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The Fox

By Englishmen, the Fox has been raised to the height of at least a demigod – and his cult is a serious matter attended with great minutiæ of ritual. Englishmen and Foxes cannot live together, but they live for one another, the man to hunt the fox, the fox to be hunted. If there be a fox anywhere, even in the Campagna at Rome, and there are sufficient Englishmen to get up a scratch pack of hounds, there must “bold Reynard” be tortured with fear and exertion, only, in all probability, to die a cruel death in the end. In the Peninsular War, a pack of foxhounds accompanied the army; in India, failing foxes, they take the nearest substitute, the jackal; and in Australia, faute de mieux, they hunt the Dingo, or native dog. No properly constituted Englishman could ever compass the death of a poor fox, otherwise than by hunting. The Vulpecide – in any other manner – is, in an English county, a social leper – he is a thing anathema. Running away with a neighbour’s wife may be condoned by county society, at least, among the men, but with them the man that shoots foxes is a very pariah, and it were good for that man had he never been born.

Every other nation, even from historic antiquity, has reckoned the Fox as among the ordinary feræ naturæ, to be killed, when met with, for the sake only of his skin, for his flesh is not toothsome: and when he arrives at the dignity of a silver or a black fox, his fur enwraps royal personages, as being of extreme value.

The Fox is noted everywhere for its “craftiness,” and was so famed long before the epic of Reineke Fuchs was evolved, and, indeed, this may be said to be its principal attribute. Many are the stories told by country firesides of his stratagems, both in plundering and in his endeavours to escape from his enemies. Indeed, no country ought to be able to compare in Fox lore with our own. Its sagacity, cunning, or call it what you like, dates far back. Pliny tells us that “in Thrace, when all parts are covered with ice, the foxes are consulted, an animal, which, in other respects, is baneful from its Craftiness. It has been observed, that this animal applies its ear to the ice, for the purpose of testing its thickness; hence it is, that the inhabitants will never cross frozen rivers and lakes, until the foxes have passed over them and returned.”

The Fox is most abundant in the northern parts of Europe, and therefore we hear more about him from the pages of Olaus Magnus, Gessner, and Topsell.

The former says: – “When the fox is pressed with hunger, Cold and Snow, and he comes near men’s houses, he will bark like a dog, that house creatures may come nearer to him with more confidence. Also, he will faign himself dead, and lie on his back, drawing in his breath, and lolling out his tongue. The birds coming down, unawares, to feed on the carkasse, are snapt up by him, with open mouth. Moreover, when he is hungry, and finds nothing to eat, he rolls himself in red earth, that he may appear bloody; and, casting himself on the earth, he holds his breath, and when the birds see that he breaths not, and that his tongue hangs forth of his mouth, they think he is dead; but so soon as they descend, he draws them to him and devours them.

“Again, when he sees that he cannot conquer the Urchin, for his prickles, he lays him on his back, and so rends the soft part of his body. Sometimes fearing the multitude of wasps, he counterfeits and hides himself, his tail hanging out: and when he sees that they are all busie, and entangled in his thick tail, he comes forth, and rubs them against a stone or Tree, and kills them and eats them. The same trick, almost, he useth, when he lyes in wait for crabs and small fish, running about the bank, and he lets down his tail into the water, they admire at it, and run to it, and are taken in his fur, and pull’d out. Moreover, when he hath fleas, he makes a little bundle of soft hay wrapt in hair, and holds it in his mouth; then he goes by degrees into the water, beginning with his tail, that the fleas fearing the water, will run up all his body till they come at his head: then he dips in his head, that they may leap into the hay; when this is done, he leaves the hay in the water, and swims forth.

“But when he is hungry, he will counterfeit to play with the Hare, which he presently catcheth and devoureth, unlesse the Hare escape by flight, as he often doth. Sometimes he also escapes from the dogs by barking, faigning himself to be a dog, but more surely when he hangs by a bough, and makes the dogs hunt in vain to find his footing. He is also wont to deceive the Hunter and his dogs, when he runs among a herd of Goats, and goes for one of them, leaping upon the Goat’s back, that he may sooner escape by the running of the Goat, by reason of the hatefull Rider on his back. The other Goats follow, which the Hunter fearing to molest, calls off his Dogs that many be not killed.

