130 GREEN TRAILS AND UPLAND PASTURES 



looked off over the dazzling, snowy world, over our 

 beautiful valley with its red and white houses, its 

 steeples and winding river, to the bounding ring of 

 amethyst hills. Last night that same scene had slept 

 under the moon, and out on this ledge had come the 

 little red form of a fox and sniffed the wind, and then, 

 slipping like a shadow into the cover of the laurels, had 

 sneaked down the slope. No one saw him. No one 

 ever sees him, though this rock is in a town park. Yet 

 he lives here. He is our neighbour in the night, and 

 takes possession of his own while we slumber. There 

 was the proof of it on the snow at our feet. 



In Massachusetts there is a week in November when 

 it is permissible to shoot deer. As rifles are not allowed, 

 however, our brave hunters go out with shotguns 

 loaded with buckshot, and later attract the admiring 

 attention of the village by driving through with a poor 

 deer's head lolling over the tailboard perhaps. That 

 open week in November probably explained our lame 

 buck. When we first saw his tracks he was trailing his 

 right hind leg badly; he was stopping frequently to lie 

 down, every hundred feet at first, and where he rested 

 there would be traces of blood. He was one of a small 

 herd. Week after week we came across records of this 

 herd ground-hemlock eaten down to the snow, tram- 

 pled sumac bushes, old orchards pawed up, and hoof- 

 prints tracking through the deep snow of the woods. 

 And always the right hind leg of the buck was dragged. 



