Polka

“ You are speedily bewildered by the noise made by the multitude that surrounds you; the heat becomes stifling; add to this the odor of the bouquets and of the perfumery used by the ladies, and lastly the strains of the enormous orchestra playing galops, waltzes, polkas, mazurkas, with a swing, a precision, a vigor which makes your legs twitch; and do not be surprised if you begin to feel like a different man, if your brain whirls, if your heart beats more rapidly, if you suddenly become inclined to play pranks, to enjoy yourself—no matter how. ”

“ But she ignored me, pattering in Blackfoot. "Don't," she chattered, "don't think of trading horses to my father. All people try to trade them off for food, but we haven't enough grub for winter, and he gets mad. So then they go away and eat a pony."
"My rifle," said I, "won't he take that in trade?"
"No buffalo left," said Miss Lane, "and the people can't find any deer. Why, Flat Tail's band are reduced to fish, and you know that the Sun God forbids them to eat fish."
"Don't you hear?" asked Rain. "Oh, Got-Wet, we'll sell the rifle." ”

“ After shelling the ‘sungahs’ for some time, Sale with much courage dispersed the enemy, and Pollock pushed on his troops, rejecting the advice of Sale to give the men rest after the fatigues of the day and to spare the cattle. He wisely deemed it best to give the enemy no time to rally, even at the cost of some of the baggage animals. Captain Troup, who was at this time at Kábul, a captive with Akbar Khan, subsequently told Pollock that, had he not pushed on, the sirdar would have sallied out of Kábul with twenty thousand men. ”

“ At Philadelphia I once saw a great number of people on a market day throwing at a dog that was so unfortunate as to have been engaged with a polecat just before, and to carry about him the tokens of its displeasure. Persons when travelling through a forest are often troubled with the stink which this creature makes; and sometimes the air is so much infected that it is necessary to hold ones nose. If the wind blows from the place where the polecat has been, or if it be quite calm, as at night, the smell is more strong and disagreeable. ”

“ The Polecat had lived all his life in the forests, thieving, cheating, robbing when a safe chance offered. He could “burr” like a goat-sucker and scream like a jay, tell the age of a deer from its slot and its dung, and judge just how high the pheasants would be roosting on a certain night. The Polecat had hunted in all the forests in Hampshire, Sussex, and Surrey, and he would slip from one to the other if it happened that the nose of the Law had smelt spilt blood.
In Blackbottom Gill five figures were grouped before a fire in the thick of the gloom of the hollies. ”

“ It is my custom to lunch at the Ship and Turtle, an hour that I always enjoy in the midst of my day's work, for I meet many old friends there, and our meal, as a rule, is a merry one. One of my most constant companions on these occasions is a man of the name of Samuel Pollak, the senior partner in the firm of Pollak and Harman, patent agents, Bishopsgate Street. Pollak is one of those breezy, good-natured individuals who make a pleasant impression wherever they go. He is stout of build and somewhat rubicund of face, an excellent man of business and a firm friend. ”

“ Poldik still stood waiting for Malka, hoping that she might yet soon return. But she did not return, and the wherrymen began now to laugh at Poldik in earnest.
“She has taken a small outing,” said one; “She wants to enjoy her freedom a little longer,” “Francis is showing her the world,” said another; “What matter! Francis knows the world, and he knows how to show it, too,” said others again.
Such was the tenor of the observations sarcastically interchanged among the bystanders.
Here Poldik suddenly turned his vehicle round loaded with sand, and tarried no longer. ”

“ Pollock stood up by the fire and drew his revolver. Fighting, at least, he was not afraid of. But a man in the dark is in the best of armour. Realising the wisdom of Waterhouse’s advice, Pollock went into the tent and lay down there.
What little sleep he had was disturbed by dreams, variegated dreams, but chiefly of the Porroh man’s face, upside down, as he went out of the hut, and looked up under his arm. It was odd that this transitory impression should have stuck so firmly in Pollock’s memory. ”

