FLUFF-BUTTON THE RABBIT 95 
but the latter is fashioned expressly for war and 
the former is not. 
The stoat went into the fray joyously. He 
slew two and drove the others back. Then, for he 
never noticed Brownie trembling in her nursery, he 
glided off and made his way to the main dormitory, 
where he found another party of rats assembled. 
These fled before him into a ' hide-up,' whither 
he followed them, and although he sustained two 
or three wounds himself, he mortally wounded 
another. The tables were now turned with a 
vengeance. The rats were in a worse plight than 
their whilom victims ; for wet, starving and be- 
wildered, they were hunted through a strange 
warren by their most implacable enemy. The 
rabbits had one and all retreated to the remotest 
corners which they could find, but the stoat heeded 
them not, for he killed among the panic-stricken 
rats for the sheer lust of killing. Even if by chance 
he crossed a rabbit's trail and followed it up, he 
invariably stumbled across some terrified rat who 
sat and jibbered in the darkness. 
At last he was satiated and retired to Fluff- 
Button's dormitory to sleep. Two rabbits were dead 
besides Brownie's litter, who had paid the grim 
penalty which is always paid by nestlings whose 
nursery is discovered. Of the rats, two had been 
