  FROM Seville to the Atlantic the great river GuadalquivÍr pursues its course through seventy miles of alluvial mud-flats entirely of its own construction. The whole of this viewless waste (in winter largely submerged) is technically termed the marisma; but its upper regions, slightly higher-lying, have proved amenable to a limited dominion of man, and nowadays comprise (besides some rich corn-lands) broad pasturages devoted to grazing, and which yield Toros bravos, that is, fighting-bulls of breeds celebrated throughout Spain, as providing the popular champions of the Plaza. It is not of these developed regions that we treat, but of the Lower Delta, which still remains a wilderness, and must for centuries remain so—a vast area of semi-tidal saline ooze and marsh, extending over some forty or fifty miles in length, and spreading out laterally to untold leagues on either side of the river. This Lower Delta, the marisma proper, while it varies here and there by a few inches in elevation, is practically a uniform dead-level of alluvial mud, only broken by vetas, or low grass-grown ridges seldom rising more than a foot or two above the In summer the marisma is practically a sun-scorched mud-flat; in winter a shallow inland sea, with the vetas standing out like islands. There are, as already stated, slight local variations in elevation. Naturally the lower-lying areas are the first to retain moisture so soon as the long torrid summer has passed away and autumn rains begin. Speedily these become shallow lagoons, termed lucios—similar, we imagine, to the jheels of India—and a welcome haven they afford to the advance-guard of immigrant wildfowl from the north. Plant-life in the marismas is regulated by the relative saltness of the soil. In the deeper lucios no vegetation can subsist; but where the level rises, though but a few inches, and the ground is less saline, the hardy samphire (in Spanish, armajo) appears, covering with its small isolated bushes vast stretches of the lower marisma. The armajo, which is formed of a congeries of fleshy twigs, leafless, and jointed more like the marine algae than a land-plant, belongs to three species as follows:—
All three belong to the natural order Chenopodiaceae (or “Goose-foot” family). The armajo is the typical plant of the marisma, flourishing even where there is a considerable percentage of salt in the soil. This aquatic shrub increases most in dry seasons, a series of wet winters having a disastrous effect on its growth. The Sapina, Formerly the Sapina possessed a commercial value, being used (owing to its alkaline qualities) in the manufacture of soap. Nowadays it is replaced by other chemicals. Here and there, owing to some imperceptible gradient, the marisma is traversed by broad channels called caÑos, where, by reason of the water having a definite flow, the soil has become less saline. The armajo at such spots becomes scarce or disappears altogether, its place being taken by quite different plants, namely: Spear-grass (Cyperus), Candilejo, Bayunco, the English names of which we do not know. Efforts have been made from time to time to reclaim and utilise portions of the marisma by draining the water to the river; but failure has invariably resulted for the following reasons: (1) The intense saltness of the soil. (2) That the marisma lies largely on a lower level than the river banks. (3) The river being tidal, its water is salt or brackish. There are vast areas of far better land in Spain which might be reclaimed with certainty and at infinitely less cost. The only human inhabitants of the marisma are a few herdsmen whose reed-built huts are scattered on remote vetas. There are also the professional wildfowlers with their cabresto-ponies; but this class is disappearing as, bit by bit, the system of “preservation” extends over the wastes. Though the climate is healthy enough except for a period just preceding the autumn rains, yet our keepers and most of those who live here permanently are terrible sufferers from malaria. Quinine, they tell us, costs as much as bread in the family economy. We quote the following impression from Wild Spain, p. 78:— Gunning-punt in the Marisma. (NOTE THE HALF-SUBMERGED SAMPHIRE-BUSHES.) Wild-Goose shooting on the Sandhills. (NOTE TIN DECOYS, ALSO SOME NATURAL GEESE.) The utter loneliness and desolation of the middle marismas call forth sensations one does not forget. Hour after hour one pushes forward Such is the physical character of the marisma, so far as we can describe it. The general landscape in winter is decidedly dreary and somewhat deceptive, since the vast areas of brown armajos lend an appearance of dry land where none exists, since those plants are growing