284 November 1748. 



almoft at the very beginning of New Eng- 

 land's being peopled with European inhab- 

 itants. Thefe foxes were believed to have 

 fo multiplied, that all the red foxes in the 

 country were their offspring. At prefent 

 they are reckoned among the noxious crea- 

 tures in thefe parts; for they are not content- 

 ed, as the grey foxes with killing fowl ; but 

 they likewife devour the lambs. In Pen- 

 fylvania therefore there is a reward of two 

 millings for killing an old fox, and of one 

 milling for killing a young one. And in 

 all the other provinces there are likewife 

 rewards offer'd for killing them, Their 

 fkin is in great requeft, and is fold as dear 

 as that of the grey foxes, that is two mil- 

 lings 



fchatka where this fpecies is common, fee Miller's Account 

 of the Navigations of the Ruffians, &c.) though in remote 

 times, and thus fpread over North America. It is perhaps 

 true that the Indians never took notice of them till the 

 Europeans were fettled among them ; this, however, was 

 becaufe they never had occafion to ufe their fkins : but when 

 there was a demand for thefe they began to hunt them, and, 

 as they had not been much accuftomed to them before, 

 they efteemed them as a novelty. What gives additional com- 

 firmation to this is, that when the Ruffians under Commo- 

 dore Bering landed on the weftern coaft of America, they faw 

 five red foxes which were quite tame, and feemed not to be 

 in the leaft afraid of men : now this might very well have 

 been the cafe if we fuppofe them to have been for many 

 generations in a place where no body difturbed them ; but 

 we cannot account for it, if we imagine that they had been 

 ufed to a country where there were many inhabitants, or, 

 where they had been much hunted. F. 



