Rabbits have no set time for lessons, they are always learning; but what
the lesson is depends on the present stress, and that must arrive
before it is known. They went to this place for a quiet rest, but had
not been long there when suddenly a warning note from the ever-watchful
bluejay caused Molly's nose and ears to go up and her tail to tighten to
her back. Away across the Swamp was Olifant's big black and white dog,
coming straight toward them.

"Now," said Molly, "squat while I go and keep that fool out of
mischief." Away she went to meet him and she fearlessly dashed across
the dog's path.

"Bow-ow-ow," he fairly yelled as he bounded after Molly, but she kept
just beyond his reach and led him where the million daggers struck fast
and deep, till his tender ears were scratched raw, and guided him at
last plump into a hidden barbed-wire fence, where he got such a gashing
that he went homeward howling with pain. After making a short double, a
loop and a baulk in case the dog should come back, Molly returned to
find that Rag in his eagerness was standing bolt upright and craning his
neck to see the sport.

This disobedience made her so angry that she struck him with her hind
foot and knocked him over in the mud.

One day as they fed on the near clover field a red-tailed hawk came
swooping after them. Molly kicked up her hind legs to make fun of him
and skipped into the briers along one of their old pathways, where of
course the hawk could not follow. It was the main path from the
Creekside Thicket to the Stove-pipe brush-pile. Several creepers had
grown across it, and Molly, keeping one eye on the hawk, set to work and
cut the creepers off. Rag watched her, then ran on ahead, and cut some
more that were across the path. "That's right," said Molly, "always keep
the runways clear, you will need them often enough. Not wide, but clear.
Cut everything like a creeper across them and some day you will find you
have cut a snare. "A what?" asked Rag, as he scratched his right ear
with his left hind foot.

"A snare is something that looks like a creeper, but it doesn't grow and
it's worse than all the hawks in the world," said Molly, glancing at the
now far-away red-tail, "for there it hides night and day in the runway
till the chance to catch you comes."

"I don't believe it could catch me," said Rag, with the pride of youth
as he rose on his heels to rub his chin and whiskers high up on a smooth
sapling. Rag did not know he was doing this, but his mother saw and
knew it was a sign, like the changing of a boy's voice, that her little
one was no longer a baby but would soon be a grown-up Cottontail.




V


There is magic in running water. Who does not know it and feel it? The
railroad builder fearlessly throws his bank across the wide bog or lake,
or the sea itself, but the tiniest rill of running water he treats with
great respect, studies its wish and its way and gives it all it seems to
ask. The thirst-parched traveller in the poisonous alkali deserts holds
back in deadly fear from the sedgy ponds till he finds one down whose
centre is a thin, clear line, and a faint flow, the sign of running,
living water, and joyfully he drinks.

There is magic in running water, no evil spell can cross it. Tam
O'Shanter proved its potency in time of sorest need. The wild-wood
creature with its deadly foe following tireless on the trail scent,
realizes its nearing doom and feels an awful spell. Its strength is
spent, its every trick is tried in vain till the good Angel leads it to
the water, the running, living water, and dashing in it follows the
cooling stream, and then with force renewed takes to the woods again.

There is magic in running water. The hounds come to the very spot and
halt and cast about; and halt and cast in vain. Their spell is broken by
the merry stream, and the wild thing lives its life.

And this was one of the great secrets that Raggylug learned from his
mother--"after the Brierrose, the Water is your friend."

One hot, muggy night in August, Molly led Rag through the woods. The
cotton-white cushion she wore under her tail twinkled ahead and was his
guiding lantern, though it went out as soon as she stopped and sat on
it. After a few runs and stops to listen, they came to the edge of the
pond. The hylas in the trees above them were singing '_sleep, sleep,_'
and away out on a sunken log in the deep water, up to his chin in the
cooling bath, a bloated bullfrog was singing the praises of a '_jug o'
rum._'

"Follow me still," said Molly, in rabbit, and 'flop' she went into the
pond and struck out for the sunken log in the middle. Rag flinched but
plunged with a little 'ouch,' gasping and wobbling his nose very fast
but still copying his mother. The same movements as on land sent him
through the water, and thus he found he could swim. On he went till he
reached the sunken log and scrambled up by his dripping mother on the
high dry end, with a rushy screen around them and the Water that tells
no tales. After this in warm, black nights, when that old fox from
Springfield came prowling through the Swamp, Rag would note the place of
the bullfrog's voice, for in case of direst need it might be a guide to
safety. And thenceforth the words of the song that the bullfrog sang
were, '_Come, come, in danger come_.'

This was the latest study that Rag took up with his mother-it was really
a post-graduate course, for many little rabbits never learn it at all.




VI


No wild animal dies of old age. Its life has soon or late a tragic end.
It is only a question of how long it can hold out against its foes. But
Rag's life was proof that once a rabbit passes out of his youth he is
likely to outlive his prime and be killed only in the last third of
life, the downhill third we call old age.

The Cottontails had enemies on every side. Their daily life was a series
of escapes. For dogs, foxes, cats, skunks, coons, weasels, minks,
snakes, hawks, owls, and men, and even insects were all plotting to
kill them. They had hundreds of adventures, and at least once a day they
had to fly for their lives and save themselves by their legs and wits.