“ And when the boy got his boat and punted about in it, and Poldik saw his face beam with pleasure, the tears came into his own eyes and he could have sung for joy. His heart beat fast, his feet made a few small skips, and he said as if he shared the boy’s joyous sense of freedom, “The world will smile upon thee wherever thou lookest upon it. And thou wilt easily find some Malka and no one will look down upon thee. I have rescued a soul from thy clutches thou foul trade of the scavenger!” ”

“ The usual weight of the pollack is six or seven pounds, but it sometimes much exceeds this. In the Baltic Sea and the Northern Ocean, particularly in those parts where the bottom is rocky, and the sea much agitated, these fish appear, at stated seasons, in great shoals, playing about on the surface in all directions and in the most sportive and agile manner. Near Lubec and Heligoland they are sometimes caught, in immense numbers, in nets, or with lines and hooks baited with a feather, a small fish, or a bit of the skin of an eel. ”

“ Like a true artist, he only devoted himself to it when the fit was on him. And thus also it came to pass that the owner of some jade might lead her to Poldik, but afterwards drive her off again straight to the knacker’s yard, and for this reason—because Poldik would not receive the horse. “I don’t take in horses” he would say. “Pray who would think of taking in horses to cure.” And sometimes, on the other hand, he received every horse that came, paraded them about the courtyard to see what progress they were making, and when they were cured despatched them to their respective masters. ”

“ Polecat uses except himself. I suppose he must like it or he wouldn't be so free with it. But other people go away when he uses it—mostly in the direction the wind's blowing from—and in a hurry, as if they were afraid they'd miss a train. Even Mr. Dog doesn't stop to argue with Mr. Polecat. Nobody does, and all the other deep woods people do their best to make him happy and [Pg 110] to keep him in a good humor whenever he comes about, and give him their nicest things to eat and a lot to carry home with him, so he'll start just as soon as possible. ”

“ But when an inverted head suddenly comes bouncing, like an india-rubber ball, between your legs, leaving distinct smears of blood every time it touches the ground, you can scarcely hope to avoid an accident. Pollock lifted his feet convulsively to avoid it, and then kicked at the thing furiously. Then something hit him violently in the back, and a hot pain ran up his arm.
He had been hit by the pole of an omnibus, and three of the fingers of his left hand smashed by the hoof of one of the horses,—the very fingers, as it happened, that he shot from the Porroh man. ”

“ Like mighty fans rose she, still gripping the struggling polecat hard by the back in a locked clutch of steel—up and up, and out over the estuary, growing slowly from a great bird to a medium-sized one, to a smaller, and a smaller, all the time fighting, it seemed, like a mad creature, to gain the upper air, to climb to the clouds, as a drowning man fights his way upwards in the water. And there was reason—the old polecat's jaws were fast shut in a vise-grip, as of a Yale lock, upon her throat. ”

“ That night, as they were sitting at their fire, Pollock again tried to draw Waterhouse out on the subject of Porroh methods. “Better get to sleep,” said Waterhouse, when Pollock’s bent became apparent; “we start early to-morrow. You may want all your nerve about you.”
“But what line will he take?”
“Can’t say. They’re versatile people. They know a lot of rum dodges. You’d better get that copper-devil, Shakespear, to talk.”
There was a flash and a heavy bang out of the darkness behind the huts, and a clay bullet came whistling close to Pollock’s head. ”

“ Then he asked again the third day, “Do you still want to be a scavenger?” “No; if I can get a boat I will not be anything but a wherryman.
“So you shall get one; but if you should ever cease to be a wherryman the boat is mine.” “And who would cease to be a wherryman while he had a boat?”
After this, Poldik told the parents that their boy had learnt to understand horses wonderfully soon. The boy then added that he was going on the water to wherry sand, and when Poldik explained the why and the wherefore he generally also obtained the consent of the parents. ”

“ Polcher passionately cried:
“The white man lies. Echota is the white town. Ayuhwasi Egwahi is a red town and the path to it is red.”
“Dog of a mixed-breed!” thundered Sevier, levelling a finger at him. “Your soul shall curl up and become as nothing. Killer of great war-eagle out of season, your bones shall rattle in blackness! You dare deny the law of the Cherokees!”
The one shaman present shivered, his eyes glistening with fear, and, unable to witness the blazing scorn the blue eyes were pouring into Polcher, drew his blanket over his head. ”

