OUTDOORS 



attitude suggestive of extreme sleepiness. 

 But he is, when the occasion demands, as 

 swift as a rattlesnake to strike. His nar- 

 row head shoots out, and when he fastens his 

 keen teeth in anything it is with a bull-dog 

 grip and a tiger's thirst for blood. One of 

 the ferrets we used to hunt with we called 

 " Ivy " because he went " creeping, creeping 

 everywhere." 



Hunting with ferrets is not always the easi- 

 est work in the world, for the beasts have an 

 ugly fashion of grabbing off a rabbit occa- 

 sionally for themselves. Rabbits have a habit 

 of snoozing away the days in their burrows, 

 and when a ferret finds one in a doze the 

 end comes quickly. And when he finishes 

 up the animal he takes a little nap him- 

 self, say, for two or three hours. Sitting out 

 on a bleak hill-side for a quarter of a day 

 waiting for a ferret to report for duty is one 

 of the most vexatious things in the annals of 

 sport. And at other times your ferret may 

 take it into his narrow head that it is more 

 comfortable down there than it is out in the 

 cold, cold world, and he will cuddle up in 

 the burrow and compose himself for a little 

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