348 
Frw animals are more wily than the fox. No 
other hunter can travel as quietly 
as Reynard; and although he 
cannot beat a rabbit in a fair 
chase, he manages to make many a square meal 
off bunny by means of slipping from bush to 
bush, crawling and creeping for all the world 
like a man stalking a deer. 
At no other time does the fox display his 
cunning so well as when running for dear life 
with a pack of hounds on his trail. A well- 
known sportsman relates that he once saw a 
tired fox, chased by a pack of hounds, make 
straight for a flock of sheep in a pen, run 
through them, and ultimately escape. Another 
fox, close pressed by the hounds, leaped from 
back to back of a herd of goats. The dogs 
Foxcraft. 
were unable to follow, and Reynard escaped. 
water and disappeared for ever.” 
“When he reached the hole he could not stop, but plunged into the 
Animal Life 
A trick often resorted to by foxes when closely 
pursued is to leap as high as possible, grasping 
the branch of a tree with their teeth, jump up, 
and remain in hiding until the hunters have 
passed. 
Wa 
A GENTLEMAN, while hunting near a river one 
winter’s day, saw a fox run out 
on the ice and make at full speed 
for an opening in the ice where 
the rushing water of the river could be plainly 
seen from the bank. At the edge he stopped, 
turned, followed his tracks back to the bank and 
then ran for some distance down the stream 
and sat there. Soon a dog came crashing out 
of the woods, baying finely, hot on the fox’s 
trail. Now dogs, when on a chase of this kind, 
trust almost entirely to their noses. This one 
was no exception. He ran along the 
ice, head down, and when he reached 
the hole he could not stop, but plunged 
into the water and disappeared for ever. 
Then the fox trotted: away with every 
sign of satisfaction. 
Wa 
A Very 
Clever Fox. 
Some swallows who had a nest which 
opened in front were 
persistently annoyed by 
attacks from sparrows. Instead of 
closing up their front door and making 
a side entrance, they resorted to strategy. 
Whenever the sparrows thought to take 
them unawares, they always found one 
of the parents keeping guard—at least 
so it seemed, for, come whenever they 
might, the sparrows found one of the 
swallows’ tails sticking out of the hole. 
When the swallows migrated the 
mystery was solved. The tail was 
really nothing but three feathers, so 
ingeniously laced that they quite 
deceived not only the sparrows but 
human beings as well. 
Wa 
Dr. Rouset, a French doctor of some 
repute and a great lover 
of horses, wishing to 
ascertain to what degree 
the intelligence of a horse was capable 
of development, by dint of much 
patience expended on his favourite 
horse ‘‘ Germinal,” has arrived at some 
remarkable results. If a chair is 
Ingenuity. 
The Brain of 
a Horse. © 
