Patrick O’Brian - Caesar & Hussein

Six uneventful months passed, during which my master and I got to know each other very well. I for my part understood that he did not mean to hit me nor shoot me, and he was always very kind and fed me and cleaned my cage.

One day he came into my cage as usual and opened the door at the back. I went out, but instead of hearing the door close I turned round and saw to my surprise that he had followed me. In his hand was a large ball. ‘Here, Cæsar,’ he said (he always called me Cæsar). Thinking for a moment that it was alive, I pounced on it and caught it in my teeth. He seemed pleased, but when I began to worry it he made a noise and patted his knee.

He seemed to want something, but I could not quite understand what he meant, though I saw dimly that it was to do with the ball. He bent down and flicked his fingers, then in a flash I understood that he wanted the ball. Picking it up I took it to him and put it at his feet. He seemed pleased, and scratched me behind the ears, which I liked.

He took the ball again and rolled it to one corner of the enclosure, saying at the time, ‘Fetch it, Cæsar.’

Seeing that he wanted me to get it again, I went and fetched it, but I thought that he was rather foolish to throw it away if he really wanted to keep it. Then after we had done this for ten times he observed that I was getting tired of it, and he went in to clean the cage while I lay in the sun pretending to be asleep, but really watching a large lizard creeping along in the grass. Its beady little black eyes were taking in everything. As soon as it came near enough I suddenly shot out my paw, but of course I was not nearly quick enough, and almost too quickly for my eye to follow, the lizard had darted across the enclosure and out between the bars, leaving only a little dust and its tail behind it.

I went back into the cage and saw that my master was tying the ball so that it was suspended about three feet from the floor. After he had gone I happened to bang against it, and seeing it swing as if it were alive, I turned to look at it and it hit me on the nose. I struck at it but it swung just out of my reach. I kept on patting it for some time, then I went to sleep for a while, but some mosquitoes woke me up. Feeling bored I patted at the ball again, just to see it swing, and back it came, and I pretended it was a living animal and growled at it.

On the back swing it seemed to be running away and I patted it again, this time from the side, and it went round on a circular course, like a bird; in fact, I was having quite a game with it when my master came back with my food and water, which was rather late. He also had a specially tasty little piece of meat, which I took from his hand as usual. Nearly every day for some months he had brought me some special thing, and on every seventh day a pig — a whole pig.

I started playing with the ball again, and I was amazed to find how fat and out of condition I was. In fact, after about half an hour’s exercise I was quite tired and perspiring freely. However, it did me good, for I slept better that night than on any other occasion.

Next morning I was a little stiff, but with a fine appetite. Soon my master came and we went out into the paddock together. He had another ball, which he threw to me as before. In a short time we were having quite a game with it. He pretended to throw it one way and threw it another. I pretended to be very angry and growled. In the end I unfortunately bit the ball in two. So he went in to clean my cage.

While he was doing this a small bird settled on the ground near me, and I tried to catch it but I was too slow. Then I saw how fat I was really getting, and I decided to exercise my body more by means of the ball. So when I got into my cage about half an hour later I knocked the ball about quite energetically, and by midday I had invented a game. I stood on the side of a crack in the stone floor of my cage and the ball hung just over it, and if on the back swing it got past me, it had escaped — if not, I had caught it.

During the next three weeks I learned how to bring the ball when I was told. We had long games with the ball sometimes, and I became very adept at catching it. As the days wore on I began to look forward to the time when he came to feed me, and I was quite anxious if he was late; and I also became so used to my cage and ready-killed food that I hardly believed that I was the same panda, who could pull down a water buffalo and think nothing of it. I do not believe that if at the time I had been set free I could have supported myself comfortably.

One day when I was in my paddock, as the door had been left open all day, the air suddenly became colder and the sky dark, and I had a horrible feeling that something terrible was going to happen. The other animals who were also in their paddocks (as their cages were being cleaned) seemed very frightened. The bear next to me started running round and round uttering a curious whimpering noise, and on the other side the ape was leaping about and chattering as if demented. Everything was as still as death, not a breeze enough to move the aspen trees on the path outside, and not a sound other than that of the animals. Then all at once the sun seemed to go out like a dead firefly and a chill that sent a shiver down my back came with its going. Now all the animals were quiet and not even a gnat buzzed, and in the distance I heard a dog howling. One would have thought that the world was dead.

In a few minutes my master came out, and after looking up to the sky for a few moments he came over to me and put his hand over my eyes and stroked me. I was badly frightened and trembling, so I snuggled my head under his arms, and he said in an even voice: ‘Keep calm, old boy — it’s only an eclipse.’

I did not know what he meant, but anyhow it was very soothing. In a few minutes after that the sun seemed to light up again.

So far I have only mentioned the pleasant side of my life in captivity, but there was quite another side.

Can you imagine the utter dreariness of the long hours between the times when my master came and fed me and the night? If so, you will be able to understand my intense hatred for all men, except my master and a few others.

Men had taken me from my home, from the jungle with its infinite variety of life and colour, and had put me in a cage with bars and a cold stone floor. A paddock or small plot of withered grass was my jungle and the barred cage was my lair.

For a flowing stream to drink from I had a small stone trough, and instead of the pleasure of tracking, stalking and then killing my prey, I was given at a regular time every day a smelly, stale and bony lump of flesh with no blood in it.

That which I missed most of all was the killing of my own food. It is true that I was always given enough. But what could compensate for the thrill of the charge, and then the last wild gallop before I reached its neck and it fell dead? What could rival the warm blood and juicy meat of which I was particularly fond?