I

t was a hooded cobra, standing up as if to strike. Before I had a chance to consider the danger, I heard a high-pitched squeal, and a furry creature threw itself onto the cobra.

It was not Chesterton, Betsy's tabby, but a strange brown creature, much like a weasel. The weasel jumped onto the cobra, than retreated, just in time to avoid the reptile's fangs. Presently the weasel got around behind the cobra's hood and attempted to get a hold on its neck, but the cobra flipped down and threw its coils around the weasel. In an instance it bit the weasel, but the weasel quickly tore itself away and bit the snake on the snout. The snake fell back into its corner for the moment and the weasel into its corner. Then they fell to it again.

Soon I resolved to aid the weasel. It only seems natural to assist another creature in a fight against a deadly snake, and I feared the snake much more than the other. I picked up a stout piece of lumber and approached the animals, who were too intent on the fight to notice me - until I raised the wood over my head. Suddenly two pairs of beady eyes were on me, and the snake instantly headed for the woods. I followed, but I must admit, at a safe distance and soon lost it in the underbrush.

When I got back and replaced the lumber, I did not expect to see the weasel, but there it was, sitting on its haunches, looking at me steadily with shiny black eyes and a twitching furry brown tail. Then it turned and ran around the Corning house with such speed that I did not even consider a chase.

As an educated man, Reverend Halifax, you no doubt have suspected that this was no weasel at all, but the only creature known to fight cobras, and to withstand the cobra's venom, the Indian Mongoose. But what were either of these natives of India doing in an English garden? We have no zoo in this region. I asked around town, especially of a sailor, an employee of the British India Company, but he swore he never brought such creatures home from his travels.

(To be continued...)