grunted, “H’m! Company,”
and turned his back and disappeared from view.
“That’s _just_ the sort of fellow he is!” observed the disappointed
Rat. “Simply hates Society! Now we shan’t see any more of him to-day.
Well, tell us, _who’s_ out on the river?”
“Toad’s out, for one,” replied the Otter. “In his brand-new wager-boat;
new togs, new everything!”
The two animals looked at each other and laughed.
“Once, it was nothing but sailing,” said the Rat, “Then he tired of
that and took to punting. Nothing would please him but to punt all day
and every day, and a nice mess he made of it. Last year it was
house-boating, and we all had to go and stay with him in his
house-boat, and pretend we liked it. He was going to spend the rest of
his life in a house-boat. It’s all the same, whatever he takes up; he
gets tired of it, and starts on something fresh.”
“Such a good fellow, too,” remarked the Otter reflectively: “But no
stability—especially in a boat!”
From where they sat they could get a glimpse of the main stream across
the island that separated them; and just then a wager-boat flashed into
view, the rower—a short, stout figure—splashing badly and rolling a
good deal, but working his hardest. The Rat stood up and hailed him,
but Toad—for it was he—shook his head and settled sternly to his work.
“He’ll be out of the boat in a minute if he rolls like that,” said the
Rat, sitting down again.
“Of course he will,” chuckled the Otter. “Did I ever tell you that good
story about Toad and the lock-keeper? It happened this way. Toad....”
An errant May-fly swerved unsteadily athwart the current in the
intoxicated fashion affected by young bloods of May-flies seeing life.
A swirl of water and a “cloop!” and the May-fly was visible no more.
Neither was the Otter.
The Mole looked down. The voice was still in his ears, but the turf
whereon he had sprawled was clearly vacant. Not an Otter to be seen, as
far as the distant horizon.
But again there was a streak of bubbles on the surface of the river.
The Rat hummed a tune, and the Mole recollected that animal-etiquette
forbade any sort of comment on the sudden disappearance of one’s
friends at any moment, for any reason or no reason whatever.
“Well, well,” said the Rat, “I suppose we ought to be moving. I wonder
which of us had better pack the luncheon-basket?” He did not speak as
if he was frightfully eager for the treat.
“O, please let me,” said the Mole. So, of course, the Rat let him.
Packing the basket was not quite such pleasant work as unpacking the
basket. It never is. But the Mole was bent on enjoying everything, and
although just when he had got the basket packed and strapped up tightly
he saw a plate staring up at him from the grass, and when the job had
been done again the Rat pointed out a fork which anybody ought to have
seen, and last of all, behold! the mustard pot, which he had been
sitting on without knowing it—still, somehow, the thing got finished at
last, without much loss of temper.
The afternoon sun was getting low as the Rat sculled gently homewards
in a dreamy mood, murmuring poetry-things over to himself, and not
paying much attention to Mole. But the Mole was very full of lunch, and
self-satisfaction, and pride, and already quite at home in a boat (so
he thought) and was getting a bit restless besides: and presently he
said, “Ratty! Please, _I_ want to row, now!”
The Rat shook his head with a smile. “Not yet, my young friend,” he
said—“wait till you’ve had a few lessons. It’s not so easy as it
looks.”
The Mole was quiet for a minute or two. But he began to feel more and
more jealous of Rat, sculling so strongly and so easily along, and his
pride began to whisper that he could do it every bit as well. He jumped
up and seized the sculls, so suddenly, that the Rat, who was gazing out
over the water and saying more poetry-things to himself, was taken by
surprise and fell backwards off his seat with his legs in the air for
the second time, while the triumphant Mole took his place and grabbed
the sculls with entire confidence.
“Stop it, you _silly_ ass!” cried the Rat, from the bottom of the boat.
“You can’t do it! You’ll have us over!”
The Mole flung his sculls back with a flourish, and made a great dig at
the water. He missed the surface altogether, his legs flew up above his
head, and he found himself lying on the top of the prostrate Rat.
Greatly alarmed, he made a grab at the side of the boat, and the next
moment—Sploosh!
Over went the boat, and he found himself struggling in the river.
O my, how cold the water was, and O, how _very_ wet it felt. How it
sang in his ears as he went down, down, down! How bright and welcome
the sun looked as he rose to the surface coughing and spluttering! How
black was his despair when he felt himself sinking again! Then a firm
paw gripped him by the back of his neck. It was the Rat, and he was
evidently laughing—the Mole could _feel_ him laughing, right down his
arm and through his paw, and so into his—the Mole’s—neck.
The Rat got hold of a scull and shoved it under the Mole’s arm; then he
did the same by the other side of him and, swimming behind, propelled
the helpless animal to shore, hauled him out, and set him down on the
bank, a squashy, pulpy lump of misery.
When the Rat had rubbed him down a bit, and wrung some of the wet out
of him, he said, “Now, then, old fellow! Trot up and down the
towing-path as hard as you can, till you’re warm and dry again, while I
dive for the luncheon-basket.”
So the dismal Mole, wet without and ashamed within, trotted about till
he was fairly dry, while the Rat plunged into the water again,
recovered the boat, righted her and made her fast, fetched his floating
property to shore by degrees, and finally dived successfully for the
luncheon-basket and struggled to land with it.
When all was ready for a start once more, the Mole, limp and dejected,
took his seat in the stern of the boat; and as they set off, he said in
a low voice, broken with emotion, “Ratty, my generous friend! I am very
sorry indeed for my foolish and ungrateful conduct. My heart quite
fails me when I think how I might have lost that beautiful
luncheon-basket. Indeed, I have been a complete ass, and I know it.
Will you overlook it this once and forgive me, and let things go on as
before?”
“That’s all right, bless you!” responded the Rat cheerily. “What’s a
little wet to a Water Rat? I’m more in the water than out of it most
days. Don’t you think any more about it; and, look here! I really think
you had better come and stop with me for a little time. It’s very plain
and rough, you know—not like Toad’s house at all—but you haven’t seen
that yet; still, I can make you comfortable. And I’ll teach you to row,
and to swim, and you’ll soon be as handy on the water as any of us.”
The Mole was so touched by his kind manner of speaking that he could
find no voice to answer him; and he had to brush away a tear or two
with the back of his paw. But the Rat kindly looked in another
direction, and presently the Mole’s spirits revived again, and he was
even able to give some straight back-talk to a couple of moorhens who
were sniggering to each other about his bedraggled appearance.
When they got home, the Rat made a bright fire in the parlour, and
planted the Mole in an arm-chair in front of it, having fetched down a
dressing-gown and slippers for him, and told him river stories till
supper-time. Very thrilling stories they were, too, to an
earth-dwelling animal like Mole. Stories about weirs, and sudden
floods, and leaping pike, and steamers that flung hard bottles—at least