vi. p. 4.
[103] Richmond Hill. The dog died at Strawberry Hill.
[104] Correspondence, chronologically arranged by Peter Cunningham,
viii. p. 39.
[105] _Loc. cit._, p. 44.
[106] Vol. vi. p. 117.
[107] "The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford," edited by Peter
Cunningham, now first chronologically arranged, ix. p. 173.
[108] _Loc. cit._, viii. p. 35.
[109] Fitzpatrick, "Memoirs of Richard Whately, Archbishop of Dublin,"
vol. i. pp. 21, 22 (1864).
[110] "Memoirs of the Life of William Collins, R.A.," by his son, W.
Wilkie Collins, i. 193.
[111] Third edition, 1806, p. 385.
WOLF.
Surely the man should get a monument who is proved to have killed the
last she-wolf in these islands. How closely allied the wolf is to the
dog may be clearly read in the accounts of Polar winterings. Some of the
larger butchers' dogs are singularly wolf-like, and it seems to be
_that_ variety which occasionally, as it were, resumes its wolfish
habits of prowling at night and killing numbers of sheep in certain
districts, as we sometimes read in the country papers of the day. In
Strathearn, we lately heard of a very recent instance of this wolf-like
ferocity breaking out. The dog was traced with great difficulty, and at
last shot. He proved to be of the kind alluded to.
POLSON AND THE LAST SCOTTISH WOLF.
Mr Scrope[112] describes, from traditions still existing on the east
coast of Sutherland, the destruction of what is supposed to have been
the last Scottish wolf and her cubs. This was between 1690 and 1700.
This wolf had committed many depredations on their flocks, and the
inhabitants had been unsuccessful in their attempts to hunt it down.
A man named Polson, attended by two herd boys, went in search of it.
Polson was an old hunter, and had much experience in tracing and
destroying wolves and other predatory animals. Forming his own
conjectures, he proceeded at once to the wild and rugged ground that
surrounds the rocky mountain-gulley which forms the channel of the burn
of Sledale. Here, after a minute investigation, he discovered a narrow
fissure in the midst of a confused mass of large fragments of rock,
which, upon examination, he had reason to think might lead to a larger
opening or cavern below, which the wolf might use as his den. Stones
were now thrown down, and other means resorted to, to rouse any animal
that might be lurking within. Nothing formidable appearing, the two lads
contrived to squeeze themselves through the fissure, that they might
examine the interior, while Polson kept guard on the outside. The boys
descended through the narrow passage into a small cavern, which was
evidently a wolf's den, for the ground was covered with bones and horns
of animals, feathers, and egg-shells; and the dark space was somewhat
enlivened by five or six active wolf cubs. Not a little dubious of the
event, the voices of the poor boys came up hollow and anxious from
below, communicating this intelligence. Polson at once desired them to
do their best, and to destroy the cubs. Soon after, he heard the feeble
howling of the whelps as they were attacked below, and saw almost at the
same time, to his great horror, a full-grown wolf, evidently the dam,
raging furiously at the cries of her young, and now close upon the mouth
of the cavern, which she had approached unobserved, among the rocky
irregularities of the place. She attempted to leap down at one bound
from the spot where she was first seen. In this emergency, Polson
instinctively threw himself forward on the wolf, and succeeded in
catching a firm hold of the animal's long and bushy tail, just as the
forepart of the body was within the narrow entrance of the cavern. He
had unluckily placed his gun against a rock, when aiding the boys in
their descent, and could not now reach it. Without apprising the lads
below of their imminent peril, the stout hunter kept firm grip of the
wolf's tail, which he wound round his left arm; and although the
maddened brute scrambled, and twisted, and strove with all her might to
force herself down to the rescue of her cubs, Polson was just able, with
the exertion of all his strength, to keep her from going forward. In the
midst of this singular struggle, which passed in silence--for the wolf
was mute, and the hunter, either from the engrossing nature of his
exertions, or from his unwillingness to alarm the boys, spoke not a word
at the commencement of the conflict--his son within the cave, finding
the light excluded from above, asked in Gaelic, and in an abrupt tone,
"Father, what is keeping the light from us?"--"If the root of the tail
break," replied he, "you will soon know that." Before long, however, the
man contrived to get hold of his hunting-knife, and stabbed the wolf in
the most vital parts he could reach. The enraged animal now attempted to
turn and face her foe, but the hole was too narrow to allow of this; and
when Polson saw his danger, he squeezed her forward, keeping her jammed
in, whilst he repeated his stabs as rapidly as he could, until the
animal, being mortally wounded, was easily dragged back and finished.
