OF FOXES, MANY AND VARIOUS 259 



fawn. The hairs arc coarse, horsey, indistinctly 

 marked, and the fur is of small value to the trader; 

 so dainty little swift, who looks as if nature made him 

 for a pet dog instead of a fox, is slighted by the hunter, 

 unless kit persists in tempting a trap. Rufus the red 

 fellow, with his grizzled gray head and black ears and 

 whitish throat and flaunting purplish tinges down his 

 sides like a prince royal, may make a handsome mat; 

 but as a fur he is of little worth. His cousin with the 

 black fore feet, the prairie fox, who is the largest and 

 strongest and scientifically finest of all his kind, has 

 more value as a fur. The colour of the prairie fox 

 shades rather to pale ochre and yellow that the nonde 

 script grizzled gray that is of so little value as a fur. 

 Of the silver-gray fox little need be said. He lives 

 too far south California and Texas and Mexico to 

 acquire either energy or gloss. He is the one indolent 

 member of the fox tribe, and his fur lacks the sheen 

 that only winter cold can give. The value of the 

 cross fox depends on the markings that give him his 

 name. If the bands, running diagonally over his 

 shoulders in the shape of a cross, shade to grayish 

 blue he is a prize, if to reddish russet, he is only a 

 curiosity. 



The Arctic and black and silver foxes have the 

 pelts that at their worst equal the other rare furs, at 

 their best exceed the value of all other furs by so 

 much that the lucky trapper who takes a silver fox has 

 made his fortune. These, then, are the foxes that the 

 trapper seeks and these are to be found only on the 

 white wastes of the polar zone. 



That brings up the question what is a silver fox? 

 Strange as it may seem, neither scientist nor hunter 



