THE STORY OF FAUST AND MARGUERITE 203 



along the center of the road, then suddenly mak- 

 ing a side leap of six or more feet, then trotting 

 along near the road and parallel with it; then out 

 in the woods making a circle, coming back on his 

 first tracks, following them back for a short dis- 

 tance, then side leaping from them and continuing 

 along parallel with the other side of the road for 

 some distance before he made another jump to the 

 center of the road, to continue the journey. .When- 

 ever we found a fox's trail, we discovered that it 

 went through the same or similar manoeuvers. 



I must admit that the examination of these 

 foxes' trails in the snow proved a stronger argu- 

 ment to me in favor of animal automatism than 

 any argument I have read in books or heard at 

 lectures, for I suppose that anything that is done 

 through habit is done more or less unconsciously 

 and I really do not believe that the foxes who left 

 their tell-tale tracks in the snow, deliberately rea- 

 soned out the subterfuges they adopted to mislead 

 any possible foe, and I have not the least doubt 

 that a tame fox that never knew an enemy would 

 leave the same sort of a trail. 



