136 THE FOX IN SUMMER 



" Didn't I see the blood on the ground, and find the 

 lambs themselves lying in a ditch, half eaten?" 



"But couldn't a dog have done that?" I suggested. 



"I know the fox did it. Don't I hear him barking 

 every night ? " was the reply. 



In vain I argued that it is not the practice of the 

 fox to bark when in pursuit of his prey — that, on the 

 contrary, he is a silent hunter ; that his bark is a 

 serenade to his lady-love, a call to a comrade, or a 

 warning to his cubs. Words were useless, pleading 

 ineffectual — and the poison was prepared. The utmost 

 favour I could gain was that the strychnine should be, 

 for the first night, placed in some porridge and not 

 in meat. The result was that within two hundred 

 yards of where the poison was laid were found the 

 corpses of three dogs — one a highly-prized setter of 

 the lamb-owner — two cats, several crows and magpies, 

 and a missel-thrush. Alas ! on the following day, in 

 the adjoining field, was found a fine dog fox, cold and 

 stiff, and almost in his paws the body of a crow. 

 Poor Reynard had apparently never entered the lamb- 

 ing field at all — he was found a quarter of a mile 

 away from the porridge ; but dogs, cats, and birds had 

 all partaken of the deadly mess. 



I by no means wish to assert that foxes never take 

 lambs, but I believe they do so very rarely, considering 

 the ease with which they could seize numbers of them 

 in the lambing season if they wished. I have asked 

 many shepherds who have been sitting up with the 

 lambs if they ever saw a fox seize a lamb, and never 

 could get a reply in the affirmative. From the 

 window which is in front of me as I write, I look 



