THE BLACK FOX. 169 



FOXES. 



THE varieties and even species of foxes are so great 

 on the North American continent that I doubt much 

 if they have ever been properly classified by the natu- 

 ralist. Go where you will they are to be found. 

 Of the commoner species, I may safely state that I have 

 killed hundreds. So hi the following I will allude only 

 to the principal of them. For a long period I had 

 resided in a part of Northern Canada that probably 

 supplies as many of those extremely rare animals the 

 Black or Silver Fox as any portion of the American 

 continent, and during the entire length of my residence 

 was constantly associated with trappers, fur traders, et 

 hoc genus omnc, so a few remarks on this scarce and 

 valuable animal may not be out of place. 



The fabulous sum that a prime black fox skin is 

 worth causes this animal to be universally sought after ; 

 the tawny redskin or the swarthy half-bred hunter when 

 he discovers the haunt of one of these beauties, never 

 ceases day or night to ponder over schemes for his 

 capture ; the martin and mink traps are for a time 

 neglected, and every artifice, every trick and ingenuity 

 that ever entered trapper's brain, is at once put into 

 practice. Nor is this fox less wary than Ins confreres, but 

 quite the reverse ; and I believe in the current opinion 

 that there is no animal more difficult to circumvent. 

 Often of an evening I have listened to the broken 

 English of the snake-eyed aborigines, or the curious 



