920 Life-histories of Northern Animals 



a chance as the Deer were running on rut. In the tree below 

 he saw several bluejays shrieking and mobbing something 

 which turned out to be a Marten that had gone up to sun itself 

 in an old crow's nest. Every time the jays swooped the 

 Marten would rise up and hiss like a cat. Dobson shot it 

 through the head from his stand. 



sANiTA- Captain Craine's Marten and all those observed by me in 



captivity, have habitually kept one corner of their cage for the 

 dung-pile. I shall welcome the discovery that this rudiment 

 of sanitation is found with this species when wild, for hitherto 

 the investigations have revealed little of redeeming virtue, but 

 rather tended to show that this externally lovely creature is in 

 disposition absolutely the most unlovely reprobate of all the 

 sanguinary group to which it belongs. 



DISEASE According to Hutchins,'" "this animal is sometimes 



troubled with epilepsy." A. H. Cocks also informed me that 

 the British Marten, Stoats, and Weasels in his collection are 

 subject to fits. 



TRAP- This fur-bearer is unsuspicious and greedy, and therefore 



easily trapped. Three different ways are practised. First, 

 the old-fashioned deadfall, made on the ground of logs and 

 sticks, so slightly and so simply that a trapper can make and 

 set half a dozen of them in an hour. The principle of this is 

 shown in Figs. 220-22 1 . This is the quickest and most humane 

 way to kill the animal. The objection to it is that the Wolver- 

 ine, Fisher, and Wolf will follow a trapper for weeks, destroy- 

 ing his traps for the bait or destroying the catch itself. Half 

 a dozen to a mile on a 20-mile round was a usual line of 

 traps. 



The second method is the steel trap set in a little cup- 

 board on the side of a tree. This cruelly starves the animal 

 to death, unless the weather is cold enough to freeze it or the 

 trapper comes often on the rounds. When using this kind the 



'»F. R. A., Vol. I, p. 51. 



