Fantasy Football Challenge - Football Fanatics Library

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My Tropic Isle

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perfectly symmetrical pond just out of the reach of the stubby tongue. Hence the scolding. Three witnesses--each ardently on the side of the bird--watched intently. Decently mannered, it refused to clamber on to the edge of the plate, for it was ever averse from defilement of food. The tit-bit was just beyond avaricious exertions--just at that tantalising distance and just so irresistibly desirable as might be directly stimulative of original enterprise towards acquirement. The chatter and abuse continued for a couple of minutes. Then the bird stood still while seeming to reflect, with wise head askew after the manner of other thinkers. Hurrying, to its playthings--which happened to be at the far end of the veranda--it selected a matchbox, dragged it clatteringly along, ranged it precisely close to the plate, mounted it, and from the extra elevation sipped the last drop with a chuckle of content. That the bird on deliberation conceived the scheme for over-reaching the coveted food I have not the slightest doubt. Baal Burra bestowed frank friendship on a fat, good-humoured, yellow cat, fond of luxury and ease during the day, a "rake-helly" prowler at night. Into Sultan's fur Baal Burra would burrow, not without occasional result, if the upbraiding tongue was to be believed. Baal Burra would fill its lower mandible with water from a drinking dish and tip it neatly into the cat's ear, and scream with delight as Sultan shook his sleepy head. To dip the tip of the cat's tail into the water and mimic the scrubbing of the floor was an everyday pastime. In addition to being an engineer and a comedian the bird was also a high tragedian. In the cool of the evening upon the going down of the sun the cat and the bird would set out together to the accustomed stage. Baal Burra burrowing through the long grass, painfully slow and cheeping plaintively, while Sultan stalked ahead mewing encouragingly. The tragedy, which was in one act, was repeated so often that each became confidently proficient, while the setting--free from the constraints of space--helped towards that degree of deception which is the highest form of art. Often we feared lest Sultan, carried away by enrapt enthusiasm, would unwittingly sustain his part even to the lamentable though natural DNOUEMENT. Baal Burra was, of' course, the engaging and guileless victim, while Sultan, with triumphant realism, rehearsed a scene ruthlessly materialised elsewhere. Climbing into a low-growing bush, Baal Burra would become preoccupied, innocently absorbed in an inspection of the young shoots and tender leaves which it seemed to caress. Assuming a ferocious mien, Sultan approached soliloquising, no doubt, "Ah, here is another silly wild-fowl! Come, let me indulge my bloodthirstiness!" His eyes glittered as he crouched, his tail thickened and swayed, his ears were depressed, his whiskers and nose twitched, his jaws worked, his claws were unsheathed and sheathed spasmodically as he crept stealthily towards the apparently unconscious bird. After two or three preliminary feints for the perfect adjustment of his faculties and pose, he bounded into the air with distended talons well over his screeching playmate. The scene would be rehearsed several times before Sultan, tired of mummery and eager for actualities, slunk yawling into the bush, while Baal Burra, whimpering in the dusk, waddled home to be caged. Towards the further justification of the argument two cases in which scrub fowl (MEGAPODIUS DUPERREYI TUMULUS) are concerned may be cited. Being a previously recorded fact, the first is excusable only on the grounds of its applicability to a debatable point. 1. On a remote spot in a very rough and rugged locality, hemmed in by immense blocks of granite, is a large incubating mound. Save at one point it is encompassed by rocks, but the opening does not grant facilities for the accumulation of vegetable debris, yet the mound continually increases in dimensions. At first glance there seems no means by which such a large heap could have been accumulated for the birds do not carry their materials, but kick and scratch them to the site. A hasty survey shows that the birds have taken advantage of the junction of two impending rocks which form a fortuitous shoot down which to send the rubbish with the least possible exertion on their part. The shoot is always in use, for the efficacy of the mound depends upon the heat generated by actually decaying vegetation. Did the birds think out this simple labour-saving method before deciding on the site for the mound, or was it a gracious afterthought--one of those automatic impulses by which Nature confronts difficulties? 2. As I wandered on the hilltops far from home I was astonished when Tom, the cutest of black boys, dropped on his knees to investigate a crevice between two horizontal slabs of granite filled with dead leaves and loam. The spot, bare of grass, was about twenty yards from the edge of a fairly thick, low-growing scrub where scrub fowls are plentiful. I was inclined to smile when he said, "Might be hegg belonga scrub hen sit down!" He scooped out some of the rubbish--the crevice was so narrow that it barely admitted his arm--and finally dug a hole with his fingers fully fourteen inches deep, revealing an egg, pink with freshness. A more unlikely spot for a scrub fowl to lay, could hardly be imagined. There was no mound, the crevice being merely filled flush, and the vegetable rubbish packed between the flat rocks did not appear to be sufficient in quantity to generate in its decay the temperature necessary to bring about incubation. Yet the egg was warm, and upon reflecting that the sun's rays keep the granite slabs in the locality hot during the day, so hot, indeed, that there is no sitting down on them with comfort, I perceived that here was evidence on which to maintain an argument of rare sagacity on the part of the bird, and that the hypothesis might be thus stated: This cool-footed cultivator of the jungle floor had during the casual rambling on sunlit spaces become conscious of the heat of the rocks. Being impressed, she surveyed the locality, and of her deliberate purpose selected a spot for the completion of her next ensuing maternal duties which, while it scandalised the traditions of her tribe, presented

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