Musketeer

“ They walked arm in arm, occupying the whole width of the street and taking in every Musketeer they met, so that in the end it became a triumphal march. The heart of d’Artagnan swam in delirium; he marched between Athos and Porthos, pressing them tenderly. ”

“ They pierce with its point, strike with the flat, cut with the edge; every stroke brings down a man. “For the king!” cried D’Artagnan, to every man he struck at, that is to say, to every man that fell. This cry became the charging word for the musketeers, who, guided by it, joined D’Artagnan. During this time the archers, recovering from the panic they had undergone, charge the aggressors in the rear, and regular as mill strokes, overturn or knock down all that opposed them. The crowd, which sees swords gleaming, and drops of blood flying in the air—the crowd falls back and crushes itself. ”

“ cried he, in an accent of greater astonishment than before, “your second witness is Monsieur Aramis?”
“Doubtless! Are you not aware that we are never seen one without the others, and that we are called among the Musketeers and the Guards, at court and in the city, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, or the Three Inseparables? ”

“ Loose, half-drunk, imposing, the king’s Musketeers, or rather M. de Treville’s, spread themselves about in the cabarets, in the public walks, and the public sports, shouting, twisting their mustaches, clanking their swords, and taking great pleasure in annoying the Guards of the cardinal whenever they could fall in with them; then drawing in the open streets, as if it were the best of all possible sports; sometimes killed, but sure in that case to be both wept and avenged; often killing others, but then certain of not rotting in prison, M. de Treville being there to claim them. ”

“ Messieurs Musketeers, I will not have this haunting of bad places, this quarreling in the streets, this swordplay at the crossways; and above all, I will not have occasion given for the cardinal’s Guards, who are brave, quiet, skillful men who never put themselves in a position to be arrested, and who, besides, never allow themselves to be arrested, to laugh at you! I am sure of it--they would prefer dying on the spot to being arrested or taking back a step. To save yourselves, to scamper away, to flee--that is good for the king’s Musketeers!”
Porthos and Aramis trembled with rage. ”

“ The musketoes are generally very troublesome; but as they are only generated in stagnant and putrid water, it is easy to perceive that this evil is not without a remedy; because by draining the marshes, and by cultivating the land, the cause which produces them will in a great measure be removed. ”

“ Get up that combination—a hot day, a dank, humid, and suffocating greenhouse given up to the musk-plant, and you will have the full effect of only one full-blown musky. The odour of the plant, heavy when close, is delicate when diffused; the scent of the musk-rat, on the other hand, is heavy when diffused, and insupportable when near. The marvellous diffusibility of this odour is illustrated in many ways. It has long been maintained that the musk-rat has only to pass over a closely corked bottle of wine to destroy its contents. ”

“ What is the secret of the musk-rat's survival while the strong creatures of the chase like buffalo and timber-wolf have been almost exterminated? In the first place, settlers can't farm swamps; so the musk-rat thrives just as well in the swamps of New Jersey to-day as when the first white hunter set foot in America. Then musquash lives as heartily on owls and frogs and snakes as on water mussels and lily-pads. If one sort of food fails, the musk-rat has as omnivorous powers of digestion as the bear and changes his diet. Then he can hide as well in water as on land. ”

“ I am peculiarly sensitive to smells, and dislike that of musk in particular, yet I have no objection to a musk-rat running about my room quietly if I do not startle him. I never allow one to be killed, and encourage their presence in the house, for I think the temporary inconvenience of a whiff of musk is amply repaid by the destruction of the numerous objectionable insects which lurk in the corners of Indian houses. The notion that they do damage by gnawing is an erroneous one, the mischief done by mice and rats being frequently laid to their charge ”

“ BEAVER RAT.
“Musk-rat, Musquash, and Ondatra are other names given to them. They have, you see, webbed feet and flattened tails, and we shall find that they carry two small glands containing the scented substance called musk. The sooner we strip off the skins the better, they will be useful for making caps.”
We went back to the house, and met Fritz and Jack just returned from their excursion, reporting that no trace of serpents, great or small, had been met with. ”

