Numbers of hares live all the summer in the cornfields. But while many rabbits are born in the corn, when there is a wood at hand most of them retire by day, returning to the corn to feed at night. No rabbit, in sleekness of fur, is comparable to the rabbit that has lived for a few fine weeks among the corn-stems, for the constant brushing of the stems grooms his coat to a state of wonderful fineness. At any moment rabbits in the corn may meet death from the teeth of stoats or weasels; which in turn run a risk, if a slight one, from the fox's teeth; there are plenty of mole-runs into which they may dive in times of danger. In dry weather, the hedgehogs leave the ditches for the corn; and the cornfield, in real summer weather, when there are no foxes about, is a paradise for pheasants and partridges. The gamekeeper, whatever the weather, clings to the faith that the corn hides most of his birds from his sight. There is comfort in the thought that if the birds live he will see them, but if they are killed, nothing will ever tell him the story of his losses. Man ploughs and sows, but for every man who eats the bread of the fields a million other mouths have been fed. There is no such perfect sanctuary to wild life as a field of corn. What the corn hides nobody knows; though many would gladly know, and seek eagerly to find. The gamekeeper guesses shrewdly what the corn may hide; later he will find what has been hidden, and it is as well for his peace of mind that he can only speculate, at this season, on the game in the field, for he is powerless to interfere. The community of the cornfield is almost safe from man, while the corn stands. If any creature moves in the corn, the stems, bowing to the breeze, cover its progress. * * * * * Finding the Fox Many a fox family spends the entire summer in the cornfield, and no man is the wiser; but if any should discover the secret, it will be the gamekeeper. Only a giant could see, from the ground, the spot where, in a level cornfield, a family of cubs is taking shelter; the keeper's plan is to climb into a tree, so that his eyes may sweep over acre upon acre at a glance, and spy out the foxes. Even if the nearest tree be a mile or more distant from the playground and refectory of the cubs, his trusty "spy-glass" will reveal the secret--and while he keeps his place in the look-out tree he may signal to a companion, and point the way to the family's eviction. From the top of a tree on the edge of a wood we have found the secret place of a vixen in a field of rank rye; and when we came to the spot, where a large patch of the rye had been rolled flat, we could have filled a wheelbarrow with the remains of partridges, pheasants, rabbits, and hares. * * * * * Harvest Sport