OF FOXES, MANY AND VARIOUS 2f)l 



only in the shades of blue with the seasons^ is certainly 

 not the white Arctic fox. 



The same difficulty besets distinction of silver fox 

 from black. The old scientists classified these as one 

 and the same creature. Trappers know better. So do 

 the later scientists who almost agree with the un 

 learned trapper s verdict there are as many species 

 as there are foxes. Black fox is at its best in mid 

 winter, deep, brilliantly glossy, soft as floss, and yet 

 almost impenetrable the very type of perfection of 

 its kind. But with the coming of the tardy Arctic 

 spring comes a change. The snows are barely melted 

 in May when the sheen leaves the fur. By June, the 

 black hairs are streaked with gray; and the black fox 

 is a gray fox. Is it at some period of the transition 

 that the black fox becomes a silver fox, with the gray 

 hairs as sheeny as the black and each gray hair deli 

 cately tipped with black? That question, too, remains 

 unanswered; for certainly the black fox trapped when 

 in his gray summer coat is not the splendid silver fox 

 of priceless value. Black fox turning to a dull gray 

 of midsummer may not be silver fox; but what about 

 gray fox turning to the beautiful glossy black of mid 

 winter? Is that what makes silver fox? Is silver fox 

 simply a fine specimen of black caught at the very 

 period when he is blooming into his greatest beauty? 

 The distinctive difference between gray fox and silver 

 is that gray fox has gray hairs among hairs of other 

 colour, while silver fox has silver hair tipped with 

 glossiest black on a foundation of downy gray black. 



Even greater confusion surrounds the origin of 

 cross and red and gray. Trappers find all these differ 

 ent cubs in one burrow; but as the cubs grow, those 



