XVI 

 THE SURVIVAL OF THE OTTER 



THE otter is so shy a creature that few British 

 naturalists have had more than tantalizing 

 glimpses of its everyday (or rather, everynight) 

 life, wherewith to supplement what they know of 

 the animal in zoological gardens, and what they 

 have gathered from a study of its structure the 

 finely-molded skull, for instance. This gap in our 

 knowledge was filled a few years ago by Mr. J. C. 

 Tregarthen's Life Story of the Otter. 1 The author's 

 observational patience and sympathy, shown also 

 in his biographies of fox and hare, have enabled 

 him to disclose the vie intime of an animal which is, 

 to say the least, very unapproachable. We hope 

 that our appreciation, at once of the beast and the 

 book, will serve to introduce Mr. Tregarthen's 

 delightful studies in Natural History to some who 

 have not had the pleasure of knowing them. The 

 question with which we are especially concerned is 

 how the otter manages to hold its own in Britain, 

 where so many of its Order, such as badger and 

 wild cat, polecat and marten, have become very 

 few and far between. It is not enough to refer to 

 the otter's cerebral endowments, its keen senses of 



1 Murray, London, 1915. 

 120 



