Volume 1

The quadrupeds of North America / By John James Audubon...and the Rev. John Bachman.

  • John James Audubon
Date:
1852-1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The quadrupeds of North America / By John James Audubon...and the Rev. John Bachman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    tempt to separate it from the latter. No sooner does he become aware that the enemy is on his track, than, instead of taking a straight course for the deepest forest, he speeds to one of the largest old-fields overgrown with briery thickets, in the neighbourhood; and having reached this tangled maze, he runs in a variety of circles, crossing and re-crossing his path many times, and when he thinks the scent has been diffused suffi- ciently in different directions by this manoeuvre, to puzzle both men and dogs, he creeps slyly forth, and makes for the woods, or for some well known swamp, and if he should be lucky enough to find a half-dried-up pond, or a part of the swamp, on which the clayey bottom is moist and sticky, he seems to know that the adhesive soil, covering his feet and legs, so far destroys the scent, that although the hounds may be in full cry on reaching such a place, and while crossing it, they will lose the track on the opposite side, and perhaps not regain it without some diffi- culty and delay. At other times the “ Cat,” when chased by the dogs, gains some tract of “burnt wood,” common especially in the pine lands of Carolina, where fallen and upright trees are alike blackened and scorched, by the fire that has run among them burning before it every blade of grass, every leaf and shrub, and destroying many of the largest trees in its furious course; and here, the charcoal and ashes on the ground, after he has traversed the burnt district a short distance, and made a few leaps along the trunk of a fallen tree, that has been charred in the conflagration, will generally put any hounds at fault. Should no such chance of safety be within his reach, he does not despair, but exerting his powers of flight to the utmost, increases his distance from the pursuing pack, and follow- ing as intricate and devious a path as possible, after many a weary mile has been run over, he reaches a long-fallen trunk of a tree, on which he may perchance at some previous time have baffled the hunters as he is now about to do. He leaps on to it, and hastily running to the farther end, doubles and returns to the point from which he gained the tree, and after running backward and forward repeatedly on the fallen trunk, he makes a sudden and vigorous spring, leaping as high up into a tree some feet distant, as he can; he then climbs to its highest forks, (branches,) and closely squatted, watches the movements of his pursuers. The dogs are soon at fault, for he has already led them through many a crooked path; the hunters are dispirited and weary, and perhaps the density of the woods, or the approach of night, favours him. The huntsmen call off their dogs from the fruitless search, and give up the chase; and shortly after- wards the escaped marauder descends leisurely to the earth, and wanders off in search of food, and to begin a new series of adventures.
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