390 Wild Life in Wales 



keeper's gun, but to his Cat, which we watched for some 

 minutes stalking the Weasel on the rail, and, cutting off its 

 retreat to the kennel wall, finally effecting a capture when 

 the Weasel leapt to the ground in order to try to escape in that 

 way. I had several times, previously, known a Cat to catch 

 a Weasel, and once knew one to kill a full-grown Stoat, but 

 I do not fancy that such prey is usually eaten by a domestic 

 cat. A few years ago, when accompanying a rabbit-catcher 

 on his rounds, I saw a dead Weasel in a trap with the heads 

 of no less than three young ones lying beside her. She was 

 in milk, but the young had been of considerable size, and 

 her stomach looked to be uncomfortably filled with their 

 remains. Possibly, in this case, the mother might have 

 been carrying a young one in her mouth when the fatal jaws 

 of the trap closed upon her, and it is quite conceivable that 

 she might have killed it in the first paroxysm of pain ; but 

 that she should have eaten it, in the circumstances, as well 

 as its companions, which were probably following her, or 

 why the heads had been rejected, seemed curious, to say the 

 least of it. 



One sometimes meets with queer tastes in animals, and 

 writing thus of Weasels brings one particular instance to 

 mind, which happened on the Merionethshire moors. I 

 one day disturbed a sheep-dog busy making a meal off a 

 Fox, which had evidently been dead at least a day. Whether 

 the dog had originally killed it or not there was nothing to 

 show ; nor was this the whole story. A couple of days 

 later, a keeper, with a view to " Hoodies," placed a trap at 

 the remains and caught a poor Hedgehog ! The latter 

 animal, by the way, was not very common about Llanuwchllyn, 

 but I saw a pair trapped by a keeper on the open heather, 

 near the Ddwallt precipice, at a height of well over 1000 feet, 

 and not, one would have supposed, a likely place to find 

 such creatures. The Hedgehog is known here as Draen-y- 

 coed, or Balloglys, both referring to its spines, and Mochyn-y- 

 coed, or pig of the wood ; sometimes it is called Sank, which 

 means a reptile. 



