Part 13

Several wolves will combine, and, forming a semicircle, creep slowly towards a herd of deer, if there be a precipice near, and hemming them in gradually, so as not to alarm them suddenly, drive them to the edge of the precipice; then they all at once set up the most terrific yells, and taking flight, the poor deer leap over the precipice, where the wolves follow them at their leisure by a safer path, to feed on their mangled carcases.

On one occasion, a troop of nine white wolves endeavoured to practise the same trick upon Sir John Richardson, evidently intending to drive him into the river. However, when he rose up they halted, and on his advancing, made way for him to go to the tents.

The lovers of tragic histories will find many of the most fearful kind among the legends of all countries where wolves abound; all probably founded on fact, but mostly interwoven with romance. There cannot be anything much more shocking than that of the solitary traveller, galloping into a village pursued by these beasts, and knocking at the doors, earnestly entreating for refuge. The inhabitants were mostly buried in sleep; some few heard and did not move, others had a dim, confused notion of what was passing, and also remained in their beds; while others again did not hear anything. The next morning the sad event was told by finding the traveler's cloak and a few bones.

Gosse's Canadian Naturalist.

FOXES.

Stealing along in the dark of evening, the cunning and rapacious Fox (Canis Vulpes) leaves his hole in the earth, and roams in search of his prey. The poultry-yards, rabbit-warrens, and the haunts of game, tell of his skilful depredations; but he is not at all difficult in his appetite. To be sure, when he can get ripe grapes, he has a feast. If young turkeys and hares are not to be had, he puts up with a young fawn, a wild duck, or even weasels, mice, frogs, or insects. He will also walk down to the sea-shore, and sup upon the remains of fishes, or arrest the crabs and make them alter their sidelong course so as to crawl down his throat. Reynard also has an eye to the future; for he never lets anything escape which comes within his sharp bite, and as there must be a limit to the quantity which any animal can contain, when he cannot possibly eat any more, he, in various spots, well marked by himself, buries the remainder for the morrow's meal. With only his toes touching the earth, he prowls about with noiseless steps; his nose and ears alive to the faintest sound or odour; his cat-like eyes, with linear pupil, gleaming like coals of fire, and he suddenly springs upon his victims before they are aware of his vicinity. His bushy tail is the envied trophy of the huntsman, who calls it a brush. His colours are white, black, red, yellow, bluish, or variegated; and in cold climates he always turns white in winter. The father takes no care of his children; but the mother performs her duty with the most exemplary devotion for four months.

The fox is generally a solitary, suspicious animal; even when as much tamed as he can be, he seems to think he is going to be deceived and ill-treated: perhaps he judges of others by himself. He lives very often in a burrow, called an earth, belonging to somebody else, for he has very lax morals concerning property, and a great idea that right is established by possession. If he should be caught and put in confinement, he is very ferocious, or dies of ennui; but he is much too coy and clever to be easily entrapped. His cry is a sort of yelp, which, however, he is much too cautious to utter when he is earning his living.

Occasionally the fox has been caught in a trap, and there is the history of one who escaped and left one of his fore feet behind him. After a lapse of time, his trail was to be seen in various places, and was, of course, easily recognized. This continued for two years, when he was chased by Mr. St. John and easily killed. Another who was unearthed by the dogs, instead of running after the usual fashion of these beasts, turned suddenly upon each dog that came up and jumped over him. This could not last long, although it puzzled the dogs very much; he was taken, and then only was the reason for his manoeuvre discovered by finding that he had only three feet.

Mr. St. John relates the following history of the cunning of a fox:—"Just after it was daylight, I saw a large fox come very quietly along the edge of the plantation; he looked with great care over the turf wall into the field, and seemed to long very much to get hold of some of the hares that were feeding in it, but apparently knew that he had no chance of catching one by dint of running. After considering a short time, he seemed to have formed his plans, examined the different gaps in the wall, fixed upon one which appeared to be most frequented, and laid himself down close to it, in an attitude like that of a cat at a mouse hole."

