HOW TO PRESERVE FOXES 69 



can be eradicated by killing off the infected foxes, 

 stopping all the earths permanently, and perhaps, 

 above all, by allowing the foxes to live in healthy, 

 natural conditions, without interference or assistance. 



But mange is not the only difficulty in the way of 

 the preservation of foxes. 



Traps in some parts of England are becoming a 

 serious danger. In that wild and beautiful district 

 where the Devon and Somerset Staghounds hunt the 

 red deer, there is rough, but very real, foxhunting. 

 On Exmoor we can still see hounds drag up to the 

 fox's kennel as our forefathers did. Once upon a 

 time in the famous days of the Stars of the West and 

 of Mr. Nicholas Snow there were plenty of foxes, 

 while on another part of Exmoor a famous Master of 

 the old Devonshire school reigned over a hunt 

 which has just been given up. The West Somerset 

 country, which was founded by Colonel Luttrell 

 in 1824, suffers in some degree from the evil. It 

 may be said that trapping in the open is illegal ; but 

 when a country is wild it is not possible to overlook it, 

 and the damage done to foxhunting is in any case very 

 great, and in some parts of the West foxes are very 

 scarce indeed. It is necessary that foxes should have 

 earths except in those countries where they are 



