d,
she picked up the trail, and followed it into a great tangle of heather,
brambles, and fern, where the scent led, by many a devious turn, to the
spreading roots of a beech, beneath which a disused rabbit warren had
been prepared for the little strangers presently to be brought into the
world. The dwelling place was empty.

Retracing her steps as far as the spot where first she had struck the
trail, then turning sharply towards the clearing, the crafty creature
hastened back to the "earth," determined to remove her cubs without
delay to the newly discovered abode. One by one she bore her offspring
thither, holding them gently by the loose skin about their necks, and
housed them all before the dispossessed tenant returned from a slow and
wearisome night's hunting. The evicted vixen, seeking to enter her home,
speedily recognised that in her distressed condition she was no match
for her savage, active enemy, and so, reluctantly retiring, took up her
quarters in the artificial "earth."

Henceforth, through all the careless hours of infancy, till summer ended
and the nights gradually lengthened towards the time of the Hunter's
Moon, the stillness of the woodlands was never broken by the ominous
note of the horn, or by the dread, fascinating music of the hounds in
full cry. Three of the cubs grew stout and strong, but the fourth was a
weakling--whether from injury at the hands of the huntsman or from some
natural ailment was not to be determined. He died, and mysteriously
disappeared, on the very day when the rest of the cubs first opened
their eyes in the dim chamber among the roots of the beech.

Vulp was the only male member of the happy woodland family. His
indulgent sisters tolerated his bouncing, familiar manners as if they
were born to be his playthings--he was so serious and yet so droll, so
stupidly self-assertive and yet so irresistibly affectionate! He seemed
to take his pleasures sadly, wearing, if such be possible to a fox, an
air of melancholy disdain; and yet his beady eyes were ever on the
lookout for mischief, and for the chance of a helter-skelter romp with
his sisters round and round the chamber, or to the entrance of the
"earth," where the sprouts of the green grass and the flowers of the
golden celandine sparkled as the sunlight of the fresh spring morning
flickered between the trees.

As yet, Vulp was unacquainted with the wide, free world. It seemed very
wonderful and awe-inspiring, as he sat by