CHAPTER II 



ALONG THE HIGHWAY OF THE FOX 



ITH only half a chance 

 our smaller wild animals 

 the fox, the mink, the 

 'coon, the 'possum, the 

 rabbit would thrive, 

 and be happy forever on 

 the very edges of the 

 towns and cities. Instead of a hindrance, houses 

 and farms, roads and railways are a help to the 

 wild animals, affording them food and shelter as 

 their natural conditions never could. So, at least, 

 it seems; for here on Mullein Hill, hardly twenty 

 miles from the heart of Boston, there are more wild 

 animals than I know what to do with just as if 

 the city of Boston were a big skunk farm or fox 

 farm, from which the countryside all around (par- 

 ticularly my countryside) were being continually 

 restocked. 



But then, if I seem to have more foxes than a 

 man of chickens needs to have, it is no wonder, liv- 

 ing as I do on a main traveled road in Foxland, a 

 road that begins off in the granite ledges this side 

 of Boston, no one knows where, and, branching, 