"In the meantime I watched all his plans; he then with great care and silence scraped a small hollow in the ground, throwing up the sand as a kind of screen; every now and then, however, he stopped to listen, and sometimes to take a most cautious peep into the field. When he had done this he laid himself down in a convenient posture for springing on his prey, and remained perfectly motionless, with the exception of an occasional reconnoiter of the feeding hares. When the sun began to rise, they came, one by one, from the field to the plantation; three had already come without passing by his ambush, one within twenty yards of him, but he made no movement beyond crouching still more flatly to the ground. Presently two came directly towards him, and though he did not venture to look up, I saw, by an involuntary motion of his ears, that those quick organs had already warned him of their approach. The two hares came through the gap together, and the fox, springing with the quickness of lightning, caught one and killed her immediately; he then lifted up his booty, and was carrying it off, when my rifle-ball stopped his course."

In Captain Brown's "Popular Natural History," I find the following:—"In the autumn of the year 1819, at a fox-chase in Galloway, a very strong fox was hard run by the hounds. Finding himself in great danger of being taken, Reynard made for a high wall at a short distance, and springing over it, crept close under the other side: the hounds followed, but no sooner had they leaped the wall, than he sprang back again over it, and by this cunning device gave them the slip, and got safe away from his pursuers."

An American gentleman of Pittsfield, accompanied by two blood-hounds, found a fox, and pursued him for nearly two hours, when suddenly the dogs appeared at fault. Their master came up with them near a large log of wood lying on the ground, and felt much surprise at their making a circuit of a few roods without any object in view, every trace of the fox seeming to have been lost, while the dogs still kept yelping. On looking about him the gentleman saw the fox stretched upon the log, apparently lifeless. He made several unsuccessful efforts to direct the attention of the dogs towards the place, and at length he approached so near as to see the animal breathe. Even then Reynard did not show any alarm; but his pursuer aimed a blow at him with the branch of a tree, upon which he leaped from his lurking-place, and was taken.

One of the drollest incidents in fox-hunting was that at Newry, in Ireland, when, being pursued very hotly, the fox leaped on to the top of a turf-stack, where he laid himself down quite flat. At last, one of the hounds perceived him, and he was obliged again to run. After this, he climbed up a stone wall, whence he sprang on to the roof of a cabin near by, and mounting to the chimney top, from thence inspected his enemies. An old hound, however, followed him, and was on the point of seizing him, when Reynard dropped down the chimney into the lap of an old woman, who was smoking her pipe at the corner. The hound did not dare to follow, but the sportsmen came up, and entering the cabin, found it in possession of the fox; the frightened woman and children huddled into one corner, and the fox (who was taken alive) grinning at them.

In all ages of fable, the fox has been the principal hero. The most ancient fables on record, those of Lokman, the Arabian, from whom AEsop took most of his, gives him a very conspicuous place among the crafty courtiers of the lion. The chief phrase of which the wily flatterer makes use, as he bows with affected humility to his sovereign, is, "Oh, Father of Beauty," by which indirect compliment he generally gains his wishes. The early German writers have also chosen him as the principal hero of various histories, and the poem of "Reynard, the Fox," will live as long as printers and illustrators exercise their art and talent.

The Arctic fox is smaller than ours; even the soles of his feet are covered with fur, like those of the hare, and he is altogether more thickly clothed. He has often been supposed to be pied in colour, but this is only in process of turning to the hue of winter. He is in these climates a much more gregarious animal, and several families live in the same earth. Bishop Heber mentions one in India, which feeds chiefly on field-mice and white ants, and this probably is the species of which the natives say, that he can turn nine times within the space of his own length. He is about half the size of the European.

Much valuable fur is derived both from European and American foxes, where there is a great variety of colour, not depending on temperature.

In Ireland there is a small animal called a fox, which does not eat flesh, but contents itself with vegetables, and is so perfectly harmless, that it roams about, unmolested even by dogs.

HYAENAS.