“If he be taken in a string, he will sometime bite off his own foot, and so get away. But, if there be no way open he will faign himself dead, that being taken out of the snare, he may run away. Moreover, when a dog runs after him, and overtakes him, and would bite him, he draws his bristly tail through the dog’s mouth, and so he deludes the dog till he can get into the lurking places of the Woods. I saw also in the Rocks of Norway a Fox with a huge tail, who brought many Crabs out of the water, and then he ate them. And that is no rare sight, when as no fish like Crabs will stick to a bristly thing let down into the water, and to dry fish, laid on the rocks to dry. They that are troubled with the Gowt, are cured by laying the warm skin of this beast about the part, and binding it on. The fat, also, of the same creature, laid smeered upon the ears or lims of a gowty person, heals him; his fat is good for all torments of the guts, and for all pains, his brain often given to a child will preserve it ever from the Falling-sicknesse. These and such-like simple medicaments the North Country people observe.”

A portion of the above receives a curious corroboration from Mr. P. Robinson in his book, The Poets’ Beasts. Speaking of the Lynx, he says: – “But it is not, as is supposed, ‘untamable.’ The Gækwar of Baroda has a regular pack of trained lynxes, for stalking and hunting pea-fowl, and other kinds of birds. I have, myself, seen a tame lynx that had been taught to catch crows – no simple feat – and its strategy was as diverting as its agility amazing. It would lie down with the end of a string in its mouth, the other end being fast to a stake, and pretend to be asleep, dead asleep, drunk, chloroformed, anything you like that means profound and gross slumber. A foot or so off would be lying a piece of meat, or a bone.

“The crows would very soon discover the bone, and collecting round in a circle, would discuss the probabilities of the lynx only shamming, and the chances of stealing his dinner. The animal would take no notice whatever, but lie there looking so limp and dead, that at last one crow would make so bold as to come forward. The others let it do so alone, knowing that afterwards there would be a free fight for the plunder, and the thief, probably, not enjoy it, after all. So the delegate would advance with all the caution of a crow – and nothing exceeds it – until within seizing distance. There it would stop, flirt its wings nervously, stoop, take a last long look at the lynx to make sure that it really was asleep, and then dart like lightning at the bone. But, if the crow was as quick as lightning, the lynx was as swift as thought, and lo! the next instant there was the beast sitting up with the bird in its mouth!..

“Next time it had to practise a completely different manœuvre. The same crows are not to be ‘humbugged’ a second time by a repetition of the being-dead trick. So the lynx, when a sufficient number of the birds had assembled, would take the string in its mouth, and run round and round the stake, at the extreme limit of its tether, as if it were tied. The crows, after their impudent fashion, would close in. They thought they knew the exact circumference of the animal’s circle, and getting as close to the dangerous line as possible, without actually transgressing it, would mock and abuse the supposed betethered brute. But all of a sudden, the circling lynx would fly out at a tangent, right into the thick of his black tormentors, and, as a rule, bag a brace, right and left.”

Topsell gives some curious particulars of the Fox, and, speaking of their earths, he says: – “These dens have many caves in them, and passages in and out, that when the Terrars shall set upon him in the earth, he may go forth some other way, and forasmuch as the Wolfe is an enemy to the Foxe, he layeth in the mouth of his den, an Herbe (called Sea-onyon) which is so contrary to the nature of a Wolfe, and he so greatly terrified therewith, that hee will never come neere the place where it groweth, or lyeth; the same is affirmed of the Turtle to save her young ones, but I have not read that Wolves will prey upon Turtles, and therefore we reject that as a fable… If a Foxe eat any meat wherein are bitter Almondes, they die thereof, if they drinke not presently: and the same thing do Aloes in their meate worke uppon them, as Scaliger affirmeth upon his owne sighte or knowledge. Apocynon or Bear-foot given to dogs, wolves, Foxes, and all other beasts which are littered blind, in fat, or any other meat, killeth them, if vomit helpe them not, which falleth out very seldome, and the seeds of this hearbe have the same operation. It is reported by Democritus, that, if wilde rue be secretly hunge under a Hen’s wing, no Fox will meddle with her, and the same writer also declareth for approoved, that, if you mingle the gal of a Fox, or a Cat, with their ordinary foode, they shall remaine free from the danger of these beasts.

