cross n
   Comb cross(-fox): red fox (Vulpes fulvus) in a colour variation with cross-like marking on back.
   [1771] 1792 CARTWRIGHT i, 82 I examined the traps and death-falls near Fox Pond, and upon the river, and had a good cross fox. [1778] ibid ii, 305 There was a fox in one of my traps; it proved a cross; was a little trace-galled, and smelt strong. 1908 HUBBARD 7 In 1907 there were brought in at one point seventeen silvers. twenty 'cross' foxes. and one hundred and thirteen of the common red ones. T 203/5-65 And the cross fox, some of him is grey on the sides, mixed with dark and a form of a cross on his back. It goes across from his forelegs across his shoulders, and right up the back of his neck [and] down.
   cross-patch: see cross-fox; PATCH FOX.
   1888 STEARNS 347 They are now said to be of one species, and the common red fox [is] the father of them all... We have the variety known as the patch fox, which is only a darker and blacker form of the red; after that the cross or cross-patch, with a lighter area in the center of the back, in the form of a bar down the back and another across the fore-shoulders.

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