220 ANIMAL COMPETITORS 
Each compartment should contain a small 
house or shelter-box, for, although the foxes 
often dig natural dens in the ground, they usu- 
ally accustom themselves readily to artificial 
shelters. A common form of these is much like 
a dog-kennel and about the same size. They 
are ordinarily made four or five feet square 
and two or three feet high, with an entrance 
about six inches square. No nesting material 
is needed inside the boxes, as the old foxes 
either do without or provide themselves from 
refuse in their enclosure. 
Foxes easy to keep. The mere keeping of 
foxes in confinement is a simple matter. They 
do not, as a rule, however, become very tame, 
even after several generations. They seem 
contented and happy in their cages, and rarely 
make determined efforts to escape. Several 
cases are recorded where captive silver foxes, 
having climbed out of their enclosures in win- 
ter, when high drifts of snow gave them a 
chance to reach the top of the fence, have re- 
turned voluntarily to their home. 
Although in general suspicious of mankind 
and inclined all their lives to snap at or bite 