More than once that hateful fox from Springfield drove them to taking
refuge under the wreck of a barbed-wire hog-pen by the spring. But once
there they could look calmly at him while he spiked his legs in vain
attempts to reach them.

Once or twice Rag when hunted had played off the hound against a skunk
that had seemed likely to be quite as dangerous as the dog.

Once he was caught alive by a hunter who had a hound and a ferret to
help him. But Rag had the luck to escape next day, with a yet deeper
distrust of ground holes. He was several times run into the water by the
cat, and many times was chased by hawks and owls, but for each kind of
danger there was a safeguard. His mother taught him the principal
dodges, and he improved on them and made many new ones as he grew older.
And the older and wiser he grew the less he trusted to his legs, and the
more to his wits for safety.

Ranger was the name of a young hound in the neighborhood. To train him
his master used to put him on the trail of one of the Cottontails. It
was nearly always Rag that they ran, for the young buck enjoyed the runs
as much as they did, the spice of danger in them being just enough for
zest. He would say:

"Oh, mother! here comes the dog again, I must have a run to-day."

"You are too bold, Raggy, my son!" she might reply. "I fear you will run
once too often."

"But, mother, it is such glorious fun to tease that fool dog, and it's
all good training. I'll thump if I am too hard pressed, then you can
come and change off while I get my second wind."

On he would come, and Ranger would take the trail and follow till Rag
got tired of it. Then he either sent a thumping telegram for help, which
brought Molly to take charge of the dog, or he got rid of the dog by
some clever trick. A description of one of these shows how well Rag had
learned the arts of the woods.

He knew that his scent lay best near the ground, and was strongest when
he was warm. So if he could get off the ground, and be left in peace for
half an hour to cool off, and for the trail to stale, he knew he would
be safe. When, therefore, he tired of the chase, he made for the
Creekside brier-patch, where he 'wound'--that is, zigzagged--till he
left a course so crooked that the dog was sure to be greatly delayed in
working it out. He then went straight to D in the woods, passing one hop
to windward of the high log E. Stopping at D, he followed his back trail
to F, here he leaped aside and ran toward G. Then, returning on his
trail to J, he waited till the hound passed on his trail at I. Rag then
got back on his old

[Illustration]

trail at H, and followed it to E, where, with a scent-baulk or great
leap aside, he reached the high log, and running to its higher end, he
sat like a bump.

Ranger lost much time in the bramble maize, and the scent was very poor
when he got it straightened out and came to D. Here he began to circle
to pick it up, and after losing much time, struck the trail which ended
suddenly at G. Again he was at fault, and had to circle to find the
trail. Wider and wider the circles, until at last, he passed right under
the log Rag was on. But a cold scent, on a cold day, does not go
downward much. Rag never budged nor winked, and the hound passed.

Again the dog came round. This time he crossed the low part of the log,
and stopped to smell it. 'Yes, clearly it was rabbity,' but it was a
stale scent now; still he mounted the log.

It was a trying moment for Rag, as the great hound came sniff-sniffing
along the log. But his nerve did not forsake him; the wind was right; he
had his mind made up to bolt as soon as Ranger came half way up. But he
didn't come. A yellow cur would have seen the rabbit sitting there, but
the hound did not, and the scent seemed stale, so he leaped off the log,
and Rag had won.




VII


Rag had never seen any other rabbit than his mother. Indeed he had
scarcely thought about there being any other. He was more and more away
from her now, and yet he never felt lonely, for rabbits do not hanker
for company. But one day in December, while he was among the red
dogwood brush, cutting a new path to the great Creekside thicket, he saw
all at once against the sky over the Sunning Bank the head and ears of a
strange rabbit. The new-comer had the air of a well-pleased discoverer
and soon came hopping Rag's way along one of _his_ paths into _his_
Swamp. A new feeling rushed over him, that boiling mixture of anger and
hatred called jealousy.

The stranger stopped at one of Rag's rubbing-trees--that is, a tree
against which he used to stand on his heels and rub his chin as far up
as he could reach. He thought he did this simply because he liked it;
but all buck-rabbits do so, and several ends are served. It makes the
tree rabbity, so that other rabbits know that this swamp already belongs
to a rabbit family and is not open for settlement. It also lets the next
one know by the scent if the last caller was an acquaintance, and the
height from the ground of the rubbing-places shows how tall the rabbit
is.

Now to his disgust Rag noticed that the new-comer was a head taller than
himself, and a big, stout buck at that. This was a wholly new experience
and filled Rag with a wholly new feeling. The spirit of murder entered
his heart; he chewed very hard with nothing in his mouth, and hopping
forward onto a smooth piece of hard ground he struck slowly:

'_Thump--thump--thump_,' which is a rabbit telegram for 'Get out of my
swamp, or fight.'

The new-comer made a big V with his ears, sat upright for a few seconds,
then, dropping on his fore-feet, sent along the ground a louder,
stronger, '_Thump--thump--thump_.'

And so war was declared.

They came together by short runs sidewise, each one trying to get the
wind of the other and watching for a chance advantage. The stranger was
a big, heavy buck with plenty of muscle, but one or two trifles such as
treading on a turnover and failing to close when Rag was on low ground
showed that he had not much cunning and counted on winning his battles
by his weight. On he came at last and Rag met him like a little fury. As
they came together they leaped up and struck out with their hind feet.
_Thud, thud_ they came, and down went poor little Rag. In a moment the
stranger was on him with his teeth and Rag was bitten, and lost several
tufts of hair before he could get up. But he was swift of foot and got
out of reach. Again he charged and again he was knocked down and bitten
severely. He was no match for his foe, and it soon became a question of
saving his own life.

