WILD WISDOM

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 851, 20 December 1929, Page 4 (Supplement)

WILD WISDOM

By

NEVILE SHERBROOKE LAWRENCE

H BADGER’S burrow, deep and dry. The entrance, overgrown with gorse, leading out into a sheltered hollow, warmed generously by the sun. This was the vixen’s choice for a nursery. Year after year she came to find this burrow. Out of the breeding season she wandered far away, but the advent of spring recalled her to it. ,

The privacy of the burrow was unusual. Many vixen find it impossible to rear fox-cubs on Dartmoor.

Man, the enemy of all wild things, is there to supply far away packs of fox-hounds with future quarries. Litter-takers are expert at outwitting fox-mothers. The vixen had often winded these litter-takers in the past. Many times had been on the point of warning her cubs. Instead she lay tightly in the burrow, shielding and hiding her young with her body until danger had passed. It was a large enough burrow for the vixen to lie with her cubs if she so wished. This privilege

she availed herself of rarely. Experience taught her that cubs seldom ceased from worrying. If they were not biting her ears, they were playing with her tail, always objects that held a great attraction to each succeeding litter. This year the litter had been a small one. There were but two cubs. At a month old these cubs had their first glimpse of daylight. The vixen was away on her search for food when the dog-cub commenced whimpering like a young hound us the desire for exploration awakened. Cautiously the youngster approached the mouth of the burrow; reaching it, he thrust out his muzzle tentatively at first, then his whole mask. A look round and he drew his body into the open. His sister followed his example. There, at the mouth of the burrow, the two paused. A ludicrous vpair they made, blinking their eyes in the unaccustomed daylight. Heads as big as all the rest of their bodies, bodies that ended in quaint little stumps—one day to become the brushes that fox hunters desire. As the cubs grew more accustomed to the sunlight they threw off much of their fear. They gambolled free from care as only the very young can do. At length their mother returned. With something between a cough and a bark the cubs scuttled back into the safety of their burrow. The vixen was not surprised at their alarm. All her former cubs had shown a like fear at the first sight of her form in the open daylight. The cubs had their moments of discontent. Every now and again they would grumble at their food. The mice and rats, frogs and beetles which their mother sometimes brought, were not so tasty as the young rabbits so plentiful around them. Mice and rats were not so easy to find at the time of year. The search for such food occupied a good deal of the vixen’s time, but the cubs must learn that foxes experience lean times, and by taking a bite every now and then at the despised rations she taught the cubs this lesson. In the days that followed what games the cubs had. Reynard, the dog cub, would lie behind the little mounds of earth that lay around, or crouch in the tiny declivities of the ground which, during the hours just after sunrise and just before sunset, when the sun was low in' the heavens, were in shadow. Here the cub would await his sister. AVhen she passed he would pounce upon her, bowling her over and over in his exuberance.

Perhaps they would find a hedgehog and the two would lie before it silently, their muzzles resting on their fore paws, waiting for the creature to unfold itself. When it did so, a touch from a paw would send the hedgehog once more into a prickly ball. The cubs would not be playing long before the vixen would get anxious. Silently, swiftly, almost as imperceptibly as the dew falls, she would Issue forth from her burrow unseen by the cubs, and seat herself on some point of vantage to watch over their safety. As time went on the cubs could take more care of themselves. During their rambles, on the slightest sign of the unknown, they would scuttle into the nearest earth, leaving nothing behind them to tell of their presence unless it was the tiny ball-prints of their feet on the sun-baked earth.

One day, just outside their own burrow, they met adventure. A man came upon them suddenly; so suddenly that they were, at first, bewildered "Into Inactivity. They halted In their

play. At last curiosity being satisfied it gave place to fear. The cubs made their burrow in great haste. Had they known, this was just what the litter-taker wished. He left the cubs’ playground well satisfied, with the intention of returning to dig them out when darkness had fallen. The vixen, when she returned to the burrow, needed no telling. Long before she got home ' her quick nostrils had scented danger. She acted quickly. The sun had hardly set behind the hills of Dartmoor than the trio set out on a journey. What a way it seemed to the cubs! It was little more than a mile, but they were footsore and weary before a halt was made. The vixen cast about here and there, her nose ou the ground The cubs watched her in the half light with their heads aslant. At last she was satisfied. It was not such a roomy burrow as the old home, neither was it so clean, but it would suffice. The cubs fell asleep dreaming of mischief on the morrow in the wonderful world they had been born Into. A week passed quickly. The cubs saw the man again. This time they lost no time in makiug their earth, arid the litter-taker left, grumbling at not having brought his bag and spade. Again the vixen scented the intruder and that; night the party returned to their old home, the vixen, with fox-llke sublety, guessing this, to be the last place the litter-taker would search for them.