“ GENUS MOSCHUS—THE MUSK DEER.
Canines in both sexes, very long and slender in the male; no horns; feet much cloven, with large false hoofs that touch the ground; the medium metacarpals fused into a solid cannon bone; in the skull the intermaxillaries join the nasals; hinder part of tarsus hairy; fur thick, elastic, and brittle; muffle large; no eye, feet, or groin-pits; a large gland or præputial bag under the stomach in the males, which contains the secretion known in commerce as "musk." ”

“ That muskeg is only one of thousands, when you go seventy miles north of the Saskatchewan, sixty miles east of Athabasca Lake. That muskeg and its like, covering an area two-thirds of all Europe, is the home of all the little furs, mink and muskrat and fisher and otter and rabbit and ermine, the furs that clothe—not princes and millionaire, who buy silver fox and sea otter—but you and me and the rest of us whose object is to keep warm, not to show how much we can spend. ”

“ As we bump along in the muskeg and the creatures surround us in a smother, he ventures to assert that "the life of the adult insect is very short" and that it is the female who stings. The Doctor is a born instructor. We learn that "the natural food of the mosquito is a drop or two of the juice of a plant." We suspect the Doctor of fagging up on "Mosquito" out of some convent dictionary while we have been at Fond du Lac. He is like the parson introduced by his friend of the cloth. ”

“ Now and again, there came a scraping of claws as one of the muskrats, unbalanced by a twist or turn, slid across the wooden floor of its prison.
As he carried his new acquisitions up the dark mountain, Andy pondered.
Muskrats, his research had taught him, are almost entirely aquatic creatures, though occasionally they make overland journeys. Their food consists of aquatic plants, tender roots and bulbs, and they are very fond of fresh-water mussels. They construct houses of mud mixed with plant stalks or dig burrows in the bank. The entrance to either type of dwelling is always under water. ”

“ Most mammals have certain portions of the skin specially modified and provided with glands secreting odorous and fatty substances characteristic of the particular species. The special gland of the musk-deer, which has made the animal so well known, and has proved the cause of unremitting persecution to its possessor, is found in the male only, and is a sac about the size of a small orange, situated beneath the skin of the abdomen, the orifice being immediately in front of the preputial aperture. ”

“ Animals which are known to prey on the Mussels are Muskrats, Minks, Raccoons, and Hogs, the first and last being especially destructive. The freshets to which the Mississippi is periodically subject undoubtedly do great damage to the Mussel-beds, burying them under sand and mud. Shifting sand-bars are also known to cover up beds. The fishermen sometimes find extensive beds of dead shells which appear to have been recently uncovered by the current. During freshets, when the stream finds new channels, many Mussels are carried from their beds, and left dry when the water subsides. ”

“ Moles are plentiful in every part, and prove themselves great enemies to agriculture, perhaps the greatest that the Gallegan peasants have to contend with: the ancients made hats of their skin, but no use is made of them here. The musk-rat, musaraña (fetid shrew-mouse) , Ginera sorex, is also found in these parts; it has glands along the outside of its stomach, under its fur, which give out a strong odour of musk. Seoane says these are the smallest mammals known; some think them poisonous; there are many fables about them. The Spanish word for musk is almizcle; it is derived from the Arabic. ”

“ The inhabitants are sometimes greatly troubled with Musquitoes. They either follow the hay which is made near the town, in the low meadows which are quite penetrated with salt water; or they accompany the cattle at night when it is brought home. I have myself experienced, and have observed in others, how much these little animalcules can disfigure a person’s face during a single night; for the skin is sometimes [268] so covered over with little blisters from their stings, that people are ashamed to appear in public. ”

“ Except by burrowing into and spoiling the banks, they are not productive of much evil, their food consisting principally of the roots of aquatic plants, in addition to the shell-fish. The musky odour which gives rise to their common name is caused by glandular organs placed near the tail, filled with a viscid and powerfully musky fluid, whose uses we know but little of, though it is thought to be intended as a guide by which these creatures may discover each other. ”

