THE HOUND OF THE PLAINS. 371 



regard to which the coyote called a council of animals after he had fin- 

 ished fashioning the globe and all the inferior creatures. Each speaker 

 wanted to form man just like himself. The coyote made free to say that 

 this was all nonsense ; he did not think himself the most perfect animal 

 that could be made, and be announced it as bis theory that man should 

 be formed by taking the best points of all the others — strong voice, 

 like a lion ; lack of tail, like a bear (since, in his opinion, a tail was 

 only a harbor for fleas) ; the sharp eye of the elk, and so on. "But," 

 said the autocrat, " there surely is no animal from whom man can bor- 

 row wit besides myself, and therefore he shall resemble the coyote in 

 being cunning and crafty." Then the council broke up in a row, and 

 there was a general battle, following which every animal set to work 

 to make an earthen image after his own ideas. Night came before 

 any models were finished, and all the sculptors went to sleep except 

 the coyote, who, when the camp became still, destroyed the other 

 models, made the composite one he had proposed, and gave it life at 

 the coming of the dawn. 



The quick wits and inquiring mind of the prairie-wolf serve him 

 not only in chasing but in saving himself from being chased. Next 

 to the wolverine he is perhaps the wariest of animals — not excepting 

 the fox — against which the trapper pits himself. To poisoned meat 

 he falls a victim through his exorbitant appetite, and in this way the 

 ranchmen destroy great numbers annually ; but he is rarely trapped. 

 Say tells, with a touch of glee, how Titian Peale was baffled in trying 

 to catch a coyote for his famous museum — one of the sights of old 

 Philadelphia. 



Peale's first experiment was with a "figure 4," which came to naught 

 because a wolf burrowed under the floor and pulled the bait down be- 

 tween the planks. " This procedure," remarks Mr. Say, " would seem 

 to be the result of a faculty beyond mere instinct." A cage was con- 

 structed, into which the wolves might enter, but out of which they 

 could not again escape. The coyotes came, admired this arrangement, 

 sang doleful jeremiads over the bait which they could see and smell, 

 but could not taste, and went away again, wondering at the heart of 

 mankind and the malignant devices thereof. 



Disappointed here, Mr. Peale next began a series of experiments 

 with steel traps, one of which, profusely baited, was concealed among 

 the leaves. Plenty of tracks — " you can't live on tracks ! " is one of 

 the aphorisms of the plains — alone rewarded this effort. Then a se- 

 ductive bait was suspended above the trap in the midst of several 

 other pieces, but the expected victims, stepping circumspectly, carried 

 off all the meat except the one piece it was intended they should take. 

 Baits were next hung up as before, the trap was buried in leaves, and 

 these were burned, so that the trap, scorched free from any odor of 

 human handling, lay covered with ashes ; still, the one bait over the 



