THE HONEY RATEL 
or stabbing or shooting it through the heart, will 
kill a ratel. They are as tenacious of life, or even 
more so, ‘than the Stink Muishond or Polecat. 
Few, if any, of the denizens of the forest venture 
to attack a ratel. 
A female ratel was attacked by Mr L. Walton’s 
dogs on his farm at Mimosa, and while the fight 
was proceeding the ratel’s mate came out of the 
bush at a swift trot and viciously attacked its mate’s 
enemies, and, to save his dogs from being torn to 
pieces, Mr Walton was obliged to shoot it. 
Although a nocturnal animal, the ratel is often 
seen abroad on cloudy days and just after sundown, 
but until after dark in the neighbourhood of man 
it does not venture far from its lair. 
Although its eyes are small and deepset, they are 
keen and sharp and long-sighted. At night they 
are powerfully phosphorescent. On an occasion 
we located a ratel in a cave. The terriers were 
barking furiously, and the ratel was giving vent to 
a volley of harsh grating sounds very much like the 
noise made by filing iron with a large rough rasp. 
Creeping through the opening to the cave, which 
was hidden by a great mass of scrubby bush, I 
was startled to see two bright phosphorescent 
lights which glowed and flashed and died down, 
to again flash out with greater intensity. So 
terrific were the grating growls, and so uncanny did 
those two points of greenish light from out of the 
intense darkness appear, that I hastily withdrew. 
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