Hurt as he was he sprang away, with the stranger in full chase, and
bound to kill him as well as to oust him from the Swamp where he was
born. Rag's legs were good and so was his wind. The stranger was big and
so heavy that he soon gave up the chase, and it was well for poor Rag
that he did, for he was getting stiff from his wounds as well as tired.
From that day began a reign of terror for Rag. His training had been
against owls, dogs, weasels, men, and so on, but what to do when chased
by another rabbit, he did not know. All he knew was to lay low till he
was found, then run.

Poor little Molly was completely terrorized; she could not help Rag and
sought only to hide. But the big buck soon found her out. She tried to
run from him, but she was not now so swift as Rag. The stranger made no
attempt to kill her, but he made love to her, and because she hated him
and tried to get away, he treated her shamefully. Day after day he
worried her by following her about, and often, furious at her lasting
hatred, he would knock her down and tear out mouthfuls of her soft fur
till his rage cooled somewhat, when he would let her go for awhile. But
his fixed purpose was to kill Rag, whose escape seemed hopeless. There
was no other swamp he could go to, and whenever he took a nap now he had
to be ready at any moment to dash for his life. A dozen times a day the
big stranger came creeping up to where he slept, but each time the
watchful Rag awoke in time to escape. To escape yet not to escape. He
saved his life indeed, but oh! what a miserable life it had become. How
maddening to be thus helpless, to see his little mother daily beaten and
torn, as well as to see all his favorite feeding-grounds, the cosey
nooks, and the pathways he had made with so much labor, forced from him
by this hateful brute. Unhappy Rag realized that to the victor belong
the spoils, and he hated him more than ever he did fox or ferret.

How was it to end? He was wearing out with running and watching and bad
food, and little Molly's strength and spirit were breaking down under
the long persecution. The stranger was ready to go to all lengths to
destroy poor Rag, and at last stooped to the worst crime known among
rabbits. However much they may hate each other, all good rabbits forget
their feuds when their common enemy appears. Yet one day when a great
goshawk came swooping over the Swamp, the stranger, keeping well under
cover himself, tried again and again to drive Rag into the open.

Once or twice the hawk nearly had him, but still the briers saved him,
and it was only when the big buck himself came near being caught that he
gave it up. And again Rag escaped, but was no better off. He made up his
mind to leave, with his mother, if possible, next night and go into the
world in quest of some new home when he heard old Thunder, the hound,
sniffing and searching about the outskirts of the swamp, and he resolved
on playing a desperate game. He deliberately crossed the hound's view,
and the chase that then began was fast and furious. Thrice around the
Swamp they went till Rag had made sure that his mother was hidden safely
and that his hated foe was in his usual nest. Then right into that nest
and plump over him he jumped, giving him a rap with one hind foot as he
passed over his head.

"You miserable fool, I kill you yet," cried the stranger, and up he
jumped only to find himself between Rag and the dog and heir to all the
peril of the chase.

On came the hound baying hotly on the straight-away scent. The buck's
weight and size were great advantages in a rabbit fight, but now they
were fatal. He did not know many tricks. Just the simple ones like
'double,' 'wind,' and 'hole-up,' that every baby Bunny knows. But the
chase was too close for doubling and winding, and he didn't know where
the holes were.

It was a straight race. The brier-rose, kind to all rabbits alike, did
its best, but it was no use. The baying of the hound was fast and
steady. The crashing of the brush and the yelping of the hound each time
the briers tore his tender ears were borne to the two rabbits where they
crouched in hiding. But suddenly these sounds stopped, there was a
scuffle, then loud and terrible screaming.

Rag knew what it meant and it sent a shiver through him, but he soon
forgot that when all was over and rejoiced to be once more the master of
the dear old Swamp.




VIII


Old Olifant had doubtless a right to burn all those brush-piles in the
east and south of the Swamp and to clear up the wreck of the old
barbed-wire hog-pen just below the spring. But it was none the less hard
on Rag and his mother. The first were their various residences and
outposts, and the second their grand fastness and safe retreat.

They had so long held the Swamp and felt it to be their very own in
every part and suburb--including Olifant's grounds and buildings--that
they would have resented the appearance of another rabbit even about the
adjoining barnyard.

Their claim, that of long, successful occupancy, was exactly the same as
that by which most nations hold their land, and it would be hard to find
a better right.

During the time of the January thaw the Olifants had cut the rest of the
large wood about the pond and curtailed the Cottontails' domain on all
sides. But they still clung to the dwindling Swamp, for it was their
home and they were loath to move to foreign parts. Their life of daily
perils went on, but they were still fleet of foot, long of wind, and
bright of wit. Of late they had been somewhat troubled by a mink that
had wandered up-stream to their quiet nook. A little judicious guidance
had transferred the uncomfortable visitor to Olifant's hen-house. But
they were not yet quite sure that he had been properly looked after. So
for the present they gave up using the ground-holes, which were, of
course, dangerous blind-alleys, and stuck closer than ever to the briers
and the brush-piles that were left.