* * * * *
A similar story has been given, with the wilds of Canada for the scene.
The young Highlander was said to be dirking pigs, while the father was
keeping guard. "Phat's keeping out the licht, fayther?" shouts the
son.--"If ta tail preaks, tou 'lt fine tat," were the question and
answer.
FOOTNOTES:
[112] "The Art of Deer-Stalking," &c., by William Scrope, Esq., F.L.S.,
p. 371.
FOX.
The sharp-faced fox is a very epitome of cunning, and his name is a
by-word for slyness. Farmers know well that no fox, nestling close to
their houses, ever meddles with their poultry. Reynard rambles a good
way from home before he begins to plunder. How admirable is Professor
Wilson's description of fox-hunting, quoted here from the "Noctes." Sir
Walter Scott, in one of his topographical essays, has given a curious
account of the way in which a fox, acquainted with the "ins and outs" of
a certain old castle, outwitted a whole pack of dogs, who had to jump up
singly to get through a small window to which Reynard led them. His
large tail, so bushy and so free, is of great use to Reynard. He often
brushes the eyes of his pursuers with it when sprinkled with water
anything but sweet, and which, by its pungency, for a time blinds them.
The pursuit of the fox is most exciting, and turns out the lord "of high
degree," and the country squire and farmer. It is the most
characteristic sport of the "better classes" in this country.
AN ENTHUSIASTIC FOX-HUNTING SURGEON.[113]
A medical gentleman, named Hansted, residing near Newbury, who was very
fond of fox-hunting, ordered his gardener to set a trap for some vermin
that infested his garden. As ill luck would have it, a fox was found in
the morning with his leg broken, instead of a plant-eating rabbit. The
gardener took Reynard to the doctor, when he exclaimed, "Why did you not
call me up in the night, that I might have set the leg?" Better late
than never: the surgeon set the leg; the fox recovered, and was killed
in due form, after a capital run.
FOX-HUNTING.
(_From the "Noctes Ambrosianae," April 1826._[114])
_North._ It seems fox-hunting, too, is cruel.
_Shepherd._ To wham? Is't cruel to dowgs, to feed fifty or sixty o' them
on crackers and ither sorts o' food, in a kennel like a Christian house,
wi' a clear burn flowin' through 't, and to gie them, twice a-week or
aftener, during the season, a brattlin rin o' thretty miles after a fox?
Is that cruelty to dowgs?
_North._ But the fox, James?
_Shepherd._ We'll come to the fox by and by. Is't cruel to horses, to
buy a hundred o' them for ae hunt, rarely for less than a hundred pounds
each, and aften for five hundred--to feed them on five or sax feeds o'
corn _per diem_--and to gie them skins as sleek as satin--and to gar
them nicher (_neigh_) wi' fu'ness o' bluid, sae that every vein in their
bodies starts like sinnies (_sinews_)--and to gallop them like deevils
in a hurricane, up hill and doun brae, and loup or soom canals and
rivers, and flee ower hedges, and dikes, and palings, like birds, and
drive crashin' through woods, like elephants or rhinoceroses--a' the
while every coorser flingin' fire-flaughts (_flakes_) frae his een, and
whitening the sweat o' speed wi' the foam o' fury--I say, ca' you that
cruelty to horses, when the hunt charge with all their chivalry, and
plain, mountain, or forest are shook by the quadrupedal thunder?
_North._ But the fox, James?
_Shepherd._ We'll come to the fox by and by. Is 't cruel to
men to inspirit wi' a rampagin happiness fivescore o' the flower o'
England or Scotland's youth, a' wi' caps and red coats, and whups in
their hauns--a troop o' lauchin, tearin', tallyhoin' "wild and wayward
humorists," as the doctor ca'd them the tither Sunday?
_North._ I like the expression, James.
_Shepherd._ So do I, or I would not have quoted it. But it's just as
applicable to a set o' outrageous ministers, eatin' and drinkin', and
guffawin' at a Presbytery denner.
_North._ But the fox, James?
_Shepherd._ We'll come to the fox by and by. Is't cruel to the lambs,
and leverets, and geese, and turkeys, and dyucks, and patricks, and wee
birds, and ither animal eatables, to kill the fox that devoors them, and
keeps them in perpetual het water?
_North._ But the fox, James?
