82 SQUIRRELS AND OTHER FUR-BEARERS 



a yard of my friends, went the pursued and the 

 pursuer, and into the garden rushed I and my 

 dog. The weasel seized the chicken by the wing, 

 and was being dragged along by the latter in its 

 effort to escape, when I arrived upon the scene. 

 With a savage glee I had not felt for many a 

 day, I planted my foot upon the weasel. The 

 soft muck underneath yielded, and I held him 

 without hurting him. He let go his hold upon 

 the chicken and seized the sole of my shoe in his 

 teeth. Then I reached down and gripped him 

 with my thumb and forefinger just back of the 

 ears, and lifted him up, and looked his impotent 

 rage in the face. What gleaming eyes, what 

 an array of threatening teeth, what reaching of 

 vicious claws, what a wriggling and convulsed 

 body ! But I held him firmly. He could only 

 scratch my hand and dart fire from his electric, 

 bead-like eyes. In the mean time my dog was 

 bounding up, begging to be allowed to have his 

 way with the weasel. But I knew what he did 

 not : I knew that in anything like a fair encoun- 

 ter the weasel would get the first hold, would 

 draw the first blood, and hence probably effect 

 his escape. So I carried the animal, writhing 

 and scratching, to a place in the road removed 

 from any near cover, and threw him violently 

 upon the ground, hoping thereby so to stun 