“ In assorting muskrats, buyers usually pay more attention to size and primeness of pelt than they do to the fur, because it is generally conceded that the average run of 'rat fur is good. Nature endows the muskrat with a dense coat of fur, which, in fact, is a necessity to further its welfare in the icy waters in which it lives. ”

“ The Musquashes is a small Beast that lives in shallow ponds, where they build them houses of earth and sticks in shape like mole-hills, and feed upon Calamus Aromaticus: in May they scent very strong of Muske; their furr is of no great esteem; their stones wrapt up in Cotten-wool will continue a long time, and are good to lay amongst cloths to give them a grateful smell. ”

“ Apparently the musk-ox (Ovibos moschatus) has little or no near relationship to either the oxen or the sheep; and it is not improbable that its affinities are with the Asiatic takin (Budorcas) and the extinct European Criotherium of the Pliocene of Samos. The musky odour from which the animal takes its name does not appear to be due to the secretion of any gland.
In height a bull musk-ox stands about 5 ft. at the shoulder. The head is large and broad. The horns in old males have extremely broad bases, meeting in the middle line, and covering the brow and crown of the head. ”

“ Musquitoes appear to be particularly fond of the fresh blood of Europeans, who always suffer much more the first year of their arrival in America than they do afterwards. The people of the country seem quite to disregard their attacks. Wherever they fix their sting, a little tumor or pustule usually arises, supposed to be occasioned by the fermentation, when mixed with the blood, of a small quantity 287of liquor which the insect always injects into the wound it makes with its spicula, as may be seen through a microscope, and which it probably does to render the blood more fluid. ”

“ The musk present in the glands differs in appearance with the season and the age of the animal. Musk deers killed in spring have in their musk bag an unctuous soft mass of a reddish-brown color with the strongest odor; at other seasons the mass is darker in color, almost black, and granular ”

“ Running to the spot where the head had been I found a beautiful brown-gray animal lying behind a bush. It was no larger than a half-grown fawn, but on either side of its mouth two daggerlike tusks projected, slender, sharp and ivory white. It was a musk deer—the first living, wild one I had ever seen. Even before I touched the body I inhaled a heavy, not unpleasant, odor of musk and discovered the gland upon the abdomen. It was three inches long and two inches wide, but all the hair on the rump and belly was strongly impregnated with the odor. ”

“ Talk about musquitoes in the States as being numerous and troublesome! Why no man who has not visited the arctic shores in the months of July and August can have a good idea of these Liliputian elephants. In the States the very hum of a musquito is enough to set any one upon his guard. How many a poor soul there has been kept in a state of torment all night by the presence of only two or three musquitoes! ”

“ Every one notices that house flies are most abundant around barns in August and September, and it is in the ordure of stables that the early stages of this insect are passed. No one has traced the transformations of this fly in our country, but we copy from Bouché's work on the transformations of insects, the rather rude figures of the larva (Fig. 85) , and pupa-case (a) of the Musca domestica of Europe, which is supposed to be our species. Bouché states that the larva is cylindrical, rounded posteriorly, smooth and shining, fleshy, and yellowish white, and four lines long. ”

“ Its flesh is most excellent food. From its peculiar, yapping cry, many times repeated, it is often called the Barking Deer. It breeds readily in captivity, and its bright fawn color attracts to it much attention.
The Musk Deer, (Moschus moschiferus) , of northern India, Tibet and Southern China is the creature which produces the well-known musk perfume of commerce. The product is secreted by the male in the “rutting” season. This species is one of the smallest of the true deer. ”

“ These animals are not uncommon in the Niger; but I believe they are not oftentimes found dangerous. They are of little account to the traveller, when compared with the amazing swarms of musketoes, which rise from the swamps and creeks, in such numbers as to harass even the most torpid of the natives ”