_Shepherd._ Deevil take baith you and the fox; I said that we would come
to the fox by and by. Weel, then, wha kens that the fox isna away
snorin' happy afore the houn's? I hae nae doubt he is, for a fox is no
sae complete a coward as to think huntin' cruel; and his haill nature
is then on the alert, which in itsel' is happiness. Huntin' him fa'in
into languor and ennui, and growin' ower fat on how-towdies (_barn-door
fowls_). He's no killed every time he's hunted.
_North._ Why, James, you might write for the "Annals of Sporting."
_Shepherd._ So I do sometimes--and mair o' ye than me, I jalouse; but I
was gaun to ask ye if ye could imagine the delicht o' a fox gettin' into
an undiggable earth, just when the leadin' houn' was at his
hainches?--ae sic moment is aneuch to repay half an hour's draggle
through the dirt; and he can lick himsel' clean at his leisure, far ben
in the cranny o' the rock, and come out a' tosh and tidy by the first
dawn o' licht, to snuff the mornin' air, and visit the distant
farm-house before Partlet has left her perch, or Count Crow lifted his
head from beneath his oxter on his shed-seraglio.
_North._ Was ye ever in at a death? Is not that cruel?
_Shepherd._ Do you mean in at the death o' ae fox, or the death o' a
hundred thousand men and sixty thousand horses?--the takin' o' a Brush,
or a Borodino?
_North._ My dear James, thank ye for your argument. As one Chalmers is
worth a thousand Martins, so is one Hogg worth a thousand Chalmerses.
_Shepherd._ Ane may weel lose patience, to think o' fules being sorry
for the death o' a fox. When the jowlers tear him to pieces, he shows
fecht, and gangs aff in a snarl. Hoo could he dee mair easier?--and for
a' the gude he has ever dune, or was likely to do, he surely had leeved
lang eneuch.
ARCTIC FOX (_Vulpes lagopus_).
This inoffensive and pretty little creature is found in all parts of the
Arctic lands. Its fur is peculiarly fine and thick; and as in winter
this is closer and more mixed with wool than it is in summer, the
intense cold of these regions is easily resisted. When sleeping rolled
up into a ball, with the black muzzle buried in the long hairs of the
tail, there is not a portion of the body but what is protected from the
cold, the shaggy hairs of the brush acting as a respirator or boa for
the mouth and a muff for the paws. Our Arctic travellers have remarked,
that it is a peculiarly cleanly animal, and its vigilance is extreme. It
is almost impossible to come on it unawares, for even when appearing to
be soundly asleep, it opens its eyes on the slightest noise being made.
During the day it appears to be listless, but no sooner has the night
set in than it is in motion, and it continues very active until morning.
The young migrate to the southward in the autumn, and sometimes collect
in great numbers on the shores of Hudson's Bay. Mr Graham noticed that
they came there in November and left in April.
[Illustration: Arctic Fox. (Canis Lagopus.)]
Sir James Ross found a fox's burrow on the sandy margin of a lake in the
month of July. It had several passages, each opening into a common cell,
beyond which was an inner nest, in which the young, six in number, were
found. These had the dusky, lead-coloured livery worn by the parents in
summer; and though four of them were kept alive till the following
winter, they never acquired the pure white coats of the old fox, but
retained the dusky colour on the face and sides of the body. The parents
had kept a good larder for their progeny, as the outer cell and the
several passages leading to it contained many lemmings and ermines, and
the bones of fish, ducks, and hares, in great quantities. Sir John
Richardson[115] observed them to live in villages, twenty or thirty
burrows being constructed close to each other. A pair were kept by Sir
James Ross for the express purpose of watching the changes which take
place in the colour of their fur. He noticed that they threw off their
winter dress during the first week in June, and that this change took
place a few days earlier in the female than in the male. About the end
of September the brown fur of the summer gradually became of an ash
colour, and by the middle of October it was perfectly white. It
continued to increase in thickness until the end of November.[116] A
variety of a blackish-brown colour is occasionally met with, but this is
rare: such specimens, Ross remarks, must have extreme difficulty in
surprising their prey in a country whose surface is of an unvaried
white, and must also be much more exposed to the persecutions of their
enemies. The food of this fox is various, but seems to consist
principally of lemmings and of birds and their eggs. He eats, too, the
berries of the _Empetrum nigrum_, a plant common on our own hills, and
goes to the shore for mussels and other shell-fish. Otho Fabricius[117]
says he catches the Arctic salmon as that fish approaches the shore to
spawn, and that he seizes too the haddock, having enticed it near by
beating the water. Crantz, in his "History of Greenland," evidently
alludes to this cunning habit when he observes, "They plash with their
feet in the water, to excite the curiosity of some kinds of fishes to
come and see what is going forward, and then they snap them up; and _the
Greenland women have learnt this piece of art from them_." Captain Lyon
noticed a fox prowling on a hill-side, and heard him for some hours
afterwards in the neighbourhood imitating the cry of the brent-goose. In
another part of his Journal he mentions that the bark is so modulated as
to give an idea that it proceeds from a distance, though at the time the
fox lies at your feet. It struck him that the creature was gifted "with
this kind of ventriloquism in order to deceive its prey as to the
distance it is from them." It sometimes catches the ptarmigan; and
though it cannot swim, it manages occasionally to get hold of oceanic
birds; in fact, nothing alive which it can master seems to come amiss,
and failing to make a meal from something it has caught and killed, the
Arctic fox is glad, like foxes in more favoured lands, to feed on
carrion.
