FOXES AND OTHER NEIGHBORS 257 



to come upon a dead rabbit which has been killed 

 by a weasel and his warm blood sucked from the 

 neck. 



The mink is four or five inches longer thaii the 

 weasel, remains a dark brown, almost a black, the 

 year through, and lives chiefly near water, in 

 which he swims and hunts with almost the speed 

 and more than the craftiness of the otter. It was 

 not many years ago that a family of mink hunted 

 in the Bronx Creek where it flows through the Zoo, 

 and lived high on the water-fowl caged there, re- 

 sisting all traps and guns. Their beady eyes are 

 sharp and intelligent, their agile bodies trim and 

 extraordinarily supple, and to see one of them at 

 work by a stream-side, unaware of you as you lie, 

 perhaps, down wind in a duck-blind, or sitting 

 quietly with a rod, is to get a peep at the cruelty 

 and grace of nature strangely combined. 



It is hard to get a good 'coon dog nowadays, I am 

 told— at least in our part of the world. Personally, 

 I'm not sorry, for you cannot have your 'coon and 

 eat him, too. A good many, factors are combining, 

 indeed, to make our Northern world safer for 'coon 

 democracy. The 'coons are hunted less (possibly 

 because automobiles are making us more and more 

 averse to hard physical labor) ; the forests are more 

 and more losing their pine at the hands of the lum- 

 bermen and coming into hardwoods, which give the 

 animals nesting-places; and the 'coons, unlike the 

 weasels, for instance, can vary their diet to embrace 

 vegetable products, especially corn, of which they 

 are extremely fond. Then, too, they hibernate in 

 winter, which is a great protection, and here in the 