There cannot be a much more uninteresting animal than the hard-hided, knock-kneed Hyaena, which is pre-eminently African, although he is found in the East; having, according to the opinion of some naturalists, migrated thither in the wake of caravans. He has a ferocious, ill-natured look, yet the first impression made by his appearance can only be expressed by the word "sneaking." He is of a tawny colour, more or less dusky till it approaches black, and is generally spotted, or striped. He has a mane continued all along the spine; his ears are long and erect; he is digitigrade, his claws are strong, and not retractile; he possesses a gland which sends forth a disagreeable odour, and his eyes have a pupil which is contracted at the top, and round at the bottom, which gives them a singular expression.

The great peculiarity of form in the Hyaena is the disproportionate smallness of his hind quarters; besides which, the vertebrae of his neck very often become stiffened, in consequence of the strain put upon them by the powerful muscles of that part, and of the jaws. So firm is the hold which they take, that nothing will make them leave what they have once seized. They devour bones as well as muscles, rejecting only hoofs, horns, and skull; and this power must have existed in former ages, for in the caves which they inhabited, and into which they dragged their prey, their fossil remains are found with those of gigantic mastodons, etc., on which their teeth had made impression. This stiffness of the neck has caused many to imagine that it was composed of one joint only, and led the Arabs to make Hyaenas the symbols of obstinacy.

The habits of Hyaenas accord with their outward appearance; they are nature's scavengers, and feed on everything, being, with the jackal and Genet cat, the especial robbers of the cemetery. Many are the stories told of their cruel depredations, such as their stealing into the kraals of the Caffres and Hottentots, and abstracting the sleeping infants from under the kaross of its mother, who only becomes conscious of her loss when she hears the cries of the victim. Major Denham, in his travels, tells us of a village stormed by them at night, when they carried off asses and other animals.

My own impressions of the Hyaena are, that he is a timid, cowardly animal. I always found them shun my approach; and my uncle has told me, that when he often encountered them during his command of the outpost of Tantum Querry, on the leeward coast of Africa, they invariably turned from him, and slunk out of sight with their dragging, shuffling gait. I cannot say that they disturbed the stillness of the night, because a tropical night never is still; but their cry used suddenly to come upon our ears, and I know not why, always seemed to be close to us. The roar of a leopard or lion is most grand, however terrific; but what is called the laugh of the hyaena, is just like the triumphant exultation of a fierce madman, when he reaches his long-sought victim.

All the natives of the Gold Coast bear witness to the powers of mimicry evinced by the hyaena; they say that he hides himself in the jungle, and imitates the cries of other beasts till he allures them to his side, when he falls upon and devours them. A gentleman, who long commanded a fortress on the Gold Coast, told me the following story, which confirms the above assertion:—"Some women from the neighbouring village were accustomed to pass the walls of the fort to fetch water after sunset, at the dinner hour of this officer, and made so much noise, that they disturbed him, so he ordered them to take another path. The next evening the noise recurred, and the same order was repeated the next morning; on which the women protested they had gone quite another way. On the third evening, when the laughing and talking were apparently recommencing, a sergeant sallied forth to bring the delinquents into the fort; but to his surprise there were only three hyaenas to be seen, whose imitation of human sounds had deceived all those who had heard them on the preceding occasions."

It was long supposed that the hyaena was incapable of attachment, but Mr. Burchell brought one with him from South Africa to this country, which evidently loved his master, and was jealous of other animals. Colonel Sykes procured one in India who followed him about like a dog, played with the sailors on board ship with the greatest good humour, and never forgot his first owner. He was placed in the Zoological Gardens, where, although Colonel Sykes paid him rare visits, he always recognized him amidst the crowd. One day, when the hyaena was asleep, this gentleman suddenly called him by his name; the poor beast as suddenly started on to his legs, looked up, rubbed his head against the bars of his cage, bounded about uttering short cries, looked sorrowfully at Colonel Sykes when he went away, and repeated these manifestations of joy when he returned.

The Spotted Hyaena has been called the Hyaena Capensis, from the belief that it only inhabited South Africa; but it is found as frequently in Guinea as the striped variety, and has just the same propensities. Near the Cape, however, it does more mischief, because colonists have settled themselves there, and their farms afford more valuable prey. They are said to prefer making an attack on strong, vigorous animals, because they run away, and the hyaenas can follow them; but the weaker animals turn round and face their enemy, which always intimidates them.

