lone
against all the rabbits Squire Murray's got."

Another whine from Whip, and more pawing and rustling in that mysterious
place he had scratched into. Every boy of them wished he were in there
with a double-barrelled gun or something.

"Tad," said Frank Perry, "maybe it isn't a rabbit. Maybe it's something
big."

"Woodchucks?"

"Are there any 'coons around here nowadays?"

"Haven't seen any; but the rabbits are awful big ones, some of 'em."

Yelp, yelp, yelp, from the dog inside, and his voice had a smothered and
anxious sound.

"He's got him!" exclaimed Tad. But he had better have kept his hold upon
Ben for a moment longer. It had been pretty hard work the last minute or
so, for Ben understood every sound Whip had been making. All it had
meant really was: "Ben! boys! there's a rabbit here, and he keeps just
about a foot ahead of me. He's three sizes smaller than I am, and he can
get through the shock faster. One of you be on the look-out for him on
that further side."

The instant Tad loosened his arms from around Ben's neck, the sagacious
old fellow sprang forward--not at the hole where Whip went in, but
straight across, where there was no hole at all, till he came to make
one.

There was a big one there before any boy of them all knew what Ben was
up to. How the corn stalks did fly as he pawed his way in and tore them
aside with his great strong teeth! If he was not much of a hand at
setting up a shock, he was a mouth and four paws at pulling one down.

"Ben! Ben!" shouted Tad. "Come here! Rabbits, Ben--rabbits! Come here,
sir."

As if Ben needed anybody to say "rabbits" to him, after he had listened
to all that anxious whimpering from Whip!

"Shake the shock a little," said Dan Burrel. "He's in there somewhere."

He suited the action to the word, but that was all that was needed, and
down it came, flat on the ground, with a big dog and a small one and
five excited boys tearing around among the ruins.

There was a rabbit there too when the shock fell over, but he came out
of the confusion with a great leap, and would have made his escape
entirely if it had not been for the long legs of old Ben.

There was no time given the rabbit to hunt for another hiding-place, for
before the boys and Whip had quite made up their minds what had become
of their game, Ben was shaking him by the back of the neck half way down
the field.

"I say, boys," said Tad, "we must set this shock up again. There comes
Jo