70 WOODLAND, MOOR, AND STREAM 



THE FOX 



I FEEL it almost presumptuous on my part to say 

 anything about that wonderful animal the fox. So 

 much has been written and said about him, both by 

 sportsmen and some of the greatest of our literary 

 geniuses. My account of him will be brief; not 

 having the fox-hunter's feeling of veneration for him 

 nor the hatred natural to the poultry-keeper, my 

 views will at any rate not be one-sided. Nor have I 

 ever had the least wish to possess Master Reynard 

 embalmed as a mummy, or to see the wily gentleman 

 in a glass case, lean and hungry-looking, with squint- 

 ing cunning in his eye. He is known to me as a 

 clean, swift, strong, and handsome creature, full of 

 courage. He is also universally credited with a very 

 large amount of intellectual power, although it is 

 always said to be employed exclusively for his own 

 benefit. To call an individual of the human family 

 an old fox is certainly not a compliment, for it 

 implies that he is crafty and selfish. 



