CANID^. 229 



insects ; and the droppings of these animals are often 

 composed almost entirely of the wing-cases of beetles. 



The Fox can scarcely be said to be susceptible of 

 attachment or capable of being tamed. The utmost 

 degree of domestication to which it can be reduced, is to 

 suffer the person who has fed and brought it up to handle 

 it without much danger of being bitten ; but it is wholly 

 devoid of that instinct of gratitude and kindness which 

 characterize its congeners the Dog, and even the Wolf 

 and Jackal. Although taken young, or even born in cap- 

 tivity, and brought up in company with domestic Dogs, 

 it still remains suspicious, sly, and timid, retreating from 

 every attempt at familiarity, and scarcely distinguishing 

 its companions by any mark of recognition. 



It has often been asserted that the Fox and the Dog 

 will breed together. The experiments of BufFon certainly 

 failed, and we have in vain endeavoured to trace any valid 

 ground for this general belief. This refusal to intermix 

 with the Dog evinces a far more remote affinity to that ani- 

 mal than either the Wolf or the Jackal, with both of which 

 the experiment has often been successfully made. The 

 female Fox loses all her timidity and shyness when suck- 

 ling her young, in whose defence she exhibits a degree of 

 courage and boldness which are very foreign to her general 

 habits and disposition. The time of gestation is not 

 perhaps accurately ascertained, but is certainly between 

 sixty and sixty -five days. The young are born in April, 

 and are a year and a half in attaining their full size. The 

 Fox is said to live thirteen or fourteen years ; but as this 

 can only have been ascertained of individuals in confine- 

 ment, it is exceedingly probable that in a state of nature 

 it considerably exceeds this period. 



Its resemblance to the Dog, the Wolf, and the Jackal 

 can scarcely be considered as sufficient to constitute it a 



