THE FOX. 97 



are very rare, and few hunters have ever seen one. 

 The American Fur Company used to obtain annu- 

 ally from fifty to one hundred skins. The skins for- 

 merly sold for twenty-five dollars, though I believe 

 they now bring only about five dollars. 



The black or silver gray fox is the rarest of all, 

 and its skin the most valuable. The Indians used to 

 estimate it equal to forty beaver skins. The great 

 fur companies seldom collect in a single season more 

 than four or five skins at any one post. Most of 

 those of the American Fur Company come from the 

 head waters of the Mississippi. One of the younger 

 Audubons shot one in northern New York. The fox 

 had been seen and fired at many times by the hunters 

 of the neighborhood, and had come to have the repu- 

 tation of leading a charmed life, and of being invul- 

 nerable to anything but a silver bullet. But Audu- 

 bon brought her down (for it was a female) on the 

 second trial. She had a litter of young in the vicin- 

 ity, which he also dug out, and found the nest to hold 

 three black and four red ones, which fact settled the 

 question with him that black and red often have the 

 some parentage, and are in truth the same species. 



The color of this fox, in a point-blank view, is 

 black, but viewed at an angle it is a dark silver-gray, 

 whence has arisen the notion that the black and the 

 silver-gray are distinct varieties. The tip of the tail 

 'is always white. 



In almost every neighborhood there are traditions 

 of this fox, and it is the dream of young sportsmen ; 

 7 