Captain M'Clintock, who commanded the yacht _Fox_ on the Franklin Arctic
search in 1857 and 1858, wintered in the ice pack of Baffin's Bay. One
of the party shot an Arctic fox when they were 140 miles from the land.
He records in a letter to his brother,[118] that this wanderer from the
shore "was very fat, living upon such few dovekies as were silly enough
to spend their winter in the pack."
Martens, in his "Spitzbergen," says, that some of the ship's crew
informed him, that the fox when he is hungry "lies down as if he was
dead, until the birds fly to him to eat him, which by that trick he
catches and eats." Our author believed it a fable, but it may
nevertheless be one of the many expedients used by a species of a group
whose name is proverbial for craftiness and cunning.
The flesh of the fox is occasionally eaten by the Esquimaux: Captain
Lyon, in his "Private Journal," says that at first all of his party were
horrified at the idea of eating foxes--"But very many soon got the
better of their fastidiousness and found them good eating; not being
myself very nice, I soon made the experiment, and found the flesh much
resembling that of kid, and afterwards frequently had a supper of it."
Sir James Clarke Ross, during his five years' imprisonment in Boothia
Felix and the adjoining seas, had ample means of judging of its flavour;
he tells us that some of his party, who were the first to taste them,
named them "lambs," from their resemblance in flavour to very young
lamb. He adds, that the flesh of the old fox is by no means so
palatable. During that disastrous expedition the flesh of this fox
formed one of the principal luxuries of their table, and it was always
"reserved for holidays and great occasions. We ate them boiled, or, more
frequently after being parboiled, _roasted_, in a pitch kettle."
When the Arctic Expedition in search of Franklin wintered in Leopold
Harbour in 1848-49, the commander, Sir J. C. Ross, made use of the
Arctic fox as a messenger. Having caught some of these animals in traps,
a collar with information for the missing parties was put round the neck
of each before liberation, as the fox is known to travel great distances
in search of food. On Captain Austin's subsequent expedition in 1850-51
the same plan was carried out, but it was found to be equally without
result. Commander Osborn thus facetiously describes the
circumstance.[119] "Several animals thus intrusted with despatches or
records were liberated by different ships; but, as the truth must be
told, I fear in many cases the next night saw the poor 'postman,' as
Jack termed him, in another trap, out of which he would be taken,
killed, the skin taken off, and packed away to ornament at some future
day the neck of some fair Dulcinea. As a 'sub,' I was admitted into this
secret mystery, or, otherwise, I with others might have accounted for
the disappearance of the collared foxes by believing them busy on their
honourable mission. In order that the crime of killing 'the postmen' may
be recognised in its true light, it is but fair that I should say, that
the brutes, having partaken once of the good cheer on board or around
the ships, seldom seemed satisfied with the mere empty honours of a
copper collar, and returned to be caught over and over again. Strict
laws were laid down for their safety, such as that no fox taken alive in
a trap was to be killed: of course no fox was after this taken alive;
they were all unaccountably dead, unless it was some fortunate wight
whose brush and coat were worthless; in such case he lived either to
drag about a quantity of information in a copper collar for the rest of
his days, or else to die a slow death, as being intended for Lord
Derby's menagerie. The departure of 'a postman' was a scene of no small
merriment; all hands, from the captain to the cook, were out to chase
the fox, who, half frightened out of its wits, seemed to doubt which way
to run, whilst loud shouts and roars of laughter, breaking the cold,
frosty air, were heard from ship to ship, as the foxhunters, swelled in
numbers from all sides, and those that could not run mounted some
neighbouring hummock of ice and gave a loud halloo, which said far more
for robust health than for tuneful melody."