That first snow had quite gone and the weather was bright and warm until
now. Molly, feeling a touch of rheumatism, was somewhere in the lower
thicket seeking a tea-berry tonic. Rag was sitting in the weak sunlight
on a bank in the east side. The smoke from the familiar gable chimney of
Olifant's house came fitfully drifting a pale blue haze through the
under-woods and showing as a dull brown against the brightness of the
sky. The sun-gilt gable was cut off midway by the banks of brier-brush,
that purple in shadow shone like rods of blazing crimson and gold in the
light. Beyond the house the barn with its gable and roof, new gilt as
the house, stood up like a Noah's ark.

The sounds that came from it, and yet more the delicious smell that
mingled with the smoke, told Rag that the animals were being fed cabbage
in the yard. Rag's mouth watered at the idea of the feast. He blinked
and blinked as he snuffed its odorous promises, for he loved cabbage
dearly. But then he had been to the barnyard the night before after a
few paltry clover-tops, and no wise rabbit would go two nights running
to the same place.

Therefore he did the wise thing. He moved across where he could not
smell the cabbage and made his supper of a bundle of hay that had been
blown from the stack. Later, when about to settle for the night, he was
joined by Molly, who had taken her tea-berry and then eaten her frugal
meal of sweet birch near the Sunning Bank.

Meanwhile the sun had gone about his business elsewhere, taking all his
gold and glory with him. Off in the east a big black shutter came
pushing up and rising higher and higher; it spread over the whole sky,
shut out all light, and left the world a very gloomy place indeed. Then
another mischief-maker, the wind, taking advantage of the sun's absence,
came on the scene and set about brewing trouble. The weather turned
colder and colder; it seemed worse than when the ground had been covered
with snow.

"Isn't this terribly cold? How I wish we had our stove-pipe brush-pile,"
said Rag.

"A good night for the pine-root hole," replied Molly, "but we have not
yet seen the pelt of that mink on the end of the barn, and it is not
safe till we do."

The hollow hickory was gone--in fact at this very moment its trunk,
lying in the wood-yard, was harboring the mink they feared. So the
Cottontails hopped to the south side of the pond and, choosing a
brush-pile, they crept under and snuggled down for the night, facing the
wind but with their noses in different directions so as to go out
different ways in case of alarm. The wind blew harder and colder as the
hours went by, and about midnight a fine, icy snow came ticking down on
the dead leaves and hissing through the brush heap. It might seem a poor
night for hunting, but that old fox from Springfield was out. He came
pointing up the wind in the shelter of the Swamp and chanced in the lee
of the brush-pile, where he scented the sleeping Cottontails. He halted
for a moment, then came stealthily sneaking up toward the brush under
which his nose told him the rabbits were crouching. The noise of the
wind and the sleet enabled him to come quite close before Molly heard
the faint crunch of a dry leaf under his paw. She touched Rag's
whiskers, and both were fully awake just as the fox sprang on them; but
they always slept with their legs ready for a jump. Molly darted out
into the blinding storm. The fox missed his spring, but followed like a
racer, while Rag dashed off to one side.

There was only one road for Molly; that was straight up the wind, and
bounding for her life she gained a little over the unfrozen mud that
would not carry the fox, till she reached the margin of the pond. No
chance to turn now, on she must go.

Splash! splash! through the weeds she went, then plunge into the deep
water.

And plunge went the fox close behind. But it was too much for Reynard on
such a night. He turned back, and Molly, seeing only one course,
struggled through the reeds into the deep water and struck out for the
other shore. But there was a strong headwind. The little waves, icy
cold, broke over her head as she swam, and the water was full of snow
that blocked her way like soft ice, or floating mud. The dark line of
the other shore seemed far, far away, with perhaps the fox waiting for
her there.

But she laid her ears flat to be out of the gale, and bravely put forth
all her strength with wind and tide against her. After a long, weary
swim in the cold water, she had nearly reached the farther reeds when a
great mass of floating snow barred her road; then the wind on the bank
made strange, fox-like sounds that robbed her of all force, and she was
drifted far backward before she could get free from the floating bar.

Again she struck out, but slowly--oh so slowly now. And when at last she
reached the lee of the tall reeds, her limbs were numbed, her strength
spent, her brave little heart was sinking, and she cared no more whether
the fox were there or not. Through the reeds she did indeed pass, but
once in the weeds her course wavered and slowed, her feeble strokes no
longer sent her landward, and the ice forming around her, stopped her
altogether. In a little while the cold, weak limbs ceased to move, the
furry nose-tip of the little mother Cottontail wobbled no more, and the
soft brown eyes were closed in death.

       *       *       *       *       *

But there was no fox waiting to tear her with ravenous jaws. Rag had
escaped the first onset of the foe, and as soon as he regained his wits
he came running back to change-off and so help his mother. He met the
old fox going round the pond to meet Molly and led him far and away,
then dismissed him with a barbed-wire gash on his head, and came to the
bank and sought about and trailed and thumped, but all his searching was
in vain; he could not find his little mother. He never saw her again,
and never knew whither she went, for she slept her never-waking sleep in
the ice-arms of her friend the Water that tells no tales.

