134 



WILD NEIGHBORS 



encountering three at once in the Adirondacks, and 

 Audubon and Bachman had one or two personal in- 

 terviews in the South ; but these were naturalists and 

 trappers who made it their business to seek and 

 find the sly creature in its haunts, yet succeeded 

 rather by perseverance and good luck than by 

 foresight. JVfany have tried equally hard, perhaps, 

 and have failed. 



I know where one lives, in a little river not far 

 from the city of New York ; but I shall by no 

 means tell you the river's name, for he must not 

 be disturbed. It is a great pleasure to me to think 

 that this stream, which for a large part of its 

 course flows between cultivated fields, is spanned 

 by highways and bound like Ixion to the miller's 

 wheel, still harbors an animal so truly wild and 

 aboriginal. It is a picturesque and poetic relic of 

 the prehistoric wilderness, and a romantic reminder 

 of the free, primitive, savage state of things, as 

 refreshing to the imagination as the pungent odor 

 of spruce-leaves in a winter drawing-room. 



A more remarkable example, perhaps, of an 

 animal that secretes itself well from observation 

 while numerous throughout its range is found in 

 the badger. Although it is comparatively large, 

 predatory, and common, it spends most of its time 

 underground, rarely comes abroad except during 

 the hours of darkness, and makes haste to hide 

 itself the moment it detects the approach of any 

 human being. The sight of a living badger is 



