180 THE FACE OF THE FIELDS 



not want to do that. We really carried no bag ; 

 and if we had, we should not have put the wood 

 pussy in it, for we were hunting tracks, not the 

 animals, and " bagging our quarry " meant trail- 

 ing a creature to its den, or following its track 

 until we had discovered something it had done, 

 or what its business was, and why it was out. 

 We were on the snow for animal facts, not ani- 

 mal pelts. 



We were elated with our luck, for this stump 

 was not five minutes by the steep ridge path 

 from the hen-yard. And here, standing on the 

 stump, we were only sixty minutes away from 

 Boston Common by the automobile, driving no 

 faster than the law allows. So we were not hunt- 

 ing in a wilderness, but just outside our dooryard 

 and almost within the borders of a great city. 



And that is the interesting fact of our morning 

 hunt. No one but a lover of the woods and a 

 careful walker on the snow would believe that 

 here in the midst of hay-fields, in sight of the 

 smoke of city factories, so many of the original 

 wild wood-folk still live and travel their night 

 paths undisturbed. 



Still, this is a rather rough bit of country, 



