How Animals Talk 



him, is curled on a warm rock or stump with the 

 winter sunshine fair upon him. Then you must 

 leave the trail, as if you were not following it, and 

 advance on noiseless feet till the fox raises his head, 

 when you must " freeze " in your tracks. If he is 

 a tramp fox (that is, one which has come hunting 

 here out of his own territory) or a veteran that 

 has already seen too much of men and their 

 devices, he will dodge out of sight and be seen no 

 more ; but if he is an ordinary young fox, especially 

 a cub weathering his first winter, he will almost 

 certainly investigate that odd motionless object 

 which was not there when he went to sleep. After 

 "pointing" you a moment he slips into the near- 

 est cover, not turning his head in your direc- 

 tion, but watching you keenly out of the corners 

 of his yellow eyes. When he thinks himself hid- 

 den from your sight he circles to get your wind; 

 and on this side or that you will have two or three 

 good glimpses of him before he floats away or 

 seems to, so lightly does he run to hunt up 

 another day-bed. Your last view of him shows 

 a slyly inquisitive little beast, perfectly self- 

 possessed; but as he disappears you notice a 

 nervous, quivering, fluttering motion of his great 

 brush, which gives him away as a tail betrays a 

 dog, and which says that Eleemos is greatly ex- 

 cited or puzzled over something. 



[186] 



