Vri WITH XATrnr: ami a camkra. 



kill .sittiii,ii' hens before they can get off their nests 

 and swallow wee "poults" in the most businc^ss- 

 like way. T knew one great laiikv conspieuous- 

 ribbed mongrel in North Yorkshire that was guilty 

 of this and another eurious practice. He must have 

 been of French extraction, for he would swallow 

 young frogs as fast as lie could iind them. 



Sheep farmers' cats often take to a feral life 

 and do a great amount of damage amongst Grouse 

 in the breeding season. Some tive or six years ago 

 I was out with a gamekeeper in the Xorth of Eng- 

 land aft(M- a Sparrow-hawk that had made her nest 

 in a little glnU which divided a nund:)er of heather- 

 clad pastures that were full of sitting Grouse. In 

 crossing one of these pastures, on our way to another 

 part of the beat, we came upon an ominous-looking 

 train of feathers. In oiu^ direction it led to a head- 

 less .female Grouse, and in the other to a nest con- 

 taining- seven eggs, from thr(>e of which protruded 

 the cold tips of little 1)eaks. I stood l)y looking 

 on in sad silence, whilst the keeper vented his rage 

 in entirely unprintable language. We turned back 

 into the ghyll where my companion had some steel 

 gins hidden, and whilst he nuide a stone passage 

 five or six feet long l)y twelve inches high and 

 seven or eight wide, 1 took off my jacket and 

 tickled a mountain trout under a moss-clad bouldci'. 

 The stone passage was luult on a fairly level bit 

 of ground, closer to some great loose rocks under 

 which the feline depredator was ])rol)al)ly liiding 

 at the time. The trout was suspended in the 

 middle of the passage, and a traj) carefully covered 

 with moss laid on the do(»i- of it at either end, 

 and the next morning that keejx'r avenged the 

 headless Grous(>. No cat can resist a trout as bait, 

 and no gamekecpci- who knows his l)usiiiess ever 



