Although there are still a fair number of badgers left to us in this country, some of them dwelling as near London as Epping Forest, their nocturnal habits and underground abodes render them difficult subjects to study.

Otters, too, are fairly numerous but exceedingly alert creatures, as I have discovered again and again when trying to come to close quarters with one which I knew to sleep on the top of an old stump overhanging a pool on the River Mole. However, it would seem that we shall one day have a photographic study of the animal, for quite recently some unsportsmanlike slayer, discovering a member of the species asleep on a stump, went off and armed himself with a pitchfork, with which he returned and killed the poor animal. The habits of the ordinary brown rat are not very difficult to study if the observer will but stand quite still near its haunts on a summers evening. It is, in addition to being a cunning brute, a fierce and quarrelsome one, and sounds of open strife are often to be heard. Brown rats are very spiteful towards water-voles, but in flying, which they do very precipitately from their ill-treatment, the latter always quickly elude pursuit by diving. We have tried harder to get a photograph of a common brown rat than of any other living thing, and although we have come very near to succeeding on several occasions, something has failed us at a critical moment. During the whole course of our wanderings up and down the British Isles we have only fallen in with a single specimen of the old British black

rat, and that was in Norfolk, where I understand it is on the increase. It is a curious thing that rats have only

WATER-VOLE.

within recent years found their way into Unst, the most northern of the Shetland Islands, through the wrecking of a ship, and that bats, frogs, and toads are entirely unknown in any of the group.

I love to sit and watch water-voles swim across a sluggish river with pieces of grass in their mouths, like little beavers; or sitting on

their haunches upon some half-submerged branch, munching bits of succulent weed, which they have dived to the bottom of their native pond to secure. They are very fond of a floating bit of plank to rest upon, and look exceedingly comical when sitting up and washing themselves. I know a little pond in the banks of which a number live, and sometimes afford me great fun. When they run out into the field along their well-worn tunnellike tracks through the grass, I creep quietly upon my hands and knees along the edge of their aquatic home until I cut them off, and then crawl after them. When doing this I have sometimes known them clap as flat as pancakes, and look up at me with their nervous little dark eyes.

Our illustration of the rodent was obtained by hiding the camera and photographer on the bank of a pond, and waiting until one came out of his burrow and entered the field of focus. brother and I A year or two ago, whilst my were engaged in photographing a nightingale's nest situated in a small Hertfordshire copse, we heard a faint chirruping cry, as of a young pheasant in distress, proceeding from a dry ditch close by. Upon investigation we could see the dead leaves heave every time the sound came forth, and by-and-by discovered a chubby little red head peeping out. We were greatly puzzled with its appearance, and could not even guess at what it was until we recovered it, when it turned

out to be a young squirrel badly bitten in its hind-quarters. Although it had its eyes open it was too young to have travelled far without assistance, and as we conjectured the nest to which it belonged could not be a great distance away, we made a cast round to find it, and speedily succeeded in doing so. It was situated some thirty feet from the ground, in the fork of an ivy-clad beech-tree. My brother went up to investigate, and discovered that the nest, which had been built of soft dead grass, strips of fibrous bark, and withered leaves that had been gathered green, was in great disorder, and only contained the tail of a baby squirrel. In descending the tree, however, he fell in with a third youngster, clinging in a most terrified state of mind to the ivy, but, happily, otherwise quite unharmed.

We carried the pair home and fed them with cow's milk, which we poured into the palm of the hand and then dipped their noses in until they learnt to lap. I dressed the wounds of the bitten one, but he never appeared to get over them, and in a fortnight or so died, to the great grief of my little daughters, who are excessively fond of animals. The other grew up a fine strong fellow, with a handsome bushy tail. He used to roam all over the house, and one of his especial delights was to play the piano by running backwards and forwards at a great rate across its keys. Nearly every evening when I

HEDGEHOG ROLLED UP

HEDGEHOG.

came home from the City he used to overhaul my pockets for Spanish nuts, with which he mounted to one of my shoulders and sat up to eat.

One day I borrowed a ferret in order to dislodge a troublesome rat that had taken up its abode underneath my fowl-house, and happened to unbag him in the presence of the squirrel. At sight of the attenuated white thing he ran up a window-curtain, and seating himself at the end of the pole supporting it, began to swear dreadfully and kick his seat just like an angry rabbit.

