ater, digging out an obstinate, but
tempting root, when there arose a sudden great outcry from all the
birds. It meant "A hawk!--A hawk!--A hawk!--A hawk!" He understood it
perfectly; but he never lifted his head from his task. Next moment
there was a mighty rush of wind in his ears; a thunderbolt seemed to
strike him, frightful claws gripped him, piercing his back, and he was
swept into the air. But it was a young hawk, unversed in the way of
the muskrat, which had seized him. What those steely claws really
clutched was little more than a roll of loose skin. Hurt, but not
daunted, the muskrat twisted his head up and back, and sank his long,
punishing incisors into the enemy's thigh. He did not hang on, in
bulldog fashion, but cut, cut, cut, deep through the bird's hard
feather armour, and into the cringing red strata of veins and muscles.
With a scream of pain and fear, the bird dropped him, and he fell into
the water. At first, he dived deep, fearing a second attack, and came
up under a tangle of grasses, from which he could peer forth unseen.
Then, perceiving that the hawk had vanished, he, by and by, came out
of the grass, and paddled to his favourite log. He was bleeding
profusely, and his toilet that evening was long and painful. But in a
few days he was as well as ever, with an added confidence.

About this time, however, a small, inquisitive, and particularly
bloodthirsty mink came down from the upper waters of the creek, where
game had grown scarce under the ravages of her insatiable and
implacable family. One of her special weaknesses was for muskrat-meat,
and many a muskrat house she had invaded so successfully that the
long, smothering, black, drowned galleries had no more terrors for
her.

She came to the house in the alders. She noted its size, and realized
that here, indeed, was good hunting. She swam down to the water-gate
at the bottom of the channel, poked her nose in, and returned to the
surface for a full supply of air. Then, with great speed, she dived
again, and disappeared within the blackness of the water-gate.

It chanced that the big muskrat was just descending. From the inner
darkness he saw the enemy clearly, before her savage, little, peering
eyes could discover him. He knew all the deadliness of the peril. He
could easily have escaped, turning back and fleeing by the other
passage while the foe went on to her bloody work in the chambers.
There was no time to warn the rest.

But flight