Poor little Molly Cottontail! She was a true heroine, yet only one of
unnumbered millions that without a thought of heroism have lived and
done their best in their little world, and died. She fought a good fight
in the battle of life. She was good stuff; the stuff that never dies.
For flesh of her flesh and brain of her brain was Rag. She lives in him,
and through him transmits a finer fibre to her race.

And Rag still lives in the Swamp. Old Olifant died that winter, and the
unthrifty sons ceased to clear the Swamp or mend the wire fences. Within
a single year it was a wilder place than ever; fresh trees and brambles
grew, and falling wires made many Cottontail castles and last retreats
that dogs and foxes dared not storm. And there to this day lives Rag. He
is a big, strong buck now and fears no rivals. He has a large family of
his own, and a pretty brown wife that he got no one knows where. There,
no doubt, he and his children's children will flourish for many years
to come, and there you may see them any sunny evening if you have learnt
their signal code, and choosing a good spot on the ground, know just how
and when to thump it.




VIXEN

THE SPRINGFIELD FOX

I


The hens had been mysteriously disappearing for over a month; and when I
came home to Springfield for the summer holidays it was my duty to find
the cause. This was soon done. The fowls were carried away bodily one at
a time, before going to roost, or else after leaving, which put tramps
and neighbors out of court; they were not taken from the high perches,
which cleared all coons and owls; or left partly eaten, so that weasels,
skunks, or minks were not the guilty ones, and the blame, therefore, was
surely left at Reynard's door.

The great pine wood of Erindale was on the other bank of the river, and
on looking carefully about the lower ford I saw a few fox-tracks and a
barred feather from one of our Plymouth Rock chickens. On climbing the
farther bank in search of more clews, I heard a great outcry of crows
behind me, and turning, saw a number of these birds darting down at
something in the ford. A better view showed that it was the old story,
thief catch thief, for there in the middle of the ford was a fox with
something in his jaws--he was returning from our barnyard with another
hen. The crows, though shameless robbers themselves, are ever first to
cry 'Stop thief,' and yet more than ready to take 'hush-money' in the
form of a share in the plunder.

And this was their game now. The fox to get back home must cross the
river, where he was exposed to the full brunt of the crow mob. He made a
dash for it, and would doubtless have gotten across with his booty had I
not joined in the attack, whereupon he dropped the hen, scarce dead, and
disappeared in the woods.

This large and regular levy of provisions wholly carried off could mean
but one thing, a family of little foxes at home; and to find them I now
was bound.

That evening I went with Ranger, my hound, across the river into the
Erindale woods. As soon as the hound began to circle, we heard the
short, sharp bark of a fox from a thickly wooded ravine close by. Ranger
dashed in at once, struck a hot scent and went off on a lively
straight-away till his voice was lost in the distance away over the
upland.

After nearly an hour he came back, panting and warm, for it was baking
August weather, and lay down at my feet.

But almost immediately the same foxy '_Yap yurrr_' was heard close at
hand and off dashed the dog on another chase.

Away he went in the darkness, baying like a foghorn, straight away to
the north. And the loud '_Boo, boo_,' became a low '_oo, oo_,' and that
a feeble 'o-o' and then was lost. They must have gone some miles away,
for even with ear to the ground I heard nothing of them, though a mile
was easy distance for Ranger's brazen voice. As I waited in the black
woods I heard a sweet sound of dripping water: '_Tink tank tenk tink, Ta
tink tank tenk tonk_.'

I did not know of any spring so near, and in the hot night it was a glad
find. But the sound led me to the bough of an oak-tree, where I found
its source. Such a soft, sweet song; full of delightful suggestion on
such a night:

     Tonk tank tenk tink
     Ta tink a tonk a tank a tink a
     Ta ta tink tank ta ta tonk tink
     Drink a tank a drink a drunk.

It was the 'water-dripping' song of the saw-whet owl.

But suddenly a deep raucous breathing and a rustle of leaves showed that
Ranger was back.

He was completely fagged out. His tongue hung almost to the ground and
was dripping with foam, his flanks were heaving and spume-flecks
dribbled from his breast and sides. He stopped panting a moment to give
my hand a dutiful lick, then flung himself flop on the leaves to drown
all other sounds with his noisy panting. But again that tantalizing
'_Yap yurrr_' was heard a few feet away, and the meaning of it all
dawned on me.

We were close to the den where the little foxes were, and the old ones
were taking turns in trying to lead us away.

It was late night now, so we went home feeling sure that the problem was
nearly solved.




II


It was well known that there was an old fox with his family living in
the neighborhood, but no one supposed them so near.

This fox had been called 'Scarface,' because of a scar reaching from his
eye through and back of his ear; this was supposed to have been given
him by a barbed-wire fence during a rabbit hunt, and as the hair came in
white after it healed, it was always a strong mark.

The winter before I had met with him and had had a sample of his
craftiness. I was out shooting, after a fall of snow, and had crossed
the open fields to the edge of the brushy hollow back of the old mill.
As my head rose to a view of the hollow I caught sight of a fox trotting
at long range down the other side, in line to cross my course. Instantly
I held motionless, and did not even lower or turn my head lest I should
catch his eye by moving, until he went on out of sight in the thick
cover at the bottom. As soon as he was hidden I bobbed down and ran to
head him off where he should leave the cover on the other side, and was
there in good time awaiting, but no fox came forth. A careful took
showed the fresh track of a fox that had bounded from the cover, and
following it with my eye I saw old Scarface himself far out of range
behind me, sitting on his haunches and grinning as though much amused.

