OUR THRUSHES. 95 



agility when free and at large. Stoats or weasels 

 are not desirable visitors on a lawn ; mice of various 

 kinds, however, are more destructive to flower-beds 

 than all the other pests put together ; and the 

 weasel family are the sworn foes and exterminators, 

 if permitted, of mice and rats, so their visits may be 

 fairly tolerated. 



Some gentlemen that I know will not allow guns 

 to be used near their dwellings ; they are quite will- 

 ing to allow nature's own police to keep order, and 

 they are wise in this. To see a weasel with a short- 

 tailed mouse or vole, almost as large as himself, 

 carried retriever -fashion in his mouth, is a very 

 interesting sight. I have seen it, and bid him good 

 luck in his hunting many a time. There are at the 

 present time far too few of his kind about. He will 

 dart from a flower-bed on to the lawn, a perfect 

 model of strength and activity; his bright eyes 

 glisten as he looks round about in all directions 

 before he begins to play. The most skilful acrobat 

 is a clumsy pretender compared with that little 

 fellow; he rolls, vaults, and tumbles in all direc- 

 tions, enjoying himself to his heart's content. From 

 one of the trees on the lawn two missel-thrushes, 



