130 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS. 



" gnawing " his bins and granary partitions in an unusually destruc- 

 tive manner, and a very energetic terrier dog was procured and 

 placed on the scent of the depredators, with the result that a large 

 musk-rat was dug out from its cosy retreat in the middle of the hay- 

 mow, and it was supposed that a quantity of apples that had been 

 temporarily stored in the building was the attraction that had 

 tempted the abnormal guest to his destruction. 



A number of years ago the pelt and fur of the mink had a much 

 higher trade value than is the case at present, and some of our 

 neighbors devoted much time and effort in the winter time to the 

 trapping business as was avowed with good paying results, and at the 

 same time poultry enemies v/ere gotten rid of. A neighbor, whose 

 flock of ducklings was nightly or daily diminishing, kept close watch 

 one day from an ambush place at the edge of the duck pond, and 

 soon saw the mink enemy swimming rapidly in rear of the retreating 

 and quacking mother-duck and her numerous progeny of two weeks 

 old. As the black enemy had approached almost to within springing 

 distance, the old duck dived, but the little ones exerted all their 

 powers of foot and winglets on the watery surface, and but for a 

 bullet from the poultryman's rifle, which ended the mink's career, 

 the waterfowl's family would soon have been one or two less in 

 number. 



With the hero of the above adventure we were well acquainted, 

 and we had entire faith in his truthfulness, and may now transcribe 

 another of his narrations. 



One warm spring day, whilst roaming in his own woodland 

 j-erritory, his dog began to bark and gnaw at the partly upturned roots 

 of a tamarac tree in the swamp, under which further search disclosed 

 the cosy nest of a mink containing eight young ones seemingly less 

 than two weeks old. The mother mink was near by, watching the 

 fate of her little ones from a safe recess in a hollow stump. Our 

 acquaintance at once removed most of the nest material and the 

 eight young minks, and placed the same in a large box in an outhouse 

 adjoining the kitchen of his house and which was 200 or 300 paces 

 distant from the spot where the mink nest was first found. Over the 

 box he placed as a cover several loose pieces of board. His intention 

 was to try to rear the young minks in the manner of kittens, 

 which he believed could be accomplished " by hand," as he expressed 