It is a very pretty sight to see squirrels in the autumn leave the woods and come down into the fields after acorns. They do not carry their tails over their backs when upon the ground, but indulge in a peculiar undulating method of progression, which cannot very well be mistaken for that of any other animal. Hedgehogs are common enough, and very easy to study when they come forth from their hiding-places in hedgerows and woods in the evening time. I remember once, whilst lying up for rabbits on the edge of a very large wood in Cumberland, seeing them come out into an open pasture in surprising numbers. They are easy enough to photograph in their favourite attitude when under observation; namely, that of a prickly ball, as represented on the previous page; but a patient and silent wait is generally necessary to secure a picture showing their heads and feet.

Moles are numerous in most parts of the country, but are not often seen on account of their almost exclusively subterranean habits. They are for their size probably the strongest, most savage, and ferocious animals on the face of the whole earth, and it is appalling to think what terrible monsters for mischief they would have been if created as large as elephants. If a mole be allowed to bury his head and fore-feet beneath the ground, it has been proved that his strength is so enormous that he can drag a lump of lead after him, bulk for bulk, as large as himself. An ingenious but rather cruel experimenter in the North of England once allowed one to hang a dog which he wished to destroy, by tying one end of a strong piece of string to its hind-legs, and placing the other in a running noose round the poor dog's neck.

I do not think that moles catch many worms whilst they are at work boring their tunnels, for the least vibratory movement in the earth sets every worm near at hand to instant flight, as anyone may prove by the following simple experiment: Insert an ordinary three or four-pronged garden fork in the ground, and then strike the shaft with the hand so as to set up a slight quivering in the earth. This motion is undoubtedly similar to that which is produced by a burrowing mole, for every worm near at hand will immediately scamper to the surface in a great state of alarm.

In very droughty summers moles may sometimes be seen upon the surface of the ground and caught before they can escape. The one represented in our illustration was captured and photographed by my brother near Enfield, whilst

straying about on the hard-baked surface of the earth. I have once or twice seen them whilst sitting quietly under a hedge, come out for leaves, doubtless for nesting purposes. They may be easily caught alive at any time when throwing up a hillock of mould by driving one's boot-heel hard down upon their tunnels, just behind where it is calculated they are at work, and then swiftly pulling the surface of the earth away. I have j

secured specimens a good many times in this way, but, of course, approach to where they are at work must be very carefully made.

Not long ago I caught one in a field close to London in this way, and took him home in my pocket and turned him loose in a zinc pail full of mould. He instantly burrowed out of sight, and I saw no more of him for two or three hours. In the dusk of evening, however, he began to bestir himself, and I could hear his claws scraping against the sides of -the pail. I knew that he was hungry, and at once commenced to search for some acceptable morsel in the way of a supper for him. I was fortunate enough to find a number of large blackbeetles feasting on a piece of fat mutton at the bottom of a jar, and turned one out upon the mould in the pail. He raced wildly round and round once or twice, and then hid up in the shadow of a wee clod. Directly he stopped the mole's little red snout popped up right beneath him, and he quickly disappeared. I was greatl}7 astonished at the precision with which the mole located the position of his prey, and tried the experiment over and over again, but always with the same result.

Of course, it is very difficult to say whether his movements were guided by scent or sound; I am inclined to think the latter, but in either case the marvellous knowledge which he displayed in

locating his victim, and the dexterity of his movements, were subjects for wonder.

It is said that a mole cannot live for more than twelve hours without food, and from personal experience I am inclined to credit the statement

Although most people, and especially women, appear to abhor house-mice, they are pretty little creatures, with interesting ways, which we seldom have an opportunity of studying on account of their cunning and timidity, brought about by a long, long period of persecution. A year or two ago I had a mouse in my office which used to come out of its hole and scamper all over the room during the luncheon-hour when I had no callers and all was quiet. One day I placed a bit ot cheese inside my leather hand-bag, and, opening it, thrust the end of a stick of lead-pencil in the gape just by the hinge, with one end protruding, so that 1 could quickly snatch it out and allow all was still he camethe bag to close. When out of his hiding-place and ran round and round the bag several times, then jumped upon it and sat for ever such a while, and eyed first me and then the cheese, as much as to say, " No tricks ? Finally, he poppednow; is it fair and square " inside, but instantly sprang out again to see if all was right. The next time he went in he stayed and, creeping up on tiptoe I very quietly snatched the pencil away, and the bag closed and made

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