214 THE FUR TRADE OF AMERICA 



pelt of a coyote — or prairie wolf — would scarcely be worth the 

 taking. Even the big, gray timber-wolf would hardly be worth 

 the cost of the shot, except for service as a tepee mat. The white 

 Arctic wolf would bring better price. The enormous black or 

 brown arctic wolf would be more valuable ; but the value would 

 not repay the risk of the hunt. But all these worthless, ravening 

 rascals are watching the traps as keenly as the trapper does ; and 

 would eat up a silver fox, that would be the fortune of any hunter. 



The Indian comes to the brush where he has set his rabbit 

 snares across a runway. His dog sniffs the ground, whining. 

 The crust of the snow is broken by a heavy tread. The twigs are 

 all trampled and rabbit fur is fluffed about. The game has been 

 rifled away. The Indian notices several things. The rabbit 

 has been devoured on the spot. That is unlike the wolverine. 

 He would have carried snare, rabbit and all off for a guzzle in his 

 own lair. The footprints have the appearance of having been 

 brushed over ; so the thief had a bushy tail. It is not the lynx. 

 There is no trail away from the snare. The marauder has come 

 with a long leap and gone with a long leap. The Indian and his 

 dog make a circuit of the snare till they come on the trail of the 

 intruder; and its size tells the Indian whether his enemy be fox 

 or wolf. 



He sets no more snares across that runway, for the rabbits have 

 had their alarm. Going through the brush he finds a fresh runway 

 and sets a new snare. 



Then his snow-shoes are winging him over the drifts to the 

 next trap. It is a deadfall. Nothing is in it. The bait is un- 

 touched and the trap left undisturbed. A wolverine would have 

 torn the thing to atoms from very wickedness, chewed the bait 

 in two, and spat it out lest there should be poison. The fox would 

 have gone in and had his back broken by the front log. And there 

 is the same brush work over the trampled snow, as if the visitor 

 had tried to sweep out his own trail ; and the same long leap away, 

 clearing obstruction of log and drift, to throw a pursuer off the 