A study of the trail made all clear. He had seen me at the moment I saw
him, but he, also like a true hunter, had concealed the fact, putting on
an air of unconcern till out of sight, when he had run for his life
around behind me and amused himself by watching my stillborn trick.

In the springtime I had yet another instance of Scarface's cunning. I
was walking with a friend along the road over the high pasture. We
passed within thirty feet of a ridge on which were several gray and
brown bowlders. When at the nearest point my friend said:

"Stone number three looks to me very much like a fox curled up."

But I could not see it, and we passed. We had not gone many yards
farther when the wind blew on this bowlder as on fur.

My friend said, "I am sure that is a fox, lying asleep."

"We'll soon settle that," I replied, and turned back, but as soon as I
had taken one step from the road, up jumped Scarface, for it was he, and
ran. A fire had swept the middle of the pasture, leaving a broad belt of
black; over this he skurried till he came to the unburnt yellow grass
again, where he squatted down and was lost to view. He had been watching
us all the time, and would not have moved had we kept to the road. The
wonderful part of this is, not that he resembled the round stones and
dry grass, but that he _knew he did_, and was ready to profit by it.

We soon found that it was Scarface and his wife Vixen that had made our
woods their home and our barnyard their base of supplies.

Next morning a search in the pines showed a great bank of earth that had
been scratched up within a few months. It must have come from a hole,
and yet there was none to be seen. It is well known that a really cute
fox, on digging a new den, brings all the earth out at the first hole
made, but carries on a tunnel into some distant thicket. Then closing up
for good the first made and too well-marked door, uses only the entrance
hidden in the thicket.

So after a little search at the other side of a knoll, I found the real
entry and good proof that there was a nest of little foxes inside.

Rising above the brush on the hillside was a great hollow basswood. It
leaned a good deal and had a large hole at the bottom, and a smaller one
at top.

We boys had often used this tree in playing Swiss Family Robinson, and
by cutting steps in its soft punky walls had made it easy to go up and
down in the hollow. Now it came in handy, for next day when the sun was
warm I went there to watch, and from this perch on the roof, I soon saw
the interesting family that lived in the cellar near by. There were four
little foxes; they looked curiously like little lambs, with their
woolly coats, their long, thick legs and innocent expressions, and yet a
second glance at their broad, sharp-nosed, sharp-eyed visages showed
that each of these innocents was the makings of a crafty old fox.

They played about, basking in the sun, or wrestling with each other till
a slight sound made them skurry under ground. But their alarm was
needless, for the cause of it was their mother; she stepped from the
bushes bringing another hen--number seventeen as I remember. A low call
from her and the little fellows came tumbling out. Then began a scene
that I thought charming, but which my uncle would not have enjoyed at
all.

They rushed on the hen, and tussled and fought with it, and each other,
while the mother, keeping a sharp eye for enemies, looked on with fond
delight. The expression on her face was remarkable. It was first a
grinning of delight, but her usual look of wildness and cunning was
there, nor were cruelty and nervousness lacking, but over all was the
unmistakable look of the mother's pride and love.

The base of my tree was hidden in bushes and much lower than the knoll
where the den was. So I could come and go at will without scaring the
foxes.

[Illustration: They tussled and fought while their mother looked on with
fond delight.]

For many days I went there and saw much of the training of the young
ones. They early learned to turn to statuettes at any strange sound, and
then on hearing it again or finding other cause for fear, to run for
shelter.

Some animals have so much mother-love that it overflows and benefits
outsiders. Not so old Vixen it would seem. Her pleasure in the cubs led
to most refined cruelty. For she often brought home to them mice and
birds alive, and with diabolical gentleness would avoid doing them
serious hurt so that the cubs might have larger scope to torment them.

There was a woodchuck that lived over in the hill orchard. He was
neither handsome nor interesting, but he knew how to take care of
himself. He had digged a den between the roots of an old pine-stump, so
that the foxes could not follow him by digging. But hard work was not
their way of life; wits they believed worth more than elbow-grease. This
woodchuck usually sunned himself on the stump each morning. If he saw a
fox near he went down in the door of his den, or if the enemy was very
near he went inside and stayed long enough for the danger to pass.

One morning Vixen and her mate seemed to decide that it was time the
children knew something about the broad subject of Woodchucks, and
further that this orchard woodchuck would serve nicely for an
object-lesson. So they went together to the orchard-fence unseen by old
Chuckie on his stump. Scarface then showed himself in the orchard and
quietly walked in a line so as to, pass by the stump at a distance, but
never once turned his head or allowed the ever-watchful woodchuck to
think himself seen. When the fox entered the field the woodchuck quietly
dropped down to the mouth of his den; here he waited as the fox passed,
but concluding that after all wisdom is the better part, went into his
hole.

This was what the foxes wanted. Vixen had kept out of sight, but now ran
swiftly to the stump and hid behind it. Scarface had kept straight on,
going very slowly. The woodchuck had not been frightened, so before long
his head popped up between the roots and he looked around. There was
that fox still going on, farther and farther away. The woodchuck grew
bold as the fox went, and came out farther, and then seeing the coast
clear, he scrambled onto the stump, and with one spring Vixen had him
and shook him till he lay senseless. Scarface had watched out of the
corner of his eye and now came running back. But Vixen took the chuck in
her jaws and made for the den, so he saw he wasn't needed.

