THE MIDNIGHT MASSACRE. 109 
slumbers by feeling my face most unmercifully scratched ; 
_ the air was filled with the flutter of birds and the screaming 
of domestic fowl. I seized both pistols and stared hopelessly 
into the darkness ; up started the maid-of-all-work, and one 
or two more, who tumbled over others in their attempts to 
escape, and thus completed the general confusion. At last a 
match was struck, and lo! nothing could be seen but a brood 
of terrified chickens. There was a cause for their alarm, and 
this cause we found behind the press. 
When the human beings and the fowls had fallen to 
sleep, a pretty-looking little quadruped thought that this 
- bed-room would be a very nice place for him also. He 
looks like a cross between a fox and a ferret, and carries 
a fine bushy tail; his body is striped with black and 
_ white, and he rejoices in the name of Skunk. Half-a-dozen 
chickens had already fallen a prey to his teeth and claws, 
and he was enjoying the flavour of their heads so much 
that no amount of probing up with divers long poles would 
make him stir from his hiding-place behind the press, so 
: we sent a bullet through his head. He had his revenge, 
but he kept it to the last; for the stench which instantly 
- followed that shot baffles description. After much good 
training I thought I could have slept through anything, or 
in the company of any one, but I had never before tried a 
skunk. I went away, and, as it was raining, took refuge 
| with my docile mule. The most wonderful part of this little 
incident still remains to be told: the Mexicans, after 
grumbling a little about being disturbed, went back to their 
blankets, and slept it out until morning without more ado. 
_ Thus ended the adventure of the chickens, the skunk, and 
_ the midnight massacre. 
With replenished saddle-bags and rested animals we started 
