Page:Handbook for Boys.djvu/209

188 example, there are, within twenty miles of New York City, fully fifty different kinds—not counting birds, reptiles, or fishes—one quarter of Which at least are abundant. Or more particularly within the limits of Greater New York there are at least a dozen species of wild beasts, half of which are quite common.

"Then how is it that we never see any?" is the first question of the incredulous. The answer is: Long ago the beasts learned the dire lesson—man is our worst enemy; shun him at any price. And the simplest way to do this is to come out only at night. Man is a daytime creature; he is blind in the soft half-light that most beasts prefer.

While many animals have always limited their activity to the hours of twilight and gloom, there are not a few that moved about in daytime, but have given up that portion of their working day in order to avoid the arch enemy.

Thus they can flourish under our noses and est.at our tables, without our knowledge or consent. They come and go at will, and the world knows nothing of them; their presence might long go unsuspected but for one thing, well known to the hunter, the trapper,' and the naturalist: wherever the wild four-foot goes, it leaves behind a record of its visit, its name, the direction whence it came, the time, the thing it did or tried to do, with the time and direction of departure. These it puts down in the ancient script. Each of these .dotted lines, called the trail, is a wonderful, Unfinished record of the creature's life during the time.it made the same, and it needs only the patient work of the naturalist to decipher that record and from it learn much about the animal that made it, without that animal ever having been seen.

Savages are more skilful at it than civilized folk, because tracking is their serious life-long pursuit and they do not injure their eyes with books. Intelligence is important here as elsewhere, yet it is a remarkable fact that the lowest race of mankind, the Australian blacks, are reputed to be by far the best trackers; not only are their eyes and attention developed and disciplined, but they have retained much of the scent power that civilized man has lost, and can follow a fresh track, partly at least by smell.

It is hard to over-value the powers of the clever tracker. To him the trail of each animal is not a mere series of similar footprints; it is an accurate account of the creature's life, habit, changing whims, and emotions during the portion of life whose record is in view. These are indeed autobiographical chapters