It was shortly after this that the dog-cub made acquaintance with grief. There came a night when his sister did not return and he missed the warmth at his side, lying whimperiug the whole night long like a weaning puppy. The vixen showed anxiety by making wide curcuits round the burrow, her nose close to the ground searching for the traces of the menfolk, for she knew a fox-cub had no other enemies. The she-cub had wandered far from the burrowfollowing the scent of a bird. The scent grow ing stronger and stronger as she went, led her on until she lost her way. Then, she picked up human scent and became fearful. She halted, crouched to the ground. Suddenly she became aware of a bright light. The light fascinated her; she sat up on her haunches gazing at it. A man aproached Although intensely frightened and her heart beating in a tempestuous gallop, she allowed herself to be picked up. The tirst movement was when she was thrust into the darkness of a sack—then she became a hurricane. After the loss of his sister Reynard's life became more active. Left more and more to himself he wandered far afield He very soon became expert in stalking rabbits; learned to distinguish the varying scents of the wild —which to follow and which to despise. Adventure never took him to any g;reat distance until September was well advanced and the terrors of cub-hunting commenced. He then

Won by JOHN L. MACDONALD, had to run miles to avoid blooding' the young fox-hounds. The vixen's training came in useful now. Reynard knew the qound of the horn, the noise of tramping horses and the cry of the young hounds as they picked up scent. If cub-hunting was important to the young hounds Is was even more so to Reynard. Reynard had wandered far from the haunts of his cub-hood, into a different country which afforded more cover than Dartmoor, and in which food was plentiful. The cub had grown into a fine fox'. He was inordinately proud of his glossy red coat and magnificent tail with Its tiny white tip. One morning, toward the end of the hunting season, Reynard became aware of a movement in the spinney in which he had intended spending the day. The scent of hounds was wafted through the air to his nostrils. He did not hurry himself, he had already more than once piloted hounds. He listened lazily for a while to the hooves of the horses stamping upon the soft ground and the voices of the huntsmen as they urged the hounds to draw the cover. At last Reynard broke away on the far side of the spinney. Hearing the “View holloa” of the followers of the Hunt, he came into the open. It was a “scenting” morning and' the hounds soon burst into cry, their music echoing through the trees as they found scent_ in the spinney he had just left. Down the valley he went, up on to the rising ground. He found a stale scent to follow, breaking away to leave a forked trail behind him. The hounds, when they reached it, split, but the fresh scent was too strong to mislead them for long. The fox was not so cool as he had been, the hounds were too close for safety. Making no definite point, for five or- six miles he piloted them. He could hear the Hunt but a field away, the dries of the yokels as they paused from their work in the pastures to watch It, or rushed to open the gates for the less courageous of the horsemen to pass through. Remembering the ruse of his mother, the fox took to the high road. The scents of the roadside offended him. The petrol from the cars which had passed was foreign to the scent of the "meadows below. The scent also worried the hounds and Reynard increased his lead which had been dangerously short. The highway did not suit his footpads. They were already sore with the miles he' had paced so he returned once more to the fields. It was a ploughed field and Reynard raced along the bottom of a furrow which shielded him from view. Another half mile passed. How he held his own he did not know. He was nearly spent. Then he came and raced along the banks longing to lap the running water. Delay was impossible. Glancing over his shoulder the fox could see the hounds but a few yards behind him. There were not so many riders as there had been. A few tired horses told the run they had had. As Reynard scrambled up a hedgebank leading to a bridge he almost felt the breath of the hounds behind him. They were hunting on sight now. There was one chance and the fox took it without hesitation. Springing on to the parapet of the bridge he dropped into the water. He heard the howl of the disappointed hounds as he was carried below the bridge. Passing through an arch his side brushed against a ledge. With a wild effort he pawed It and succeeded In dragging his weary body on to the resting place. He dropped panting. The ledge was well in the centre of the arch which was deep and dark. Reynard lay listening to the pad-pad of the hounds overheard and the champing bits of the horses that were joining them. He heard the muffled sounds of voiees and the oaths of a huntsman as he exclaimed; “Drowned himself, by gad!” Some of the hounds took to the water, but the fox was well screened. Reynard took a lap at the water to soften his parched tongue and his panting gradually subsided. Stretching wearily he became busy with an injured paw. A long wait, and he heard the huntsmen calling off the lingering hounds by name; the crack of the whip as it fell on the stragglers of the pack. His tongue was still hanging out, but it was soft and comfortable; his paw still pained him, but it would soon mend. Reynard wrinkled his snout showing his teeth. Fox-fashion, he was smiling.