FOXES. 



edge of the water, or perhaps to drink, and then 

 on again until out of sight. If he kept to the 

 course he was following, he must have gone pretty- 

 nearly two miles before reaching the woods, but 

 evidently from choice, for most of the time there 

 were thick evergreen woods within a quarter of a 

 mile or less on either side of him. 



On the 20th of last July I heard a general out- 

 cry from the robins and thrushes among the 

 sweet-fern and young pines in the pasture, and 

 pushing toward the sound, caught a glimpse of a 

 young fox evidently about to help himself to the 

 contents of a brown thrush's nest just in front of 

 his nose, containing three young birds nearly 

 grown. At my approach he slipped away among 

 the bushes, and I saw no more of him. The 

 young birds crouched down in the nest in silence 

 until I touched them, when one shrieked wildly 

 and scrambled over the edge, and falling caught 

 one foot in the fork of a twig and hung suspended, 

 stopping its outcry immediately. When I re- 



35 



