How Animals Talk 



it, and the creature moved away. There was 

 nothing to be done without eyes, so I snuggled the 

 blanket closer and went to sleep again. In the 

 morning there were the tracks of a moose, a bull 

 as I judged from the shape of his feet, to say that 

 he had come down the shore at a fast walk, halted, 

 stepped over the stern of the canoe, and went on 

 without hastening his pace. 



That was odd enough ; but more surprising were 

 some tracks on the other side, between the bow of 

 the canoe and the woods. Very faint and dainty 

 tracks they were, as if a soft pad had touched the 

 sand here and there in an uneven line; but they 

 told of a fox who had come trotting along under 

 the bank, and who had passed in the night without 

 awakening me. That neither he nor the moose 

 had smelled the sleeping man, or nothing alarming 

 in him at least, is about as near to certainty as 

 you will come in interpreting animal action. 



There is another and not wholly unreasonable 

 hypothesis which may help to explain such phe- 

 nomena; namely, that it is not the scent of man 

 but of excitement, anger, blood-lust or some other 

 abnormal quality which alarms a wild animal. 

 It sounds queer, I know, to say that anger can be 

 smelled ; but it is more than probable that anger or 

 fierce excitement of any kind distils in the body 



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