“ Attempts to account for the first syllable of the word polecat rest entirely on conjecture.
The Siberian polecat (Putorius eversmanni) is very like the European in size, colour and proportions, but with head and back both nearly or quite white, and skull more heavily built and sharply constricted behind the orbits, at least in fully adult individuals. It inhabits the greater part of south-western Siberia, extending from Tibet into the steppes of south-eastern European Russia. ”

“ And we must say that Malka on the water recovered her spirits surprisingly soon. On the whole she liked life on the water far better than life in the street. Also, hitherto life with Francis had been far more agreeable to her than life with Poldik.
In the streets went on a monotonous, unexciting, sluggish, clattering carting of sand. Here on the water life actually acquired wings, and was swift, bird-like, and diversified. And such as the street was Poldik, and such as the water was Francis. With Poldik, before a thought got clothed in words, no brief interval of time was needed. ”

“ But Pollock, using his revolver to parry the lightning stab which was aimed at his deltoid muscle, sent the iron dagger flying, and, firing, hit the man in the hand.
He fired again and missed, knocking a sudden window out of the wall of the hut. The Porroh man stooped in the doorway, glancing under his arm at Pollock. Pollock caught a glimpse of his inverted face in the sunlight, and then the Englishman [143] was alone, sick and trembling with the excitement of the affair, in the twilight of the place. It had all happened in less time than it takes to read about it. ”

“ The other glanced at Poldik, infused a certain smug satisfaction into his look, and this look meant “No; he does not limp to-day,” or he saw the white horse in the forenoon with one of its shoes off, and when he met it in the afternoon the shoe was still missing. Here Poldik looked at the carter, and and this look meant “It is still with one of its shoes off!” The owner of the white horse similarly replied by a look, and in it Poldik heard or saw the words “we have been very busy to-day, and really have not had time.”
Poldik’s regularity was shown moreover in the way he spoke to his horses. ”

“ From some cause or other he always happened to overtake Malka about mid-day in some street, settled her in the cart, drove about with her, smirked at her, urged on the horses until the cart bumped over the paving stones, and then again lifted her from the cart and took his dinner. At that time Poldik’s horses fared well, so that they thought nothing of their accelarated speed. They had plainly grown rich, both in the matter of speed and their provisions for life, and displayed it in every step. ”

“ Also, it hurt, and the polecat did not lose his hold.
Then, maddened, wild with rage, the rage of one who expects a walk-over and receives a bad jolt instead, that old she-otter really got to work. She recoiled like a coiled snake, and the polecat felt fire in one loin.
It looked like the contortions of one big, furry beast twisted with cramp, by the moonlight. You could not possibly separate the combatants, or tell that there were two. But the polecat only fought because he dared not expose his flank with the foe facing him. ”

“ You bloody Polak coward!"
and with a speed in comparison to which lightning is snail-like the tower reached twice for the peaches-and-cream cheeks of the prone victim; who set up a tragic bellowing of his own, writhed upon his somewhat dislocated paillasse, raised his elbows shieldingly, and started to get to his feet by way of his trembling knees—to be promptly knocked flat. Such a howling as The Young Pole set up I have rarely heard: he crawled sideways; he got on one knee ”

“ A Polecat, that had long committed depredations on the farm-yard, having a mind to make a meal of the blood of the Cock, seized him one morning by surprize, and asked him what he could say for himself why slaughter should not pass upon him? The Cock replied, that he was serviceable to mankind by crowing in the morning, and calling them up to their daily labour. That is true, says the Polecat, and is the very objection that I have against you, for you make such a shrill impertinent noise, that people cannot sleep for you. ”

“ And he had just finished as they lay to, and Malka stepped smiling out of the skiff, on which the jolly waterman remained smiling also. Though Malka stepped out of the skiff as quickly as she could, she did not move quickly enough to stop Poldik, who was just that instant driving off and discharging upon his horses every oath in his vocabulary like a shower of hail.
When Malka took her basket and the remains of the untasted dinner, some of the men who were lading sand said, “Poldik wishes us to tell you that to-morrow he will not require dinner.” ”