i^i«ia«l^li^MIM— « II II ■ i ill l W ^I*«*t««iift«>i^t*« 



WILD LIFE OF ORCHARD AND FIELD 



the jaws of a wolf one may be sure who has seen 

 his sturdy, undaunted struggle with a dog. I 

 have read and have seen pictured accounts of 

 birds of prey having seized weasels of one kind or 

 another that in turn fastened upon the bird's throat 

 or body, and so were carried up into the air until 

 they had gnawed the bird's life away, and both 

 came tumbling to earth locked in mutual murder. 

 It is quite possible something of this sort may 

 occasionally happen, but I have never seen it, 

 nor can I find any evidence of a predatory bird in 

 this country ever having seized a weasel, even by 

 mistake, for something easier to handle. 



This animal's endowment of especial valor 

 seems, therefore, superlative, and tending to need- 

 less slaughter and cruelty in nature. But this 

 quality is probably an inheritance from the distant 

 past, when the race of weasels dwelt in the midst 

 of a world of fighting against conditions and en- 

 emies which they have survived by means of these 

 very virtues ; and it may be that here, as sometimes 

 happens elsewhere, virtues have changed into vices 

 through change of exterior circumstances. 



But this leads us into what is really a wrong 

 and illogical position, for what we are calling 

 vices — namely, the weasel's acts of rapacity and 



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