Quadrupeds. 489 



of dead mice he found there. The intelligent bailiff of a Staffordshire 

 nobleman has of late given protection to stoats and weasels in his farm 

 and stack-yards, and has been amply repaid for this indulgence by 

 the almost total extirpation of rats and mice : at present I do not learn 

 that his poultry have been injured, but I will not undertake to gua- 

 rantee their safety, when the more favourite objects of pursuit shall 

 have become less abundant. The sagacity and perseverance with 

 which these little animals follow their predatory sport, is admirable. 

 They will track both rabbits and rats by scent, and when they are at 

 a fault, they will return and quarter the ground with as much precision 

 as the most experienced fox-hound would. I have often watched 

 their graceful motions, when thus engaged ; but the following field- 

 adventure, which I happened to meet with some years ago, gave me a 

 more intimate knowledge of their habits than T could have acquired 

 with all my vigilance upon ordinary occasions. A deep snow was gra- 

 dually melting away, and, as I was walking in my grounds, I observed 

 something moving among the long grass, which was just beginning to 

 appear through it. Its colour was as white as the surrounding snow, 

 and had it not been for the black tip of the tail, I think I should scarce- 

 ly have distinguished it. After a time this ermine stoat (for such it 

 was) caught a field mouse, which it conveyed in its mouth to an ad- 

 joining plantation, where it ascended a fir tree, and deposited the 

 mouse in a nest near the top of it. I afterwards caught it among some 

 dead leaves, and although it made several attempts to bite me, a pair 

 of thick gloves sufficiently guarded my hands, and some heavy blows 

 on the head soon checked its energies. Having repeated them seve- 

 ral times, I believed that I had effectually killed it, and carried it some 

 distance in what I conceived a dead state, but the little hypocrite had 

 only assumed the appearance of death, for the moment I threw it 

 down on the ground, it found the free use of its legs, and effected its 

 escape, to my great surprize and disappointment. I have read anec- 

 dotes of foxes and other animals feigning death when surprized on a 

 sudden, but I should conceive it impossible for any creature to act the 

 part more perfectly than this ermine stoat did. I saw the mouse af- 

 ter it had been deposited in the nest, but a departure from home pre- 

 vented further observations. 



The courage of the stoat and the weasel far exceeds that of the 

 ferret, and their more slender forms give them a great advantage over 

 that animal in following rats through the intricacies of their burrows: 

 added to which the constitution of the ferret is more delicate, in con- 

 sequence of its being a native of a tropical climate. For these reasons 

 ii i 



