The Waif 349 



when it was known for certain that Indians were near, 

 and when the fact of their presence was soon proved. 



Coursing coyotes is a favorite sport with many persons 

 in the West, and while the weather is cool and dry they 

 often make good runs ; otherwise, the game soon succumbs 

 to heat, or to a serious impediment in the way of escape' — 

 its own tail. This is carried low, and despite his long hind 

 legs and powerful quarters, the brush gathers so much mud 

 in deep ground as seriously to embarrass flight. 



In those localities where this race exhibits indications 

 of much lamidity, it will be found that every destructive 

 device of man's ingenuity is practised against it ; even to 

 taking advantage of a harmless weakness for assafoetida in 

 the matter of preparing poisoned baits. All this makes 

 certain associations of ideas inevitable, and special impres- 

 sions upon his mind things of course. At the same time, 

 no mortal knows precisely what these are. 



Where no such experiences of human malice and dupli- 

 city color the coyote's character, its conduct is quite 

 different. Under those circumstances it does not fly from 

 imaginary perils. Even when fired at it shows no unseemly 

 haste to leave ; but if the shot be repeated, then the hint 

 is always taken, and it vanishes. Most persons who have 

 become personally acquainted with them must have had 

 occasion to observe that where they have been subjected 

 to the worst that man can do, their dexterity in the way 

 of robbery is not more striking than the audacity by which 

 it is accompanied. It seems difficult to reconcile the idea 

 of any instinctive fear of man with the conduct of an 

 animal that will steal thfough a line of sentinels into a 



