THE BADGER 



thought that, in spite of the earths being open, 

 she must have been chopped by the hounds. 

 A post-mortem examination, as well as the 

 improbability of a vixen with cubs being out 

 in the early part of the day, convinced me 

 that she had not been killed by hounds. 

 She seemed to have been badly bitten through 

 the legs and thighs but not on the body. 

 From this time the other vixen and all the 

 cubs left the badgers' earths and remained in 

 the covert. It was on this occasion that an 

 attempt to find out how many badgers there 

 were in these earths was rewarded by seeing 

 seven full-grown badgers emerge from a 

 single hole. It was rough, no doubt, that 

 the badgers should be invaded by two large 

 families of smelling foxes, and no doubt their 

 patience had become exhausted. Still I 

 could not tolerate this kind of behaviour, and 

 so I had a dig at them, took two old ones out, 

 and transported them to Scotland. The 

 following year there was peace and fox cubs 

 again. The year after, however, the vixen 

 and her cubs took off into the covert very 

 early after another bit of Bank Holiday 



74 



