WILD ANUIALS IN CAPTIVITY 
poisonous one, we think would be at a loss to know how 
to doctor his wounds were they filled with poison as active 
and fatal as the poison of the cobra. It is probable that 
no living creature, the size of which does not render it 
impossible to be seized, is free or safe from its attack. 
It will, when other food is not at hand, take to the water 
like an otter, and swim about after fish. The slippery 
eel, which it kills in the same manner as it would a snake, 
is unable to elude its bloodthirsty intentions. 
In fighting with each other, the mode of attack is 
completely changed; the neck of the ichneumon being 
thick and almost invulnerable, they bite each other about 
the feet and legs, and most frequently terminate their 
battle by getting fast hold of the throat. They live in 
holes in the ground, among loose stones or rocks, in hollow 
trees or under the roots, in old drains or in any comfort- 
able hiding-place, their slender form enabling them to 
find their way into places so small, that it sometimes 
appears incredible that they could enter them. Their 
habits are both diurnal and nocturnal, according to cir- 
cumstances. They usually produce three or four at a 
birth ; the young are helpless and blind for some days. 
The ichneumon is a dangerous animal to keep in a 
careless manner in the house, or in any other place, as 
should it by accident find itself at liberty, it will kill 
every living creature it can overpower. One kept as a 
pet by the writer escaped in the night from its cage, and 
cleared the poultry-house belonging to him by killing 
fifteen or sixteen valuable fowls through biting them on 
the back of the necks, and, no doubt, sucking a portion 
of blood from each of its victims. It is a well-known fact 
that a single animal will continue to hunt and kill, one 
after another, everything that it can find possessing life 
in the place, and in that way a very large number of its 
