4 
MAMMALS OF LEICESTERSHIEE AND RUTLAND. 
every direction, being joined in this operation by the other. After a few 
minutes had been thus spent in fruitless search, the two b'oxes fell upon 
each other, and a fierce battle ensued until the spectator approached the 
combatants and separated them. Probably the first Fox had invited his friend 
to dine, and the latter, thinking himself the victim of a hoax, endeavoured 
to be revenged on his friend by thrashing him. 
The late IMr. P. Widdowson, a well-known taxidermist of Melton Mowbray, 
wrote me in Feb. 1885 : — “ Did you ever hear of a Fox running awav, 
carrying three large Fowls at once ? ” On enquiry, I found he had lately 
‘ set up ” a Fox shot in his neighbourhood whilst attempting to accomplish 
that feat. 
At Noseley Hall there is a mounted “ bob-tailed ” Fox, about which 
Col. T. M. Hazlerigg writes me: — “The ‘bob-tailed’ vixen Fox was bobbed 
at Noseley as a cub ; she generally lived and brought up her young in 
hollow trees, and gave Mr. Tailby’s Hounds many a good run. After beating 
Hounds for nearly ten years, she was run to ground under the railway 
near Hallaton, by Sir Bache Cunard’s Hounds. She killed the first Terrier 
sent in after her.” 
The ‘Leicester Chronicle and Mercury’ of 9th January, 1886, gives the 
following item from Kibworth “ Extraordinary Encounter. — ^A remarkable 
instance of the tenacious rapacity of the long-tailed denizens of the woods has 
just occurred here. A few days ago, whilst Mr. Cunnington, of Kibworth 
Harcourt, was engaged in cutting hay on his stack, situated by the side of the 
highway between Kibworth and Tur Langton, he saw, running along the field 
on the opposite side of the road, what he took to be a Hare. His Dog immediately 
gave chase, and speedily overtook the animal. Mr. Cunnington, for the better 
observation of what was going on, hastened across to the field, and saw a large 
Fox pulling lustily at one end of something (he could not then distinguish what), 
and his Dog tugging as vigorously at the other. Curiosity prompting him to 
gain further knowledge, he ran towards the struggling couple, and soon perceived 
that the ‘ bone of contention ’ was well covered with meat ; and to such a length 
of impudence did Reynard’s voracity extend, that it was not until Mr. Cunnington 
attempted to bring his boot into contact with the varmint that he decided to 
relinquish his grip of the plunder. It then transpired that the booty which 
Pug had, with so much reluctance, abandoned, was j)art of a loin of mutton 
which (Pug’s contamination excepted) was perfectly sweet. The tug-of-war 
revealed that, in pluck and strength. Fox and Dog were equally matched, and, 
without the interference of Mr. Cunnington, the issue of the struggle might 
long have been doubtful.” Mr. W. H. Thompson, writing from Beckenham, 
Kent, informed me that, some years ago, on the estate of Mr. H. L. Powys-Keck 
at Stoughton, two vixen Foxes, with four cubs apiece, were known to inhabit 
the same earth. Mr. Powys-Keck, on being written to, confirmed this, saying 
