Nat the Naturalist | Page 4

him, and after a moment or two he smiled at
me, and then patted me on the shoulder.
"Don't do anything to annoy your aunt, my boy," he said; "I wouldn't
play with Nap if I were you."
"I'll try not to, uncle," I said; "but he will come and coax me to play
with him sometimes."
"H'm! yes," said my uncle thoughtfully, "and it does do him good, poor
dog. He eats too much, and gets too fat for want of exercise. Suppose
you only play with him when your aunt goes out for a walk."
"Very well, uncle," I said, and then he shook hands with me, and gave
me half a crown.
I couldn't help it, I was obliged to spend that half-crown in something I
had been wanting for weeks. It was a large crossbow that hung up in
the toy-shop window in Streatham, and that bow had attracted my
attention every time I went out.

To some boys a crossbow would be only a crossbow, but to me it
meant travels in imagination all over the world. I saw myself shooting
apples off boys' heads, transfixing eagles in their flight, slaying wild
beasts, and bringing home endless trophies of the chase, so at the first
opportunity I was off to the shop, and with my face glowing with
excitement and delight I bought and took home the crossbow.
"Hallo, Nat!" said Uncle Joseph. "Why, what's that--a crossbow?"
"Yes, uncle; isn't it a beauty?" I cried excitedly.
"Well, yes, my boy," he said; "but, but--how about your aunt? Suppose
you were to break a window with that, eh? What should we do?"
"But I won't shoot in that direction, uncle," I promised.
"Or shoot out Jane's or Cook's eye? It would be very dreadful, my boy."
"Oh, yes, uncle," I cried; "but I will be so careful, and perhaps I may
shoot some of the birds that steal the cherries."
"Ah! yes, my boy, so you might," he said rubbing his hands softly. "My
best bigarreaus. Those birds are a terrible nuisance, Nat, that they are.
You'll be careful, though?"
"Yes, I'll be careful, uncle," I said; and he went away nodding and
smiling, while I went off to Clapham Common to try the bow and the
short thick arrows supplied therewith.
It was glorious. At every twang away flew the arrow or the piece of
tobacco-pipe I used instead; and at last, after losing one shaft in the
short turf, I found myself beside the big pond over on the far side, one
that had the reputation of being full of great carp and eels.
My idea here was to shoot the fish, but as there were none visible to
shoot I had to be content with trying to hit the gliding spiders on the
surface with pieces of tobacco-pipe as long as they lasted, for I dared
not waste another arrow, and then with my mind full of adventures in

foreign countries I walked home.
The next afternoon my aunt went out, and I took the bow down the
garden, leaving my uncle enjoying his pipe. I had been very busy all
that morning, it being holiday time, in making some fresh arrows for a
purpose I had in view, and, so as to be humane, I had made the heads
by cutting off the tops of some old kid gloves, ramming their
finger-ends full of cotton-wool, and then tying them to the thin deal
arrows, so that each bolt had a head like a little soft leather ball.
"Those can't hurt him," I said to myself; and taking a dozen of these
bolts in my belt I went down the garden, with Buzzy at my heels, for a
good tiger-hunt.
For the next half-hour Streatham was nowhere, and that old-fashioned
garden with its fruit-trees had become changed into a wild jungle,
through which a gigantic tiger kept charging, whose doom I had fixed.
Shot after shot I had at the monster--once after it had bounded into the
fork of a tree, another time as it was stealing through the waving reeds,
represented by the asparagus bed. Later on, after much creeping and
stalking, with the tiger stalking me as well as springing out at me again
and again, but never getting quite home, I had a shot as it was lurking
beside the great lake, represented by our tank. Here its striped sides
were plainly visible, and, going down on hands and knees, I crept along
between two rows of terrible thorny trees that bore sweet juicy berries
in the season, but which were of the wildest nature now, till I could get
a good aim at the monster's shoulder, and see its soft lithe tail twining
and writhing like a snake.
I crept on,