Mr. Steedman, a South African traveller, gives an unmitigated bad character to the spotted hyaenas, and says, that such is their preference for human flesh, that they will even pass by the cattle, and seize on children as old as eight years.

The Straand Wolf of the Dutch, or the Villose Hyaena of Dr. Abel Smith, who has done so much for the natural history of Southern Africa, is less common than the other species; and often feeds on the shore, from its preference for those dead animals which are cast up by the sea. If, however, it be pressed by hunger, it commits just as many depredations as the others. It is extremely cunning, conceals itself by day among the mountains, or thick patches of forest, and preys at a great distance from its habitation.

Mr. Pringle confirms Mr. Steedman's accounts of the terrible havoc occasioned by the hyaenas of South Africa, and says, that in the district of Somerset, they destroyed seventy foals in one year, belonging to the farmers; he, however, believes, that they never attack human beings by night or by day, and that they come in packs and play the part of four-footed vultures, even devouring their own kindred if they should chance to be killed; but no other beast of prey will eat them, from the offensive rankness of their flesh. The den of a spotted hyaena, that was kept in the Tower about twenty years ago, required some repair. The carpenter nailed a thick oaken plank upon the floor, about seven feet long, putting at least a dozen nails into it, each longer than his middle finger. At one end of this piece of wood, there was a small projection, and not having a proper chisel with him by which he might remove it, the man returned to his shop to fetch one. While he was absent, some persons came to see the animals; and the hyaena was let down by the keeper into the part of the den in which the carpenter had been at work. Directly the beast saw the projecting piece of wood, he seized it with his teeth, tore the plank up, and drew out every nail with the utmost ease; which action will give a good idea of the muscular strength of this creature.

It is impossible to say why there should be such conflicting accounts of the hyaena, given by those whose veracity is undoubted. No one dreads them on the Gold Coast, but they seem to be the terror of all the inhabitants at, and to the north of the Cape, also in Abyssinia, where Bruce called them "the plagues of their lives," and we can scarcely forbear a smile, when we read that one of them stood by his bed-side, with a purloined bunch of candles in his mouth; having found his way to him even through the streets of Gondar.

THE CAT TRIBE.—LIONS.

I must be allowed to give a somewhat more lengthened description than I have bestowed on other animals, to the Felidae, or Cat-tribe, because the same characters serve for all; size and colour being almost the only difference among those of which I shall treat. Grace and strength are their universal attributes, the latter lying chiefly in the fore parts of their frames; such as their paws, legs, shoulders, neck and jaws; the former in their arched and rounded form, and the extreme suppleness of their joints. Their muzzle is short and round, some of their teeth are of enormous size and strength, their sight is very acute both by night and day; their eyes are set obliquely in the head, and always glare in the dark; and sometimes by day when they are in a rage. It is only in the smaller tribes that the pupil is vertically linear, when the full light causes it to contract. The ears are large, and the sense of hearing much developed. Their smell is not equally perfect, and the roughness of their tongue shews, that their taste cannot be very delicate. This roughness is caused by the horny papillae, or small projections, with points directed backwards, which cover the tongue, and enable it to lick the flesh from the bones of their food. They have long bristles on each side of the mouth, which form the most sensitive organs of touch; each bristle being inserted in a bed of glands under the skin, communicating with a nerve. The claws of the Felidae are extremely strong, sharp, and crooked; and all four-feet are furnished with them, five before, and four behind; and the most effective system of muscular contrivance not only gives such force to the fore-paws, that a blow from one of these will fracture a man's skull, but keeps these claws from touching the ground, and enables the animal to draw them back into a sheath. In aid of this, the sole of the foot, and each of the toes, has a soft, elastic pad, or cushion under it, on which they walk, and as they never set the heel to the ground, their footsteps are noiseless, unless they choose them to be otherwise. It is with their formidable claws, and still more formidable teeth, that they tear their prey to pieces.