Back to the den came Vix, and carried the chuck so carefully that he was
able to struggle a little when she got there. A low '_woof_' at the den
brought the little fellows out like school-boys to play. She threw the
wounded animal to them and they set on him like four little furies,
uttering little growls and biting little bites with all the strength of
their baby jaws, but the woodchuck fought for his life and beating them
off slowly hobbled to the shelter of a thicket. The little ones pursued
like a pack of hounds and dragged at his tail and flanks, but could not
hold him back. So Vix overtook him with a couple of bounds and dragged
him again into the open for the children to worry. Again and again this
rough sport went on till one of the little ones was badly bitten, and
his squeal of pain roused Vix to end the woodchuck's misery and serve
him up at once.

Not far from the den was a hollow overgrown with coarse grass, the
playground of a colony of field-mice. The earliest lesson in woodcraft
that the little ones took, away from the den, was in this hollow. Here
they had their first course of mice, the easiest of all game. In
teaching, the main thing was example, aided by a deep-set instinct. The
old fox, also, had one or two signs meaning "lie still and watch,"
"come, do as I do," and so on, that were much used.

So the merry lot went to this hollow one calm evening and Mother Fox
made them lie still in the grass. Presently a faint squeak showed that
the game was astir. Vix rose up and went on tip-toe into the grass--not
crouching, but as high as she could stand, sometimes on her hind legs so
as to get a better view. The runs that the mice follow are hidden under
the grass tangle, and the only way to know the whereabouts of a mouse is
by seeing the slight shaking of the grass, which is the reason why mice
are hunted only on calm days.

And the trick is to locate the mouse and seize him first and see him
afterward. Vix soon made a spring, and in the middle of the bunch of
dead grass that she grabbed was a field-mouse squeaking his last squeak.

He was soon gobbled, and the four awkward little foxes tried to do the
same as their mother, and when at length the eldest for the first time
in his life caught game, he quivered with excitement and ground his
pearly little milk-teeth into the mouse with a rush of inborn
savageness that must have surprised even himself.

Another home lesson was on the red-squirrel. One of these noisy, vulgar
creatures, lived close by and used to waste part of each day scolding
the foxes, from some safe perch. The cubs made many vain attempts to
catch him as he ran across their glade from one tree to another, or
spluttered and scolded at them a foot or so out of reach. But old Vixen
was up in natural history--she knew squirrel nature and took the case in
hand when the proper time came. She hid the children and lay down flat
in the middle of the open glade. The saucy low-minded squirrel came and
scolded as usual. But she moved no hair. He came nearer and at last
right overhead to chatter:

"You brute you, you brute you."

But Vix lay as dead. This was very perplexing, so the squirrel came down
the trunk and peeping about made a nervous dash across the grass, to
another tree, again to scold from a safe perch.

"You brute you, you useless brute, scarrr-scarrrrr."

But flat and lifeless on the grass lay Vix. This was most tantalizing to
the squirrel. He was naturally curious and disposed to be venturesome,
so again he came to the ground and skurried across the glade nearer than
before.

Still as death lay Vix, "surely she was dead." And the little foxes
began to wonder if their mother wasn't asleep.

But the squirrel was working himself into a little craze of foolhardy
curiosity. He had dropped a piece of bark on Vix's head; he had used up
his list of bad words, and he had done it all over again, without
getting a sign of life. So after a couple more dashes across the glade
he ventured within a few feet of the really watchful Vix, who sprang to
her feet and pinned him in a twinkling.

"And the little ones picked the bones e-oh." Thus the rudiments of their
education were laid, and afterward, as they grew stronger, they were
taken farther afield to begin the higher branches of trailing and
scenting.

For each kind of prey they were taught a way to hunt, for every animal
has some great strength or it could not live, and some great weakness or
the others could not live. The squirrel's weakness was foolish
curiosity; the fox's that he can't climb a tree. And the training of the
little foxes was all shaped to take advantage of the weakness of the
other creatures and to make up for their own by defter play where they
are strong.

From their parents they learned the chief axioms of the fox world. How,
is not easy to say. But that they learned this in company with their
parents was clear. Here are some that foxes taught me, without saying a
word:--

Never sleep on your straight track.

Your nose is before your eyes, then trust it first.

A fool runs down the wind.

Running rills cure many ills.

Never take the open if you can keep the cover.

Never leave a straight trail if a crooked one will do.

If it's strange, it's hostile.

Dust and water burn the scent.

Never hunt mice in a rabbit-woods, or rabbits in a henyard.

Keep off the grass.

Inklings of the meanings of these were already entering the little ones'
minds--thus, 'Never follow what you can't smell,' was wise, they could
see, because if you can't smell it, then the wind is so that it must
smell you.

One by one they learned the birds and beasts of their home woods, and
then as they were able to go abroad with their parents they learned new
animals. They were beginning to think they knew the scent of everything
that moved. But one night the mother took them to a field where was a
strange black flat thing on the ground. She brought them on purpose to
smell it, but at the first whiff their every hair stood on end, they
trembled, they knew not why-it seemed to tingle through their blood and
fill them with instinctive hate and fear. And when she saw its full
effect she told them--

"_That is man-scent_."