in, say, a foot or two of water—“a floating forest paints the wave.” The monotony is broken at intervals by the reed-fringed caÑos, or sluggish channels, and by the lucios, big and little—the latter partially sprinkled with armajo-growth, the bigger sheets open water, save that, as a rule, their surface is carpeted with wildfowl. Should our attempted description read vague, we may plead that there is nothing tangible to describe in a wilderness devoid of salient feature. Nor can we liken it with any other spot, for nowhere on earth have we met with a region like this—nominally dry all summer and inundated all winter, yet subject to such infinite variation according to varying seasons. It is not, however, the marisma itself that during all these years has absorbed our interest and energies—no, that dreary zone would offer but little attraction were it not for its feathered inhabitants. These, the winter wildfowl, challenge the world to afford such display of winged and web-footed folk, and it is these we now endeavour to describe. By mid-September, as a rule, the first signs of the approaching invasion of north-bred wildfowl become apparent. But if, as often happens, the long summer drought yet remains unbroken, these earlier arrivals, finding the marisma untenable, are constrained to take to the river, or to pass on into Africa. Should the dry weather extend into October, the only ducks to remain permanently in any great numbers are the teal, the About the 25th September the first greylag geese appear. These are not affected by the scarcity of water in any such degree as ducks, since they only need to drink twice a day, morning and evening, and make shift to subsist by digging up the bulb-like roots of the spear-grass with their powerful bills. GREYLAG GEESE But so soon as autumn rains have fallen, and the whole marisma has become supplied with “new water,” it at once fills up with wildfowl—ducks and geese—in such variety and prodigious quantities as we endeavour to describe in the following sketches. Wildfowl—‘twixt Cup and Lip Wildfowl beyond all the rest of animated nature lend themselves to spectacular display. For their enormous aggregations (due as much to concentration within restricted haunts, as to gregarious instinct, and to both these causes combined) are always openly visible and conspicuous inasmuch as those haunts are, in all lands, confined to shallow water and level marsh devoid of cover or concealment. Thus, wherever they congregate in their thousands and tens of thousands, wildfowl are always in view—that is, to those who seek them out in their solitudes. This last, however, is an important proviso. For the haunts aforesaid are precisely those areas of the earth’s surface which are the most repugnant to man, and least suited to his existence. In crowded England there survive but few of those dreary We have before attempted to describe such scenes, though a fear that we might be discredited oft half paralysed the pen. An American critic of our former book remarked that it “left the gaping reader with a feeling that he had not been told half.” That lurking fear could not be better explained. A dread of Munchausenism verily gives pause in writing even of what one has seen again and again, raising doubts of one’s own eyesight and of the pencilled notes that, year after year, we had scrupulously written down on the spot. The Baetican marisma has afforded many of those scenes of wild-life that, for the reason stated, were before but half-described. With fuller experience we return to the subject, though daring not entirely to satisfy our trans-Atlantic friend. The winter of 1896 provided such an occasion. It was on the 26th of November that, under summer conditions, we rode out, where in other years we have sailed, across what should have been water, but was now a calcined plain. November was nearly past; autumn had given place to winter, yet not a drop of rain had fallen. Since the scorching days of July the fountains of heaven had been stayed, and now the winter wildfowl from the north had poured in only to find the marisma as hard and arid as the deserts of Arabia Petraea. Instinct was at fault. True, each to their appointed seasons, had come, the dark clouds of pintail, teal, and wigeon, the long skeins of grey geese. Where in other years they had revelled in shallows rich in aquatic vegetation, now the travellers find instead nought but torrid plains devoid of all that is attractive to the tastes of their tribe. For the parched soil, whose life-blood has been drained by the heats of the summer solstice, whose plant-life is burnt up, has remained panting all the autumn through for that precious moisture that still comes