QUADRUPEDS. 35 



attract the wolves by its scent. The poison once taken is sure to 

 prove fatal, before the animals can proceed many rods. 



The common and the black wolf are usually destroyed in two 

 ways. When annoyed by them the farmers frequently unite, and 

 by a general battue destroy them. This is effected, by forming 

 about the observed retreats of the wolf, a large circle of two or 

 three miles in diameter. The hunters gradually close in on the 

 point of hiding, and hedge the wolf in, when he is easily de- 

 stroyed. 



A frequent means of destruction is a deep pit. This is dug so 

 deep as to prevent the wolf from jumping out. once he is in. The 

 pit is baited with a dead sheep or animal or can-ion. The wolf 

 jumps down for his prey, gorges himself, and then seeks to 

 escape, but in vain. His howlings soon inform the farmer or 

 hunter of his imprisonment, when the pit is visited and the pri- 

 soner killed. 



The prairie wolf is too sagacious to be caught by traps. He 

 may be poisoned like the other varieties. He is frequently shot. 

 Occupying the open prairie he is good game for the grayhound, 

 and is often chased by him. Once the grayhound sights him, if in 

 the open prairie, the wolf must be near the cover of a wood, or he 

 has not the least chance of an escape. Being small, a brace of 

 grayhounds soon dispatch him. He may be taken in pits, but is 

 very shy of them. 



THE WOODCHUCK. This animal is the arctomys monax or mar- 

 mot. Among the country people it bears the name of vwodchuck 

 and ground-hog, the latter being expressive of its habits of bur- 

 rowing and peculiar voracity. 



The woodchuck is the cause of great injury, especially to the 

 farmers engaged in the cultivation of clover, as their numbers be- 

 come very considerable, and the quantity of herbage they consume 

 is really surprising. They are more capable of doing mischief 

 from the circumstance of their extreme vigilance and acute sense 

 of hearing, as well as from the security afforded them by their ex- 

 tensive subterranean dwellings. 



When about to make an inroad upon a clover-field, all the 

 woodchucks resident in the vicinity quietly and cautiously steal 

 toward the spot, being favored in their march by their gray color, 

 which is not easily distinguished. While the main body are 

 actively engaged in cropping the clover-heads and gorging theii 

 ample cheek-pouches, one or more individuals remain at some dis 



