T. V. ROBERTS — nEETFORDSnTRE MAMMALIA. 171 



bcccli trees gTowing on the high ground which forms that side of 

 the depression. Some three or four years ago a determined attempt 

 was made to exterminate the badgers in order to get rid of the 

 mange in the foxes that used the earths. Great excavations were 

 made and vast quantities of chalk removed, but the attempt had to 

 be abandoned. I forget how many men were employed, but I 

 think tliey were at work for twelve days. The runs were found 

 in numerous directions and at considerable depths; one cutting 

 made by the workmen, that I went into, must have been eight or 

 nine feet deep, and there were runs all along the bottom. A 

 chamber was also found supported by a pillar left in the centre. 

 Foxes, badgers, and rabbits all use this great earth. Mr. HoUiday 

 told me that he had frequently watched both fox and badger cubs 

 playing together outside. We went to see another very similar but 

 smaller earth, also in a depression in a beech grove, with the holes 

 formed on the highest side and running into the chalk under the 

 roots of the trees. Mr. Holliday entirely confirms Mr. St. John's 

 statement as to the extreme cleanliness of the badger in its abode. 

 An inspection of these earths gave one an excellent idea of the 

 resources of badgers, and of the almost impossibility of destroying 

 them when the locality chosen for their abode happens to be one 

 well adapted for their habits. The extent of their runs and the 

 great depth at which they occurred rendered even this most vigorous 

 attempt futile. I hope and believe that now they will be suffered 

 to remain in peace, and that the prescriptive right of such ancient 

 inhabitants to their stronghold will be respected. 



Foxes ( Canis vulpes) have, as we all know, been credited from 

 remote antiquity with ingenuity in the art of getting out of wells. 

 One was found at the bottom of a well in the ice-house at Ashlyns. 

 Mr. Holliday got a ladder, went down, and brought it up under 

 his arm. The animal appeared quite to grasp the situation, did 

 not attempt to bite, but merely looked up at him with its wonder- 

 fully bright eyes. On reaching the surface it was of course 

 liberated. 



The extraordinary courage of the weasel [Mustela vulgaris) is 

 well knovsTi. Osgood, Mr. Hucks Gibbs' keeper, tells me that 

 when feeding his young pheasants he has actually killed with his 

 foot one that had come close to him through the grass after the 

 birds, and had seen others at the same time. 



Both stoats and weasels seem to be commoner in this locality 

 than might be expected. Osgood tells me that he has killed as 

 many as fifty stoats (^Mustela erminea) in one year, a number which 

 strikes me as being very large in such a country as this. The 

 exceptionally fine specimen of a stoat exhibited I obtained from 

 him. It was shot near Aldenham. A comparison between this 

 skin and another which may be taken to represent the normal size 

 of a stoat will show what a singularly fine animal the Aldenham 

 specimen was. The keeper told me that he had no recollection of 

 ever having seen a larger one. Stoats, he tells me, often prodiice 

 ten or twelve young at a litter. He has frequently killed as many. 



