TAME FOXES. 1 33 



coming with it, but she took care to search 

 well for any left behind. 



In the latter end of April in the year 1885, 

 during the campaign in the Soudan, I happened 

 one day, when on the march across the desert 

 with my company, to pass by a fox earth in a 

 heap of sand under some mimosa bushes, in 

 which one could see there was a litter of cubs. 

 When we halted for the day some distance 

 further on and formed our " zariba,'' I called for 

 a few volunteers to return to dig them out. It 

 was a novel use for the ''Wallace" spade — 

 part of the soldiers' equipment — but after 

 digging for about an hour we came upon two 

 tiny little cubs about the size of rats, a dog and 

 a vixen ; there was another in the earth, but a 

 fox terrier we had with us unfortunately killed 

 it. These little cubs were not many days old, 

 the sweetest little darlings, of a light-cream 

 colour, with large dark eyes like a gazelle, very 

 pointed faces, and little black snouts, their tiny 

 brushes tipped with black — a species of the 

 " Fennec " we ascertained afterwards. We 

 brought them back to camp in triumph;, and 

 then came the question of how they were to be 

 fed. A goat had luckily been looted from the 



