The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-06-27
YOUNG FOXES.

As a lively companion in a peace
 loving household, I will back a healthy
 young fox against anything else of his
 weight in North America. have had
 many young animals, including raccoons,
 opossums, woodchucks, muskrats, wild
 rabbits, porcupines rats, wild rabbits,
 porcupines, rats and mice, half-a-dozen
 kinds of squirrels, and even young
 skunks, and as makers of fun and mis-
 chief, many of them have great possi-
 bilities; but for sheer deviltry young fox can give them cards and spades and win out handily. Not that there is speck of real badness in a young fox; never knew fox to do mean thing yet; and between one morning and the
 next he can get into more kinds of mis- chief and get into 1t deeper than two
 small boys with a monkey.
 On the 11th of last April, with the as-
 sistance of friend, dug out fox bur
 row, and took from it three little cubs,
 of which only one had his eyes open.
 One of these youngsters drowned him.
 self by climbing over the edge of a
 water pitcher when no one was in the
 room to save him; one of the survivors
 is being made the subject of special
 study, so this article deals chiefly with the doings of the third of the trio, whom we named. The Sprite. The night we brought him home, he was just little
 ball of gray fur quite blind, and so in- nocent that, after being fed with warm cnu-bc SplSaa1ad cront1u info htC mouth with a dropper, he curled up in my hand and went fast to sleep Nor did he look less innocent the next day, when his eyelids parted and revealed two blinking blue eyes, which, as they opened wider, took on an expression of
 mild inquiry. In day or two, however,
 those eyes became intelligent, and have
 been growing more so ever since. At first, the little foxes slept nearly all the time, waking up now and then because they were hungry. As soon as they
 awoke, they yawned, and stretched 1 their little limbs with an absurd apear- ance of earnestness, and then they be-
 gan to call for food in chorus. The | first sound was always 8 whine, quite low at first, but becoming louder, if the
 milk was not forthcoming at once. Im- patience was indicated by the loudness and rapidity with which the whines were delivered, and anger, which quickly followed further neglect, was manifested by a succession of VOWS" delivered at the end of each series of whines. As near as can describe them in words, the sounds were as follows: i,,no
 ne--hne-hne-hne, WOW wow 1 WOW-WOW, the last ''wow' being given with great force and emphasis
 After being fed, they would go to sleep again at once.
 At night we always put them into a l box, covered them up with flannel and, as the air was apt to become very cold before morning, We generally gave them hot bottle which kept them as
 warm as their own mother could have
 done. The second night after they arr rived, they all crawled out of the box, | which was quite shallow, and in the ! morning found them under the sofa, piled one on top of another like so many little sacks of flour. In a few days they ! were able to toddle about the room a I bit. and after that they did not go to sleep immediately their hunger was satisfied. In the first place they began to hold mock fights among themselves. l One wobbly youngster would seize an-
 other by the neck growing with all the force of his little lungs, and being still | very unsteady on their legs, both com batants would usually roll over on the floor to rise and continue the battle un- | til one of them tired and toddled away. 1 After that they would usually go on an exploring expedition wandering very I quietly about the room, under the tables ! and bookcase, always ending up at the
 same place, a little fur rug, where they curled up and went to sleep until l aroused by hunger some two hours I later.
 | For 8 week or ten days, they were not afraid of any sight or sound, but then their fear, their inborn fear, began to | assert. and they woud start violently | and run away at every strange sound
 or sudden movement. A suitable pro- vision of Nature this, to withhold from l helpless young wild things fear which ) would avail them nothing, and then all at once to supply this fear when their
 increased strength enables them to es-
 cape from, or protect themselves
 against. that which they are afraid of. | It was about this time one of the little | fellows came to his untirnely end, and I
 began to make special study of one of | the survivors. The rest of this arti-
 cle then, will be devoted to The Sprite. One evening, after he had been fed on