Ways of Wood Folk | Page 3

there!"
In the midst of his planning he gives a grasshopper-jump aside, and
brings down both paws hard on a bit of green moss that quivered as he
passed. He spreads his paws apart carefully; thrusts his nose down
between them; drags a young wood-mouse from under the moss; eats
him; licks his chops twice, and goes on planning as if nothing had
happened.

"On the way back, I'll swing round by the Fales place, and take a sniff
under the wall by the old hickory, to see if those sleepy skunks are still
there for the winter. I'll have that whole family before spring, if I'm
hungry and can't find anything else. They come out on sunny days; all
you have to do is just hide behind the hickory and watch."
So off he goes on his well-planned hunt; and if you follow his track
to-morrow in the snow, you will see how he has gone from one hunting
ground directly to the next. You will find the depression where he lay
in a clump of tall dead grass and watched a while for the rabbit; reckon
the number of mice he caught in the meadow; see his sly tracks about
the chicken coop, and in the orchard; and pause a moment at the spot
where he cast a knowing look behind the hickory by the wall,--all just
as he planned it on his way to the brook.
If, on the other hand, you stand by one of his runways while the dogs
are driving him, expecting, of course, to see him come tearing along in
a desperate hurry, frightened out of half his wits by the savage uproar
behind him, you can only rub your eyes in wonder when a fluffy yellow
ball comes drifting through the woods towards you, as if the breeze
were blowing it along. There he is, trotting down the runway in the
same leisurely, self-possessed way, wrapped in his own thoughts
apparently, the same deep wrinkles over his eyes. He played a trick or
two on a brook, down between the ponds, by jumping about on a lot of
stones from which the snow had melted, without wetting his feet
(which he dislikes), and without leaving a track anywhere. While the
dogs are puzzling that out, he has plenty of time to plan more devices
on his way to the big hill, with its brook, and old walls, and rail fences,
and dry places under the pines, and twenty other helps to an active
brain.
First he will run round the hill half a dozen times, crisscrossing his trail.
That of itself will drive the young dogs crazy. Then along the top rail of
a fence, and a long jump into the junipers, which hold no scent, and
another jump to the wall where there is no snow, and then--
"Oh, plenty of time, no hurry!" he says to himself, turning to listen a
moment. "That dog with the big voice must be old Roby. He thinks he

knows all about foxes, just because he broke his leg last year, trying to
walk a sheep-fence where I'd been. I'll give him another chance; and oh,
yes! I'll creep up the other side of the hill, and curl up on a warm rock
on the tiptop, and watch them all break their heads over the crisscross,
and have a good nap or two, and think of more tricks."
So he trots past you, still planning; crosses the wall by a certain stone
that he has used ever since he was a cub fox; seems to float across an
old pasture, stopping only to run about a bit among some cow tracks, to
kill the scent; and so on towards his big hill. Before he gets there he
will have a skilful retreat planned, back to the ponds, in case old Roby
untangles his crisscross, or some young fool-hound blunders too near
the rock whereon he sits, watching the game.
If you meet him now, face to face, you will see no quiet assumption of
superiority; unless perchance he is a young fox, that has not learned
what it means to be met on a runway by a man with a gun when the
dogs are driving. With your first slightest movement there is a flash of
yellow fur, and he has vanished into the thickest bit of underbrush at
hand.--Don't run; you will not see him again here. He knows the old
roads and paths far better than you do, and can reach his big hill by any
one of a dozen routes where you would never dream of looking. But if
you want another glimpse of him, take the shortest cut to the hill. He
may take a nap, or sit and listen a while