“The medicinall uses of this beast are these: first, (as Pliny, and Marcellus affirme) a Fox sod in water until nothing of the Foxe be left whole except the bones, and the Legges, or other parts of a gouty body, washed, and daily bathed therein, it shall drive away all paine and griefe strengthening the defective and weake members; so also it cureth all the shrinking up and paines in the sinnewes: and Galen attributeth the same vertue to an Hyæna sod in Oyle, and the lame person bathed therein, for it hath such power to evacuate and draw forth whatsoever evill humour aboundeth in the body of man, that it leaveth nothing hurtfull behinde.

“Neverthelesse, such bodies are soon againe replenished through evill dyet, and relapsed into the same disease againe. The Fox may be boyled in fresh or salt water with annise and time, and with his skin on whole, and not slit, or else his head cut off, there being added to the decoction two pintes of oyle.

“The flesh of a Foxe sod and layed to afore bitten by a Sea hare, it cureth and healeth the same. The Foxe’s skinne is profitable against all moyste fluxes in the skinne of the body, and also the gowt, and cold in the sinnewes. The ashes of Foxe’s flesh burnt and drunk in wine, is profitable against the shortnesse of breath and stoppings of the liver.

“The blood of a Foxe dissected, and taken forth of his urine alive, and so drunk, breaketh the stone in the bladder, or else (as Myrepsus saieth) kill the Foxe, and take the blood, and drink a Cupfull thereof, and afterward with the same wash the parts, and, within an houre the stone shall be voyded: the same vertue is in it being dryed and drunke in wine with sugar.

“Oxycraton and Foxes blood infused into the Nostrils of a lethargick Horsse, cureth him. The fat is next to a Bul’s and a Swine’s, so that the fat or larde of Swine may be used for the fat of Foxes, and the fat of Foxes for the Swines grease in medicine. Some do herewith annoynte the places which have the Crampe, and all trembling and shaking members. The fatte of a Foxe and a Drake enclosed in the belly of a Goose, and so rosted, with the dripping that commeth from it, they annoynt paralyticke members.

“The same, with powder of Vine twigs mollified and sod in lye, attenuateth, and bringeth downe, all swelling tumours of the flesh. The fat alone healeth the Alopecias and looseness of the haire; it is commended in the cure of all sores and ulcers of the head, but the gall, and time, with Mustard-seede is more approved. The fat is also respected for the cure of paine in the eares, if it be warmed and melt at the fire, and so instilled; and this is used against tingling in the eares. If the Haires rot away on a Horse’s taile, they recover them againe, by washing the place with urine and branne, with Wyne and Oyle, and afterward annoynt it with foxe’s grease. When sores or ulcers have procured the haire to fall off from the heade, take the head of a young foxe burned with the leaves of blacke Orchanes and Alcyonium, and the powder cast upon the head recovereth againe the haire.

“If the braine be often given to infants and sucking children, it maketh them that they shall remaine free from the falling evill. Pliny prescribeth a man which twinkleth with his eies, and cannot looke stedfastly, to weare in a chaine, the tongue of a foxe; and Marcellus biddeth to cut out the tongue of a live foxe, and to turne him away, and hang uppe that tongue to dry in purple thred, and, afterward put it about his necke that is troubled with the whitenesse of the eies, and it shall cure him.

“But it is more certainely affirmed, that the tongue, either dryed, or greene, layed to the flesh wherein is any Dart or other sharpe head, it draweth them forth violently, and rendeth not the flesh, but, only where it is entred. The liver dryed, and drunke cureth often sighing. The same, or the lights drunke in blacke Wine, openeth the passages of breathing. The same washed in Wyne, and dryed in an earthen pot in an Oven, and, afterward, seasoned with Sugar, is the best medicine in the world for an old cough, for it hath bin approved to cure it, although it hath continued twenty years, drinking every day two sponfuls in Wine.

“The lightes of foxes drunke in Water after they have beene dryed into powder, helpeth the Melt, and Myrepsus affirmeth, that when he gave the same powder to one almost suffocated in a pleurisie it prevailed for a remedy. Archigene prescribeth the dried liver of a Fox for the Spleneticke with Oxymell: and Marcellinus for the Melt, drunke after the same manner; and Sextus adviseth to drinke it simply without composition of Oxymell. The gall of a Foxe instilled into the eares with Oyle, cureth the paine in them, and, mixed with Hony Atticke, and annointed upon the eies, taketh away al dimnes from them, after an admirable manner. The melt, bound upon the tumors, and bunches of the brest, cureth the Melt in man’s body. The reynes dried and mingled with Honie, being anointed uppon Kernels, take them away. For the swelling of the Chaps, rub the reines of a Fox within the mouth. The dung, pounded with Vineger, by annointment cureth the Leprosie speedily. These and such other vertues medicinal, both the elder and later Phisitians have observed in a Fox, – wherewithal we wil conclude this discourse.”

