LITTLE BEASTS OF FIELD AND WOOD 



made by the tips of their wing feathers several 

 feet apart on the snow, while half-way between 

 them a mouse track terminates abruptly, though 

 much oftener the hunter plunges deep into the 

 snow in Its anxiety to secure its prey. 



Last winter I observed where a great horned- 

 owl had dashed at a rabbit and, missing, gone 

 sprawling along the snow-crust, helpless before 

 the velocity of its charge, stripping the leaves 

 from the ground laurel in its endeavours to check 

 its speed, until finally brought to a full stop by 

 the drooping boughs of a hemlock frozen into the 

 snow. Whereupon it regained its feet and walked 

 off a few yards before taking flight, while the 

 rabbit bounded away to cover. 



The tracks of a pair of foxes hunting rabbits 

 together make interesting reading, but when 

 weasels have been the hunters, they generally 

 leave such a muddle of intersecting tracks as to 

 make it difficult to follow the course of events. 



Many people appear to take it for granted that 



