LETTER XXTX. 323 



after all, does not make half so much fuss about a couple 

 or two of chickens as his wealthy landlord does about a 

 paltry cock pheasant. 



There may possibly be a question whether pheasants 

 ought to be considered as ferce naturce. In the manner 

 they are now reared and preserved my opinion is that 

 they are not ; but there can be no question as to a fox 

 being an animal ferce naturce. He is here to-day and 

 gone to-morrow. We may find him in a game preserve 

 it is true, but as he will run eight or ten miles straight 

 away into another locality, it would puzzle even the 

 Poor-law Commissioners to assign him his proper place 

 of settlement ; and I think a game-preserver has made an 

 equally wide shot in asserting that a fox is supplied from 

 his victualling department alone. 



Some game-preservers appear to me to be labouring 

 under an attack of foxopliohia, w^hich has infected their 

 whole system, and look upon Mr. Wiley as a rampant 

 and roaring lion, walking about their preserves from 

 morning till night, with his mouth wide open seeking 

 how many pheasants and hares he can devour ; or per- 

 haps they recollect a certain funny little picture which 

 excited their particular attention when children, in which 

 a fox is represented as sitting under a tree with his 

 mouth open, expecting a cock which is perched on the 

 top, to fall into it as a matter of course. They should 

 have seen also the answer put into the mouth of this 

 said cock by a wag to this polite invitation to fall into 

 the fox's open jaws and be eaten — " I wish you may get 

 itJ" Pheasants are at roost w^hen foxes begin their 

 evening rambles, and few would suppose a fox such an 

 ass as to sit under a tree half the night with his mouth 



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