The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-12-26
RED FOX SHOWS
 SPO0KY CUNNING Leads Hunters and Hounds
 Weary Chase FOR THREE LONG DAYS Runs In Twenty-Mile Circuit and Keeps It Up Through Entire Chase-PecuIar Cunning of
 Reynard.
From the Boston Herald.

From the Boston Herald.
 If I hadn't gone out the third day after that red fox.' said q member of a hunt club, 'I doubtless would be believing to this day that he was spook fox sure enough, that demon stration of the cunning of the red fox was so utterly uncanny.
 There were five of the club be- sides myself In the chass at the start. The fox broke cover from a bunch of brush near a tangled willow copse He led hunters and hounds a beauti- full chase uphill and down dale. For five good miles he kept a neat lead and then the hounds began to press him close.
 He was showing signs of weary ing and he began to drag, but with the dogs only a few jumps behind him he disappeared in hollow at one end of an old fallen tree trunk. It looked as if his brush was just as good as in our hands. The pack thought so too, and it was good to hear their triumphant music as they dashed up to that hollow in the tree to sur- round it.
 lHo Hext instant, tnouBn, tnelr notes of joy ceased and they were in full cry on the trail again. The fox popped out of the far end of the old tree trunk and was scudding away across country with every indication of a new lease of life The tree trunk was hollow from butt to tip end.
 Fox Went In Circle.
 Away we went on the heels of the hounds again. It seemed odd to us, too, that the lusty fox made no effort to lead us by crooked and difficult ways and over rough paths. He kept right on his course, bearing gradually around toward the point where the chase began.
 Toward the end of another five-mile run the puzzling fox showed signs again of tagging. The dogs were beginning to feel the effects of the run and our horses were blowing some But we gained rap idly on the tagging fox, and that he would be in the jaws of the pack within the next minute or so seemed as certain as as anything well could be. Suddenly the tired fox jumped, or rather tumbled, into blind ditch with peculiar overhang- ing bank, under which and out of sight he quickly dragged himself.
 ''I was riding in the lead of the hunt. and when I saw this movement of the fox I had to smile at the desperate strait he must be In to let himself be so nsxtly trapped
 |" For a red fox said I. the kind that is so smart, this one couldn't be big ger chump if he was a groundhog!
 But before the dogs came up to the ditch out came reynard at the very spot where the chumpish disappearance act had occurred; came out with the ease and agility of a cat, and sped away al a pace that soon left dogs and hunters to hump themselves to keep in touch with him.
 Guess Pm the chumpw said I, quick ly revising my opinion of the fox.
 Always In Same Distance.
 "Our dogs were getting pretty well winded, but these aggravating tactics of the fox seemed to put them anew on their mettle, and they flew on the trail across another fve-mile stretch, tn 3 tantalizing quarry always in sight and bearing almost directly toward the starting point of the chase, which was a good 10 miles distant.
 Another run of five miles affected the fox just as the two previous ones had, and he began to droop and lag. He fell off of his speed gradually and the dogs were closing up on him. with the same appearance of being soon Tn at the death as had marked the chase twice before. How that fox could out wit us a third time couldn't for the life of me see, but while I was thinking about it he headed for a heap of dead brush that lay loosely piled at the edge of 8 piece of woods. He paused a moment at the brush heap looked back and saw how close the dogs were on his heels, and then crept Into 8 small opening in the pile and drew himself out of sight beneath it.
 Again the dogs were fooled into excited yelps of triumph and I was similarly melted to shout or two of the same kind myself. for we were within 10 feet of the brush heap and there didn't seem to be any possible escape for the fox. and, at any rate. he certainly must be pretty well run off his feet by this time. The dogs bounded up to the brush heap The leader of the pack and another hound out of a gun, out of the far end of the pile went MT. Fox!
 Still Kept Going.
 When the dogs saw him they actually stood stock still and showed on their faces as much astonishment, mingled with despair, as we did on ours. I al- most tumbled from my horse l was so much amazed at the uncanny audacity
  vating fox. But there he was, scooting away again across country as If he hadn't run a mile that day.
 The dogs soon recovered themselves. and on after the fox they dashed in full cry But they never lessened the dis tance between them and him until he act ually slowed up and seemed to walt for them.
 This run took us another five miles, and then that surprising beast began to lag and lose speed again until the dogs were almost upon him, when he wormed his way with evident difficulty and much labor into the dense tangle of willow copse right by the spot where he had raised him from cover at fhe start. He has led us good 2o-mile chase. and how in the world, as tired as he seemed to be, he could ever manage to force him self out from that tangle and get away again was more than I could imagine.
 But before the dogs could surround the copse out popped the fox, and off Ike the wind he went, taking the same course we had followed in the morning The dogs howled in dismay. We hunters swore some think. and even the horses sniffed and snorted.
 of Toward sIxtieth Mile.
 But we gritted our teeth and started on his trail again. only to encounter the same experiences-the hollow tree trunk, the blind ditch, the brush heap and the willow copse performances-with the fox bounding away again from the last, fresh and speedy, and intent on giving us a third whirl. But then we gave up. beat. m0Rp ;:: x; ;;:;: :; :; :';i <; k; <: