The Wit of the Wild 



r 



carnivores (notably the fox), and a large num- 

 ber of rodents. One finds all along streams 

 frequented by muskrats heaps of mussel shells, 

 and other refuse, indicating where day after 

 day the musquash has brought his catch and 

 dined. Little hillocks and stumps are favorite 

 refectories, perhaps because they afford an easy 

 outlook; and I have given in my Life of Mam- 

 mals* a photographic illustration of such a 

 dining-room on and about a stump beside a 

 stream. 



This practice may be followed from various 

 motives, such as the wish to be alone so as not 

 to suffer robbery between bites, or to be in a 

 suitable place to lie down and sleep at the end 

 of the meal. In the case of flesh-eaters the 

 beasts or birds of prey there is added to this, 

 at any rate in the season when their offspring 

 are young, the impulse to carry some of the 

 plunder to the family. 



Now, one of the strongest feelings animating 

 animal conduct is the desire to do things by 



* The Life of Animals: the Mammals. The Macmillan 

 Company, New York, 1906. 



<* 42 $* 



