FOREST TITHES 
gusts of howling winds that sweep over the uplands. 
A fortnight of such weather as this brings the wild 
creatures close up to human dwellings, and particu- 
larly to these lonely farmsteads. When the light 
shows red through the window casements, before the 
stout shutters are pinned up for the night, it is the 
signal for the fox to come and see if he can pick up 
a supper somehow. It will be through no fault of 
his if he fails in this, if there is anything about that 
he can kill and eat, from a turkey down to a poor 
starved blackbird, or from a hare to a mouse. I 
have seen some grey dog foxes that I should not like 
to be shut up in a small room with, if I had nothing 
but a stick in my hands. A hard fighter is Reynard, 
when cornered ; he snaps like a wolf and is active as 
a cat. He makes short work of anything he can 
capture. Domestic fow r ls have, some of them, an 
aggravating way of preferring to roost, like phea- 
sants, in the trees at night, and to make their nests 
away out in the moorland or under the trailing plants 
and bushes. That jubilant cackle, however, which 
the successful hen cannot control herself sufficiently 
to repress, after she has had the cunning to hide 
away in her nesting place, betrays her to other crea- 
tures besides her lawful owners. She may even have 
been prudent enough to wander a little way from her 