The Wolf

The Wolf, as a beast of prey, is invested with a terror peculiarly its own; when solitary, it is not much dreaded by, and generally shrinks from, man, but, united by hunger into packs, they are truly to be dreaded, for they spare not man nor beast. They lie, too, under the imputation of magic, and have done so from a very early age. Their cunning, instinct, or reasoning powers, are almost as well developed as in the fox, and, of all the authorities I have consulted, the one best fitted to discourse upon the Wolf and his peculiarities is Topsell, and here is one of their idiosyncrasies: —

“It is said that Wolves doe also eate a kind of earth called Argilla, which they doe not for hunger, but to make their bellies waigh heavy, to the intent, that when they set upon a Horsse, an Oxe, a Hart, an Elke, or some such strong beast, they may waigh the heavier, and hang fast at their throates till they have pulled them downe, for by vertue of that tenacious earth, their teeth are sharpened, and the waight of their bodies encreased; but, when they have killed the beast that they set upon, before they touch any part of his flesh, by a kind of natural vomit, they disgorge themselves, and empty their bellies of the earth, as unprofitable food…

“They also devoure Goates and Swyne of all sortes, except Bores, who doe not easily yeald unto Wolves. It is said that a Sow, hath resisted a Wolfe, and when he fighteth with her, hee is forced to use his greatest craft and suttelty, leaping to and from her with his best activity, least she should lay her teeth upon him, and so at one time deceive him of his prey, and deprive him of his life. It is reported of one that saw a Wolfe in a Wood, take in his mouth a peece of Timber of some thirty or forty pound waight, and with that he did practise to leape over the trunke of a tree that lay upon the earth; at length, when he perceived his own ability and dexterity in leaping with that waight in his mouth, he did there make his cave, and lodged behinde that tree; at last, it fortuned there came a wild Sow to seeke for meat along by that tree, with divers of her pigs following her, of different age, some a yeare olde, some halfe a yeare, and some lesse. When he saw them neare him, he suddenly set upon one of them, which he conjectured was about the waite of Wood which he carried in his mouth, and when he had taken him, whilest the old Sow came to deliver her pig at his first crying, he suddenly leaped over the tree with the pig in his mouth, and so was the poore Sow beguiled of her young one, for she could not leape after him, and yet might stand and see the Wolfe to eate the pigge, which hee had taken from her. It is also sayd, that when they will deceive Goates, they come unto them with the greene leaves and small boughes of Osiers in their mouthes, wherewithall they know Goats are delighted, that so they may draw them therewith, as to a baite, to devour them.

“Their maner is, when they fal upon a Goat or a Hog, or some such other beast of smal stature, not to kil them, but to lead them by the eare with al the speed they can drive them, to their fellow Wolves, and, if the beast be stubborne, and wil not runne with him, then he beateth his hinder parts with his taile, in the mean time holding his ear fast in his mouth, whereby he causeth the poore beast to run as fast, or faster than himselfe unto the place of his owne execution, where he findeth a crew of ravening Wolves to entertaine him, who, at his first appearance seize upon him, and, like Divels teare him in peeces in a moment, leaving nothing uneaten but onely his bowels…

“Now although there be a great difference betwixt him and a Bul, both in strength and stature, yet he is not affraid to adventure combat, trusting in his policy more than his vigor, for when he setteth upon a Bul, he commeth not upon the front for feare of his hornes, nor yet behind him for feare of his heeles, but first of al standeth a loofe from him, with his glaring eyes, daring and provoking the Bul, making often profers to come neere unto him, yet is wise enough to keepe a loofe till he spy his advauntage, and then he leapeth suddenly upon the backe of the Bul at the one side, and being so ascended, taketh such hold, that he killeth the beast, before he loosen his teeth. It is also worth the observation, how he draweth unto him a Calfe that wandereth from the dam, for by singular treacherie he taketh him by the nose, first drawing him forwarde, and then the poore beast striveth and draweth backward, and thus they struggle togither, one pulling one way, and the other another, till at last the Wolfe perceiving advantage, and feeling when the Calfe pulleth heavyest, suddenly he letteth go his hold, whereby the poore beast falleth backe upon his buttocks, and so downe right upon his backe; then flyeth the Wolfe to his belly which is then his upper part, and easily teareth out his bowels, so satisfieng his hunger and greedy appetite.