not. The carcases of horses and cattle, that have died from thirst and lack of pasturage, strew the plains; the winter-sown wheat is dead ere germination is complete. In such years of drought many of the newly arrived wildfowl, especially pintails, pass on southwards (into Africa), not to return till February. The remainder crowd into the few places where the precious element—water—still exists. Such are the rare pools that are fed from quicksands (nuclÉs) or permanent land-springs (ojos) and a few of the larger and deeper lucios of the marisma. Riding through stretches of shrivelled samphire we frequently spring deer, driven out here, miles from their forest-haunts, by the eager search for water. WHITE-EYED POCHARD (Fuligula nyroca) Approaching the first of the great lucios, or permanent pools, a wondrous sight lay before our eyes. This water might extend for three or four miles, but was literally concealed by the crowds of flamingoes that covered its surface. For a moment it was difficult to believe that those pink and white leagues would really be all composed of living creatures. Their identity, however, became clear enough when, within 600 yards, we could distinguish the scattered outposts gradually concentrating upon the solid ranks beyond. Disbelieve it if you will, but four fairly sane Englishmen estimated that crowd, when a rifle-shot set them on wing, to exceed ten thousand units—by how much, we decline to guess. The nearer shores, with every creek and channel, were darkened It was a rifle-shot at these last that finally set the whole host on wing—an indescribable spectacle, hurrying hordes everywhere outflanked by the glinting black and pink glamour of flamingoes. Then the noise—the reverberating roar of wings, blending with a babel of croaks and gabblings, whistles and querulous pipes, punctuated by shriller bi-tones, ... we give that up. “FLAMINGOES OVER” A long ride in prospect precluded serious operations to-night, but towards dusk we lined out our four guns, and in half an hour loaded up the panniers of the carrier-ponies with nearly three score ducks and geese. An hour before the morning’s dawn we were in position to await the earliest geese. Experience had taught the chief flight-lines, and these, over many miles of marsh, were commanded by lines of sunken tubs. These, however, the exceptional conditions had rendered temporarily useless. Our tubs lay miles This morning, however, the greylags flew wide and scattered, in strange contrast with their customary regularity. We noticed the change, but knew not the cause. The geese did. The barometer during the night (unnoticed by us at 4 A.M.) had gone down half an inch, and already, as we assembled for breakfast at ten o’clock, rain was beginning to fall—the first rain since the spring! The wind, which for weeks had remained “nailed to the North—norte clavado,” in Spanish phrase—flew to all airts, and a change was at hand. By eleven there burst what the Spanish well name a tormenta; lightning flashed from a darkened sky, while thunder rolled overhead, and rain drove horizontal on a living hurricane. An hour later the heavens cleared, and the sun was shining as before. That short and sudden storm, however, had marked an epoch. The whole conditions of bird-life in the marisma had been revolutionised within a couple of hours. POCHARD (Fuligula ferina) In other years, under such conditions as this morning had promised, we have records of sixty and eighty greylags brought to bag, and it was with such anticipation that we had set out to-day. The result totalled but a quarter of such numbers. Ducks came next in our programme, and the writer, being the last gun by lot, had several miles to ride to his remote post at El HondÓn. The scenes in bird-life through which we rode Crouching behind a low breastwork, before me lay a five-acre pool which no amount of firing ever kept quite clear of swimming forms, so fast did thirsty duck, teal, and geese keep dropping in, since behind for twenty leagues stretched waterless plain. Merely to make a bag under such conditions means taking every chance, firing away till barrels grow too hot to hold. Here, however, that nature-love that overrides even a fowler’s keenness stepped in. With half the wildfowl of Europe flashing, wheeling, and alighting within view—many, one fondly imagined, likely to be of supreme interest—the writer cannot personally go on taking single mallards, teal, or wigeon, one after another in superb but almost monotonous rapidity. For the moment, in fact, the naturalist supplants the gunner. True, this may be sacrificing the mutton to the shadow, and this afternoon no special prize rewarded self-denial in letting pass many a tempting