A WHITE DAY AND A RED FOX 



the dog. But not a sound is heard. A flock of snow 

 buntings pass high above us, uttering their contented 

 twitter, and their white forms seen against the in- 

 tense blue give the impression of large snowflakes 

 drifting across the sky. I hear a purple finch, too, 

 and the feeble lisp of the redpoll. A shrike (the 

 first I have seen this season) finds occasion to come 

 this way also. He alights on the tip of a dry limb, 

 and from his perch can see into the valley on both 

 sides of the mountain. He is prowling about for 

 chickadees, no doubt, a troop of which I saw com- 

 ing through the wood. When pursued by the shrike, 

 the chickadee has been seen to take refuge in a 

 squirrel-hole in a tree. Hark! Is that the hound, 

 or doth expectation mock the eager ear? With 

 open mouths and bated breaths we listen. Yes, 

 it is old "Singer;" he is bringing the fox over the 

 top of the range toward Butt End, the Ultima Thule 

 of the hunters' tramps in this section. In a moment 

 or two the dog is lost to hearing again. We wait 

 for his second turn ; then for his third. 



"He is playing about the summit," says my 

 companion. 



" Let us go there," say I, and we are off. 



More dense snow-hung woods beyond the clear- 

 ing where we begin our ascent of the Big Mountain, 

 a chief that carries the range up several hundred 

 feet higher than the part we have thus far traversed. 

 We are occasionally to our hips in the snow, but 

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