The Arctic fox as a captive has often amused our Arctic voyagers, and
accounts of it are to be met with in most of their narratives. Captain
Lyon made a pet of one he captured, and confined it on deck in a small
kennel with a piece of chain. The little creature astonished the party
very much by his extraordinary sagacity, for, on the very first day,
having been repeatedly drawn out by his chain, he at length drew his
chain in after him whenever he retreated to his hut, and took it in with
his mouth so completely, that no one who valued his fingers would
venture afterwards to take hold of the end attached to the staple.
Sir J. C. Ross observed in Boothia Felix a good deal of difference in
the disposition of specimens, some being easily tamed, whilst others
would remain savage and untractable even with the kindest treatment. He
found the females much more vicious than the males. A dog-fox which his
party captured lived several months with them, and became so tame in a
short time that he regularly attended the dinner-table like a dog, and
was always allowed to go at large about the cabin. When newly caught
their rage is quite ungovernable, and yet when two are put together they
very seldom quarrel. They soon get reconciled to confinement. Captain
Lyon[120] notices that their first impulse on getting food is to hide it
as soon as possible, and this, he observed, they did, even when hungry
and by themselves; when there was snow on the ground they piled it over
their stores, and pressed it down forcibly with their nose. When no
snow was to be obtained, he noticed his pet fox gather the chain into
his mouth, and then carefully coil it so as to cover the meat. Having
gone through this process, and drawn away his chain after him on moving
away, he has sometimes repeated his useless labours five or six times,
until disgusted, apparently, at the inability of making the morsel a
greater luxury by previous concealment, he has been forced to eat it.
These creatures use snow as a substitute for water, and it is pleasing
to see them break a large lump with their feet, and roll on the pieces
with evident delight. When the snow lay lightly scattered on the decks,
they did not lick it up as dogs do, but by pressing it repeatedly with
their nose, collected a small lump which they drew into their mouth.
It may be added that the specific name _lagopus_, or "hare-foot," was
given to this fox from the soles of its feet being densely covered with
woolly hair, which gives them some resemblance to the feet of a hare.
Cuvier remarks that other foxes acquire this hair on the soles when
taken to northern lands.
The specimens, figured so admirably by Mr Wolf, were drawn from some
brought alive to the Zoological Gardens by one of the late Arctic
expeditions.--_A. White, in "Excelsior" (with additions)._
FOOTNOTES:
[113] _Edinburgh Review_, 1841, vol. lxxiv. p. 77.
[114] "Noctes Ambrosianae." Works of Professor Wilson, vol. i. pp.
136-138.
[115] "Fauna Boreali-Americana." Mammalia, p. 87.
[116] Appendix to "Second Voyage," p. xii.
[117] "Fauna Groenlandica," p. 20.
[118] _Dublin Nat. Hist. Review, 1858_, p. 166.
[119] "Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal," p. 176.
[120] "Private Journal," p. 105.
JACKAL.
The boy who used to read, long ago, "The Three Hundred Animals," was
ever familiar with "_the Lion's Provider_," as the menagerie showmen,
even now, somewhat pompously style this hungry howler of the desert.
The jackal is a social kind of dog, and a pack of hungry or excited
jackals can howl in notes fit to pierce the ears of the deafest. He is a
mean, starved-looking creature in ordinary circumstances, seeming as if
his social life prevented his getting what is called _a lion's_ share on
any occasion.
JACKAL AND TIGER.
As Burke was declaiming with great animation against Hastings, he was
interrupted by little Major Scott. "Am I," said he, indignantly, "to be
teased by the barking of this _jackal_, while I am attacking the royal
_tiger_ of Bengal?"[121]
CATS.
Another fertile subject for anecdote. Who has not some faithful black
Topsy, Tortoise-shell, or Tabby, or rather succession of them, whose
biographies would afford many a curious story? Professor Bell[122] has
well defended the general character of poor pussy from the oft-repeated
calumnies spread about it. Cats certainly get much attached to
individuals, as well as to houses and articles in them. They want the
lovableness and demonstrativeness of dogs; but their habits are very
different, and they are strictly organised to adapt them to watch and to
pounce on their prey.