The ferret came out after the rabbit; he immediately caught it and thrust it into his pocket.  There were still two ferrets in—­one that was suspected to be gorging on a rabbit in a cul de sac, and the other lined, and which had gone to join that sanguinary feast.  The use of the line was to trace where the loose ferret lay.  ’Chuck I the show’l, measter,’ said Little John.

I gave the ‘navigator’ tool a heave over the hedge; it fell and stuck upright in the sward.  Orion handed it to him.  He first filled up the hole from which a rabbit had just bolted with a couple of ‘spits,’ i.e. spadefuls, and then began to dig on the top of the mound.

This digging was very tedious.  The roots of the thorn bushes and trees constantly impeded it, and had to be cut.  Then upon at last getting down to the hole, it was found that the right place had not been hit by several feet.  Here was the line and the lined ferret—­he had got hitched in a projecting root, and was furiously struggling to go forward to the feast of blood.

Another spell of digging—­this time still slower because Little John was afraid lest the edge of his tool should suddenly slip through and cut his ferret on the head, and perhaps kill it.  At last the place was reached and the ferret drawn forth still clinging to its victim.  The rabbit was almost beyond recognition as a rabbit.  The poor creature had been stopped by a cul de sac, and the ferret came upon him from behind.

As the hole was small the rabbit’s body completely filled it, and the ferret could not scramble past to get at the spot behind the ear where it usually seizes.  The ferret had therefore deliberately gnawn away the hindquarters and so bored a passage.  The ferret being so gorged was useless for further hunting and was replaced in the bag.  But Little John gave him a drink of water first from the bottom of the ditch.

Orion and I, wearied with the digging, now insisted on removing to the next bury, for we felt sure that the remaining rabbits in this one would not bolt.  Little John had no choice but to comply, but he did so with much reluctance and many rueful glances back at the holes from which he took the nets.  He was sure, he said, that there were at least half-a-dozen still in the bury:  he only wished he might have all that he could get out of it.  But we imperiously ordered a removal.

We went some thirty yards down the mound, passing many smaller buries, and chose a spot perfectly drilled with holes.  While Little John was in the ditch putting up nets, we slily undid the ferret-bag and turned three ferrets at once loose into the holes.  ’Lor! measter, measter, what be you at?’ cried Little John, quite beside himself.  ’You’ll spoil all on it.  Lor!’

A sharp report as Orion fired at a rabbit that bolted almost under Little John’s fingers drowned his remonstrances, and he had to scramble out of the way quick.  Bang! bang! right and left:  the firing became rapid.  There being no nets to alarm the rabbits and three ferrets hunting them, they tumbled out in all directions as fast as we could load.  Now the cartridges struck branches and shattered them.  Now the shot flattened itself against sarsen stones imbedded in the mound.  The rabbits had scarce a yard to bolt from one hole to another, so that it was sharp work.