[Illustration]




III


Meanwhile the hens continued to disappear. I had not betrayed the den of
cubs. Indeed, I thought a good deal more of the little rascals than I
did of the hens; but uncle was dreadfully wrought up and made most
disparaging remarks about my woodcraft. To please him I one day took
the hound across to the woods and seating myself on a stump on the open
hillside, I bade the dog go on. Within three minutes he sang out in the
tongue all hunters know so well, "Fox! fox! fox! straight away down the
valley."

After awhile I heard them coming back. There I saw the
fox--Scarface--loping lightly across the river-bottom to the stream. In
he went and trotted along in the shallow water near the margin for two
hundred yards, then came out straight toward me. Though in full view, he
saw me not, but came up the hill watching over his shoulder for the
hound. Within ten feet of me he turned and sat with his back to me while
he craned his neck and showed an eager interest in the doings of the
hound. Ranger came bawling along the trail till he came to the running
water, the killer of scent, and here he was puzzled; but there was only
one thing to do; that was by going up and down both banks find where the
fox had left the river.

The fox before me shifted his position a little to get a better view and
watched with a most human interest all the circling of the hound. He was
so close that I saw the hair of his shoulder bristle a little when the
dog came in sight. I could see the jumping of his heart on his ribs,
and the gleam of his yellow eye. When the dog was wholly baulked by the
water trick it was comical to see:--he could not sit still, but rocked
up and down in glee, and reared on his hind feet to get a better view of
the slow-plodding hound. With mouth opened nearly to his ears, though
not at all winded, he panted noisily for a moment, or rather he laughed
gleefully just as a dog laughs by grinning and panting.

Old Scarface wriggled in huge enjoyment as the hound puzzled over the
trail so long that when he did find it, it was so stale he could barely
follow it, and did not feel justified in tonguing on it at all.

As soon as the hound was working up the hill, the fox quietly went into
the woods. I had been sitting in plain view only ten feet away, but I
had the wind and kept still and the fox never knew that his life had for
twenty minutes been in the power of the foe he most feared. Ranger would
also have passed me as near as the fox, but I spoke to him, and with a
little nervous start he quit the trail and looking sheepish lay down by
my feet.

This little comedy was played with variations for several days, but it
was all in plain view from the house across the river. My uncle,
impatient at the daily loss of hens, went out himself, sat on the open
knoll, and when old Scarface trotted to his lookout to watch the dull
hound on the river flat below, my uncle remorselessly shot him in the
back, at the very moment when he was grinning over a new triumph.




IV


But still the hens were disappearing. My uncle was wrathy. He determined
to conduct the war himself, and sowed the woods with poison baits,
trusting to luck that our own dogs would not get them. He indulged in
contemptuous remarks on my by-gone woodcraft, and went out evenings with
a gun and the two dogs, to see what he could destroy.

Vix knew right well what a poison bait was; she passed them by or else
treated them with active contempt, but one she dropped down the hole, of
an old enemy, a skunk, who was never afterward seen. Formerly old
Scarface was always ready to take charge of the dogs, and keep them out
of mischief. But now that Vix had the whole burden of the brood, she
could no longer spend time in breaking every track to the den, and was
not always at hand to meet and mislead the foes that might be coming too
near.

The end is easily foreseen. Ranger followed a hot trail to the den, and
Spot, the fox-terrier, announced that the family was at home, and then
did his best to go in after them.

The whole secret was now out, and the whole family doomed. The hired man
came around with pick and shovel to dig them out, while we and the dogs
stood by. Old Vix soon showed herself in the near woods, and led the
dogs away off down the river, where she shook them off when she thought
proper, by the simple device of springing on a sheep's back. The
frightened animal ran for several hundred yards; then Vix got off,
knowing that there was now a hopeless gap in the scent, and returned to
the den. But the dogs, baffled by the break in the trail, soon did the
same, to find Vix hanging about in despair, vainly trying to decoy us
away from her treasures.

Meanwhile Paddy plied both pick and shovel with vigor and effect. The
yellow, gravelly sand was heaping on both sides, and the shoulders of
the sturdy digger were sinking below the level. After an hour's digging,
enlivened by frantic rushes of the dogs after the old fox, who hovered
near in the woods, Pat called:

"Here they are, sor!"

It was the den at the end of the burrow, and cowering as far back as
they could, were the four little woolly cubs.

Before I could interfere, a murderous blow from the shovel, and a sudden
rush for the fierce little terrier, ended the lives of three. The fourth
and smallest was barely saved by holding him by his tail high out of
reach of the excited dogs.

He gave one short squeal, and his poor mother came at the cry, and
circled so near that she would have been shot but for the accidental
protection of the dogs, who somehow always seemed to get between, and
whom she once more led away on a fruitless chase.

The little one saved alive was dropped into a bag, where he lay quite
still. His unfortunate brothers were thrown back into their nursery bed,
and buried under a few shovelfuls of earth.

We guilty ones then went back into the house, and the little fox was
soon chained in the yard. No one knew just why he was kept alive, but in
all a change of feeling had set in, and the idea of killing him was
without a supporter.

He was a pretty little fellow, like a cross between a fox and a lamb.
His woolly visage and form were strangely lamb-like and innocent, but
one could find in his yellow eyes a gleam of cunning and savageness as
unlamb-like as it possibly could be.