146 DENIZENS OF THE DESERT 



snarls and barks savagely at him when he comes 

 near him on the hunt. It is not strange that 

 in the Southwestern Indian folk-tales, wherein 

 the coyote figures so largely, the smaller ani- 

 mals make him the butt of so many jokes and 

 that they give him so little sympathy in all his 

 troubles. 



Like an outlaw the coyote is a wanderer ever 

 on the move and swift of foot. He makes his 

 miserable home among the rocks of the shrubby 

 hills or seeks shelter in holes made in the steep 

 banks of barrancas or washes leading down from 

 the mountains. In these retreats he spends his 

 days, but when the first stars are beginning to 

 show themselves he comes out of his hole, 

 shakes his dusty coat, and, after giving a few 

 short, ringing, yapping barks to announce him- 

 self to his comrades, sets forth on the long hunt- 

 ing excursions of the night. These journeys are 

 often of remarkable length, it being not uncom- 

 mon for him to travel ten or twenty miles out 

 across the desert and back again before sunrise 

 and breakfast. 



It is both interesting and amusing to follow 

 the tracks of this shiftless, seemingly homeless 



