134 



THE FOX 



regularly fed. The same desire to kill breaks out 

 sometimes in dogs, though it can be and is restrained ; 

 but the fox is never to be trusted. The creature has 

 always been in contact with man and always at war 

 with him, and the long enmity cannot be pacified. 



Of all the enemies of the poultry- yard the cap- 

 tive fox that has escaped is the worst. There is, at 

 the time I write, a very large fox which is supposed 

 to be an escaped captive, and in this season, 1905, he 

 has had twenty head of poultry from one yard, sixty 

 from another, and forty from a third. He has lost 

 much of his fear of man, and will not seldom forage 

 by day. Yet his natural cunning is not abated, for 

 the county pack, though they often find, have not, 

 so far, been able to kill him, although they are a kill- 

 ing pack, having slain some forty brace in the cub- 

 hunting season. 



Some thirty years ago, a Mr. P^agle Cole gave 

 a most interesting account of some tame foxes 

 that were kept at his home in his boyhood. There 

 were three cubs, two dogs and a vixen. In the 

 summer-time they lived in the open confined by 

 chains. Each fox had his own earth, made with a 

 burrow which led to a barrel buried in the ground. 

 At first they were chained underneath a cherry tree, 

 but they ate so much of the unripe fruit as to make 



