If, on the other hand, you stand by one of his runways while the dogs
are driving him, expecting, of course, to see him come tearing along
in a desperate hurry, frightened out of half his wits by the savage
uproar behind him, you can only rub your eyes in wonder when a fluffy
yellow ball comes drifting through the woods towards you, as if the
breeze were blowing it along. There he is, trotting down the runway in
the same leisurely, self-possessed way, wrapped in his own thoughts
apparently, the same deep wrinkles over his eyes. He played a trick or
two on a brook, down between the ponds, by jumping about on a lot of
stones from which the snow had melted, without wetting his feet (which
he dislikes), and without leaving a track anywhere. While the dogs are
puzzling that out, he has plenty of time to plan more devices on his
way to the big hill, with its brook, and old walls, and rail fences,
and dry places under the pines, and twenty other helps to an active
brain.

First he will run round the hill half a dozen times, crisscrossing his
trail. That of itself will drive the young dogs crazy. Then along the
top rail of a fence, and a long jump into the junipers, which hold no
scent, and another jump to the wall where there is no snow, and then--

"Oh, plenty of time, no hurry!" he says to himself, turning to listen
a moment. "That dog with the big voice must be old Roby. He thinks he
knows all about foxes, just because he broke his leg last year, trying
to walk a sheep-fence where I'd been. I'll give him another chance;
and oh, yes! I'll creep up the other side of the hill, and curl up on
a warm rock on the tiptop, and watch them all break their heads over
the crisscross, and have a good nap or two, and think of more
tricks."