FREQUENTING THE HOLES OF FIELD-MICE. 121 
have watched him enter a wheat-rick at the bottom, and in 
less than a minute seen him peeping out under the thatch : 
but in mentioning this I am on dangerous ground ; I fear 
I shall neither make you nor your readers believe that 
wheat-ricks are very often a complete honeycomb, with the 
galleries made in them by mice and rats, extending from 
the very crown to the faggots on which they are built ; 
and that hundreds of these vermin are frequently found in 
one rick. However, where there are many rats there are 
few mice, and where there are many mice there are few 
rats ; because the rats, being strongest, expel the mice. 
To return to the weasel : his usual habitation is the gal- 
lery of a field-mouse on whom he has served a writ of 
ejectment, and he usually chooses one in a bank in which 
the roots of bushes are tolerably plentiful and strong, as he 
well knows that these will effectually prevent his being 
dug out by any evil-disposed person or persons : he also 
invariably takes the precaution to select a burrow with two 
openings, so that, if one is besieged, he makes his exit at 
the other. I very well recollect seeing a weasel go into a 
little round hole, scarcely bigger than the hole of a wasp's 
nest ; I immediately put my foot on it, and despatched a 
lad who was with me for a spade, determined to take the 
little fellow alive. The spade came, we dug away, cut 
through roots, pulled down the bank, and did no end of 
mischief; and, after two hours' labour, found that the hole 
went right through the bank, and came out on the other 
side. 
The weasel has an excellent nose, as. I think I have 
pretty clearly shown above ; but it is not exercised on the 
trail of rats only. I have, on two occasions, seen rabbits 
pursued by him, run down, and killed : one was on Munsted 
