86 THE WEASEL AND THE STOAT (THE ERMINE). 



prove more than a match for a single weasel, and 

 a very ample handful for the sturdiest of stoats. 



A doe-rabbit with young to defend will turn 

 and face a stoat or a weasel most gallantly, driving 

 him out of her burrow, and stamping on him 

 with her powerful hind-paws till all the fight 

 is knocked out of him. Similarly, a mother-hare 

 will attack one of these creatures with such fury 

 that, unless he beats it for cover, he may find him- 

 self with a crippled spine. 



Stoats and weasels attack and kill snakes with 

 great dexterity, even the poisonous varieties often 

 falling victims to their swiftness. Toads, frogs, 

 beetles, and worms likewise figure conspicuously 

 in the bill of fare of these animals ; while any dead 

 thing they find is welcome to their multifarious 

 tastes. 



HUNTING RABBITS. 



When a weasel (the term is here used as apply- 

 ing also to the stoat) sets out on the trail of a 

 rabbit, he sticks to that one rabbit, never wavering 

 from his original selection till he has run it down. 

 The quarry may run through half-a-dozen burrows 

 thickly tenanted by other rabbits ; it may cross and 

 criss-cross its trail with a hundred other trails ; but 

 every trick it plays, every sidelong leap and double 

 back, finds the remorseless little pursuer still on 

 its trail. A young rabbit does not run far when 

 hunted by stoat or weasel, but after one spasmodic 

 sprint it seems to give up all hope, and become 

 paralysed with terror. Immediately it catches 

 sight of the weasel behind it, indeed, after one 

 half-hearted endeavour to escape, it throws up the 

 sponge, beginning to run in foolish circles, while 

 without haste the weasel follows by sight now. 



