made several visits to the place during moonlight nights, but without success. They were perched too high for him to reach them. If he got them he must therefore resort to stratagem. This he did.

He first scratched the ground beneath one of the trees with his forefeet, and then the base of the tree itself, in order to attract their attention, at the same time looking up to mark every movement. He then ran round the tree in rapid rings. The turkeys, aware of their danger, followed his quick movements with their eyes, and became confused and dizzy. One fine bird fell plump on the ground, and was instantly killed. The scheme. was repeated, and down came another, which shared the same fate. Both were borne off by the fox to his den.

Discovering his clever trick, the farmer laid wait for him one night, and dispatched him with his gun.

CATCHING GEESE AND DUCKS BY

STEALTH

A GENTLEMAN in New Jersey was one day in a field near a stream where some geese were swimming. Presently he observed one disappear under the water with a sudden jerk. While look

ing for her to rise again, he saw a fox emerge from the water and trot off to the woods with the unfortunate goose in his mouth.

The fox had entered the stream some distance above the geese, and, with merely the tip of his nose above the water, had floated noiselessly down among them and succeeded in capturing one without causing any alarm.

Another fox, by taking a large mouthful of grass in his jaws, was enabled to float into the midst of a flock of ducks in the same manner, without causing the least alarm, and thus secured one of them, an easy prey, for his dinner.

A CLEVER TRICK

A MAN was lying one summer day under the shelter of some shrubs on the banks of the Tweed, a famous river in southern Scotland, when he heard the cries of wild fowl, attended by a great deal of fluttering and splashing. On looking round, he saw a number of ducks had been disturbed by the drifting of a fir branch among them. After circling in the air for a little time, they again settled down quietly on their feedingground.

Two or three minutes elapsed, when the same thing occurred again-a branch drifted down

with the stream into the midst of the ducks, and startled them. Once more they rose upon the wing, screaming loudly; but when the harmless bough had drifted by, they settled down on the water as before.

This occurred so often that at last they scarcely troubled themselves to flutter out of the way, even when about to be touched by the drifting bough.

The gentleman, meantime, marking the regular intervals at which the fir branches came one after another in the same track, looked for a cause, and saw, at length, higher up the bank of the stream, a fox, which, having evidently sent them adrift, was eagerly watching their progress and the effect they produced.

Satisfied with the result, cunning Reynard at last selected a larger branch of spruce fir than usual, and couching himself down on it, sent it adrift as he had done the others.

The birds, now well used to the floating branches, scarcely moved till he was in the midst of them. Then, making rapid snaps right and left, he secured two fine young ducks as his prey, and floated forward in triumph on his raft; while the remaining fowls, screaming in terror, took to flight, and returned no more to the spot.

The shrewd trick of the fox was successful.

THE LABORER AND THE SLY FOX

A LABORER going to his work one morning caught sight of a fox stretched out at full length under a bush. Believing it to be dead, the man drew it out by the tail, and swung it about to assure himself of the fact. Seeing no signs of life, he then threw it over his shoulder, intending to make a cap of the skin, and ornament his cottage with the bushy tail.

While the fox hung over one shoulder, his pickaxe balanced it on the other. The point of the axe, as he walked along, every now and then struck against the ribs of the fox, which, not so dead as the man thought, objected to this treatment, though he did not mind being carried along with his head downward. Losing patience, he gave a sharp snap at that portion of the laborer's body near which his head hung.

The man, startled by this sudden and unexpected attack, threw the fox and pickaxe to the ground, when, turning round, he saw the live animal making off at full speed.

TWO FOXES ACTING IN CONCERT

Two foxes will sometimes act in concert in capturing their prey.

An old hare had frequently bid defiance to her would-be captors, and escaped from the speed of the best greyhounds. But two foxes that had evidently learned of her movements, laid a plan for her capture.

One aroused and chased the hare up along a long wood-siding. The other, having placed himself in ambush about half way up, rushed at her as she came along at a rapid rate, but missed her; but she was by this means so deflected from her course as to be turned aside into the very teeth of the other; and thus the two effected by stratagem what the hounds had failed to accomplish by speed.

A FOX AT PLAY

"ONE of the prettiest and most unexpected incidents I have witnessed," says a traveler, " occurred one summer, in the month of August, on a sandy, open hillside, where the grass was short and dry, and the grasshoppers had taken to the huckleberry bushes.

"A full-grown fox, only a few feet from me, was playing with these grasshoppers as a kitten plays with white butterflies. He would leap straight up into the air, striking at a jumping grasshopper, curve over and land with the insect between his forepaws. Sometimes he would eat