“But, if they chance to see a Beast in the water, or in the marsh, encombred with mire, they come round about him, stopping up al the passages where he shold come out, baying at him, and threatning him, so as the poore distressed Oxe plungeth himselfe many times over head and eares, or at the least wise they so vex him in the mire, that they never suffer him to come out alive. At last, when they perceive him to be dead, and cleane without life by suffocation, it is notable to observe their singular subtilty to drawe him out of the mire, whereby they may eat him; for one of them goeth in, and taketh the beast by the taile, who draweth with al the power he can, for wit without strength may better kill a live Beast, than remove a dead one out of the mire; therefore, he looketh behind him, and calleth for more helpe; then, presently another of the wolves taketh that first wolve’s tail in his mouth, and a third wolf the second’s, a fourth the third’s, a fift the fourth, and so forward, encreasing theyr strength, until they have pulled the beast out into the dry lande. Sextus saith that, in case a Wolf do see a man first, if he have about him the tip of a Wolf’s taile, he shal not neede to feare anie harme. All domestical Foure footed beasts, which see the eie of a wolfe in the hand of a man, will presently feare and runne away.

“If the taile of a wolfe be hung in the cratch of Oxen, they can never eat their meate. If a horse tread upon the foote steps of a Wolfe, which is under a Horse-man or Rider, hee breaketh in peeces, or else standeth amazed. If a wolfe treadeth in the footsteps of a horse which draweth a waggon, he cleaveth fast in the rode, as if he were frozen.

“If a Mare with foale, tread upon the footsteps of a wolfe, she casteth her foal, and therefore the Egyptians, when they signifie abortment doe picture a mare treading upon a wolf’s foot. These and such other things are reported, (but I cannot tell how true) as supernaturall accidents in wolves. The wolfe also laboureth to overcome the Leoparde, and followeth him from place to place, but, for as much as they dare not adventure upon him single, or hand to hand, they gather multitudes, and so devoure them. When wolves set upon wilde Bores, although they bee at variance amonge themselves, yet they give over their mutual combats, and joyne together against the Wolfe their common adversarie.

“And this is the nature of this beast, that he feareth no kind of weapon except a stone, for, if a stone be cast at him, he presently falleth downe to avoide the stroke, for it is saide that in that place of his body where he is wounded by a stone, there are bred certaine wormes which doe kill and destroie him… As the Lyon is afraide of a white Cocke and a Mouse, so is the wolfe of a Sea crab, or shrimp. It is said that the pipe of Pithocaris did represse the violence of wolves when they set upon him, for he sounded the same unperfectly, and indistinctly, at the noise whereof the raging wolfe ran away; and it hath bin beleeved that the voice of a singing man or woman worketh the same effect.

“Concerning the enimies of wolves, there is no doubt but that such a ravening beast hath fewe friends, … for this cause, in some of the inferiour beasts their hatred lasteth after death, as many Authors have observed; for, if a sheepe skinne be hanged up with a wolves’s skin, the wool falleth off from it, and, if an instrument be stringed with stringes made of both these beasts the one will give no sounde in the presence of the other.”

Here we have had all the bad qualities of the Wolf depicted in glowing colours; but, as a faithful historian, I must show him also under his most favourable aspect – notably in two instances – one the she-wolf that suckled Romulus and Remus, and the other who watched so tenderly over the head of the Saxon Edmund, King and Martyr, after it had been severed from his body by the Danes, and contemptuously thrown by them into a thicket. His mourning followers found the body, but searched for some time for the head, without success; although they made the woods resound with their cries of “Where artow, Edward?” After a few days’ search, a voice answered their inquiries, with “Here, here, here.” And, guided by the supernatural voice, they came upon the King’s head, surrounded by a glory, and watched over, so as to protect it from all harm – by a WOLF! The head was applied deftly to the body, which it joined naturally; indeed, so good a job was it, that the junction could only be perceived by a thin red, or purple, line.

It must be said of this wolf, that he was thorough, for not content with having preserved the head of the Saintly King from harm, he meekly followed the body to St. Edmund’s Bury, and waited there until the funeral; when he quietly trotted back, none hindering him, to the forest.