IN FIELD AND WOOD 



so as to look back over the track it had come, and 

 there crouched down, shivering with apparent fear. 

 Mr. Kerr was at first at a loss to know what had dis- 

 turbed the rat, but in a little while noticed a weasel 

 coming along the cellar floor and on the track of the 

 rat. The weasel came much more slowly than the 

 rat had come, as it had to follow the trail entirely 

 by scent. Mr. Kerr was standing near the rat aU this 

 time and watching it. As the weasel drew near the 

 stairway, the rat began to scream again. By this 

 time the weasel saw Mr. Kerr. It stopped for a mo- 

 ment and eyed him intently, and then, as if in con- 

 tempt of him, passed on and rushed upon the rat 

 with a ferocity and indifference almost incredible 

 for so small an animal. The rat simply cowered and 

 screamed and made no resistance whatever. The 

 weasel seized the rat around the neck with its fore 

 paws and fastened its teeth in the rat's throat in a 

 mere instant of time, and the struggle was over be- 

 fore it could be said to have fairly begun. 



"That an animal so combative as the rat, and es- 

 pecially one so large as the one in the present in- 

 stance (for it was, if anything, heavier than the 

 weasel) should yield without a struggle, Mr. Kerr 

 says, fiUed him with astonishment, as did also the 

 fact that the rat, though having a free field and 

 abundance of time to fly out of the cellar, or to seek 

 refuge elsewhere in the many holes in the walls of 

 the cellar, failed to do so. He says he scarcely could 

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