1 8 FOREST TITHES 
The polecat, who used to be one of the chief of these, 
is now almost a thing of the past, and when he is 
seen or captured the circumstance is made a note of. 
Like the rest of his species, this very powerful, and 
in his own domain most useful, little creature car- 
ries his prey like a retriever. From the polecat to 
the weasel, the strength of the family is something 
remarkable. It is a wonderful sight to see one of 
them come bounding along, holding a prey as large 
and as heavy as itself off the ground by the middle 
of the back. A few days ago, a friend of mine a 
keen observer of wild life, the result of whose obser- 
vations will, I trust, ere long come before the public 
saw what he took to be a lump of dry hedgerow 
plums blown up by the wind over a green ride 
towards him. As it came nearer, it proved to be 
some creature bounding along bearing a half-grown 
rat, and, when within a yard or so of the spot 
where he stood, the rat was dropped on the turf, and 
a weasel looked at him as only a weasel can look. 
The animal was only aware of the proximity of a 
human when he got wind of my friend ; in fact, the 
rat he carried before him prevented the weasel from 
seeing what was directly in front of him. The man 
lifted the rat, noted the way in which it had been 
killed, and then placed it where the weasel had 