chance. For gratifying indeed to fowler’s pride it is to pull down in falling heap the smart pintails and brilliant shovelers, to bring off a right-and-left at geese, though, it may be, one had first to let a cloud of wigeon pass the silent muzzle. Such is individual taste, nor will the memory of that afternoon ever fade, although my score, when at 3.30 P.M. I was recalled, only totalled up to seventy-four ducks and four greylag geese. The recall was imperative, and I obeyed, though not without hesitation and doubt. Could earth provide a better place? WILD GEESE ALIGHTING AT FIFTEEN YARDS (Take the upper pair right-and-left, leaving the nearer geese for second gun.) Within thirty-six hours we had secured sixty-two geese and over two hundred ducks. For four guns, under favouring conditions, this would have been no very special result; but to-day the fowl were all alert and restless at the prospect of a coming change. The keynote had already been sounded that first day, when the tormenta burst, and when the long drought ended on the very Las Nuevas We had acquired this waste of marsh and mud-flat and were keen to “go and possess it.” Initial difficulties arose to confront us. Though the whole region now belonged to us (i.e. the rights of chase, and it boasts but little other value) yet our possession was to be met by some opposition. It was all very natural, delightfully human, and despite the annoyance, captivated our sympathy. Local fowlers, accustomed from immemorial times to earn a scant living by shooting for market the wildfowl of the wilderness, resented this acquisition of exclusive rights. Our scattered guards were overawed, our reed-built huts were burned, and threats reached us—not to mention a casual bullet or two ricochetting in wild bounds across the watery waste. That one quality, however, above mentioned—sympathy—is the passport to Spanish hearts, and For the moment, however, we found ourselves hutless, and constrained to encamp two leagues away on the distant terra firma, this involving an extra couple of hours’ work in the small dark hours. As before 4 A.M. we rode, beneath a pouring rain, “path-finding,” in blind darkness across slimy ooze and shallow—not to mention deeper channels that reached to the girths,—a nightjar circled round our cavalcade—true, a very small event, but recorded because it is quite against the rules for a nightjar to be here in December. Only three guns braved this adventure, and by 5.45 we occupied each his allotted post. These could not be called comfortable, since the positions in which we had to spend the next six or eight hours were quite six inches deep in water, and the only covert a circle of samphire-bush barely a foot above water-level—that being the utmost height allowed by the keen sight of flighting fowl. Each man had an armful of cut brushwood to kneel on, besides another bundle on which cartridge-bags might be supported clear of the water. Rain descended in sheets. Before it was fully light—indeed the average human being of diurnal habit would probably swear it was still quite dark—the swish of wings overhead foretold the coming day. Then with a roar the whole marisma bursts into life as though by clock-work. Thrice-a-minute, and oftener, sped bunches of duck right in one’s face, at times a hurricane of wings. Not seeing them till quite close in, but one barrel can be emptied each time, yet soon a score of beautiful pintail and wigeon formed the basis of a pile. Behind, in the gloom to westward, a sense of movement has developed. At first it might have been but the drift of night-clouds, but as light broadens, form and colour evolve and the phenomenon shapes itself into vast bodies of flamingoes, sprawling, as it were, on the face of heaven in writhing, scintillating confusion. After infinite evolutions, the amorphous mass resolves itself into order; files and marshalled phalanxes serry the sky—those weird wildfowl, each with some six foot of rigid extension, advancing direct upon our posts. Their armies have spent the night on the broad WILDFOWL IN THE MARISMA The flamingoes have passed away, but the lightening skies are still streaked and serried. Most numerous are the wigeon, millions of them in hurrying phalanxes, white specks flanged with dark wings, too well known to describe; pintails (this wet winter hardly less numerous), readily distinguishable by their longer build and stately grace of flight; the dark heads and snowy necks of the drakes conspicuous afar. The arrow-like course of the shoveler, along with his vibrant wing-beats and incessant call, “zook, zook, tsook, tsook,” identify that species; while gadwall, more sombre in tone than the mallards, “talk” in distinctive