REYNARD OUTWITTED.
A good fox year can be counted upon with reasonable certainty once
every five years, says Martin Hunter, on the Labrador coast, at least
so say the oldest residents. The year before they begin to come down
from the interior, then the climax for great numbers. Then the
following year they decrease in numbers to what they were two years
before, and the winter following so few that one or two about in
miles of coast is a rarity.
Such was the case in the winter of 71; 69 had been a great fox year.
What was not trapped in the winter of 70 had migrated back to the
remote interior. Between the posts of Scum Islands and Moisie, a
distance of twenty-one miles of coast, there was only known to be one
fox--a red one--with a claw missing on his right paw, and he was as
cunning an old fellow as ever bothered a trapper. For a night or two
he would play all kinds of tricks down about Moisie, and then we
would hear of him around Seven Islands. There being no kind of
hunting, the people got anxious as to who would succeed in catching
the old rascal.
Bait would be sprinkled about at certain places, and no traps. Big
tail would come around and eat every scrap; this would be done for
two or three nights in succession, and then the hunter would think
the fox's fears were allayed, and carefully put two or three traps
and the bait as usual. Next morning the bait would be gone, as
before, but he would find his traps turned up side down.
[Illustration: FOX TRAPS WITH DRAGS.]
The fox we will say would pass and repass at a certain up-turned root
or a point of trees, then the hunter would think a trap in his beaten
track would surely nip him. Not so, however. The trap would be nicely
concealed, but old Reynard would deflex his road to suit the
circumstances. Smoking, greasing, or all the usual modes of taking
the smell from the iron traps were of no avail; when a trap was set
where his supper was spread, that old fox would begin by digging a
trench from a distance off in a straight line for the hidden traps,
the closer he got to the danger the slower and more cautiously he
would work. This we could see plainly next morning by standing
outside his works and reading his signs.
There were better and older trappers in the field after this old
stayer's life, but it was given to me to circumvent his maneuvers and
possess his fur. I had reset my traps near the bait two nights in
succession in the exact place where he had turned them over, and of
course he burrowed along his old trench to get at them. This I
carefully noted and set another trap in the trench on edge. Something
told me I was going to be successful, and I hardly slept that night.
I was on my snowshoes and off at the first grey of the February
morning. Before I got to the point where my traps were set I saw his
fresh tracks leading off in the same direction I was going. My heart
beat with expectation and anticipation as I hurried forward; it was
not for the value of the beast, but to have it to say I had killed
the cunning fox of 1871 where all the old hunters had failed.
Yes there he was sure enough, as I turned the last point; I could
hardly credit my good fortune, and was so afraid that he would even
now escape that I walked right on top of him with my snowshoes. He
was pinned down tight with my weight and was powerless to even
wriggle. I slipped my left hand under the snowshoe and with my other
hand pulled down his heart; a quiver or two and that fox was a good
fox.
Indians never strike or shoot either foxes, mink or marten when they
find them alive in the traps, as it causes the blood to collect and
congeal where the blow was given, and spoils the looks of the skin,
besides the annoyance of the blood when skinning. They hold the
animal by the neck and with the other hand pull down the heart until
the heart-strings break, and death is as sudden as if the spine were
severed.