style; and mob-like masses of teal and marbled ducks sweep along the open channels. Then there are the diving-ducks with harsh corvine croaks, pochards, ferruginous, and tufts, just as swift as the rest, though of apparently more laboured flight; occasionally a string of shelducks, conspicuous by size and contrasted Now the rim of the sun shows over the distant sierra, and one begins to see one’s environment and to realise what Las Nuevas is like. Of Mother Earth as one normally conceives it not a particle is in sight, beyond such low reeds and miles of samphire-tops as break the watery surface, and a vista of this extends to the horizon. Behind our positions stretched a lucio of open water. Upon this, a mile away, stood an army of flamingoes, whose croaks and gabblings filled the still air. During a quiescent interval I examined these with binoculars. Thereupon I discovered that the whole lucio around them and stretching away, say a league in length, was carpeted with legions of duck, which had not been noticed with the naked eye. The discovery explained also a resonant reverberation that, at recurring intervals, I had noticed all the morning, and which I had attributed to the gallant Cervera’s squadron at quick-firing gun-practice away in CÁdiz Bay. Now I saw the cause; it was due to the duck-hawks and birds-of-prey! Twice within ten minutes a swooping marsh-harrier aroused that host on wing—or, say, half-a-mile of them—to fly in terror; but only to settle a few hundred yards It is nine o’clock, the pile of dead has mounted up, but the “flight” is slackening. Already I see our mounted keepers (who have hitherto stood grouped on an islet two miles away) separate and ride forth to set the ducks once more in motion. At this precise moment one remembers two things—both that wretched breakfast at 3 A.M., and the luxuries that lie at hand, almost awash among the reeds. Ducks pass by unscathed for a full half-hour, while such quiet reigns in “No. 1” that tawny water-shrews climb confidingly up the reeds of my screen. Meanwhile the efforts of our drivers were becoming apparent in a renewal of flighting ducks; but we would here emphasise the fact that these second and artificially-produced flights are never so effective from a fowler’s point of view as the earlier, natural movements of the game. For the ducks thus disturbed come, as the Spanish keepers put it, obligados and not of their own free-will. Hence they all pass high—many far above gunshot—and not even the attraction that our fleet of “decoys” (for we have now stuck up the whole of the morning’s spoils to deceive their fellows) will induce more than a limited proportion, and those only the smaller bands, to descend from their aËrial altitude. The “movement” of these masses nevertheless affords another of those spectacular displays that we must at least try to describe. For though none of their sky-high armies will pass within gunshot—or ten gunshots—yet one cannot but be struck with amazement when the whole vault of heaven above presents a quivering vision of wings—shaded, seamed, streaked, and spotted from zenith to horizon. Then the multiplied pulsation of wings is distinctly perceptible—a singular sensation. One remembers it when, perhaps an hour later, you become conscious of its recurrence. But now the heavens are clear! Not a single flight crosses the sky—not one, that is, within sight. But up above, beyond the limits of human vision, there pass unseen hosts, and theirs is that pulsation you feel. The passage of these sky-scrapers is actuated by no puny manoeuvre of ours. They are travellers on through-routes. Perhaps the last land (or water) they touched was Dutch or Although nominally describing that first day in Las Nuevas (and, so far as facts go, adhering rigidly thereto), yet we are endeavouring to concentrate in fewest words the actual lessons of many subsequent years of practical experience. Thus the pick-up on that day (though it may have numbered a couple of hundred ducks) we refrain from recording in this attempt to convey the concrete while avoiding detail. Back again, splash, splosh, through mud and mire, two hours’ ride to our camp-fire—a picturesque scene with our marsh-bred friends gathered round, their tawny faces lurid in the firelight as flames shoot upwards and pine-cones crack like pistol-shots; and over the embers hang a score of teal each impaled on a supple bough. Away beyond there loom like spectres our horses tethered when silvery moonlight glances through scattered pines. Things would have been pleasant indeed had the rain but stopped occasionally. True we had our tents; but our men slept in the open, each rolled in his cloak, beneath some sheltering bush. |
|
