^S Adams, On the Mole {Talpa etiropcsa). 



Folklore. 



It is not strange that this animal, with its curious 

 appearance and mysterious habits, should give rise to 

 superstitions and fables. 



A writer in Science Gossip, 1867, relates the fol- 

 lowing : " A curious mode of treatment for ague is 



practised in Marshland ' You must catch a mole, 



and it must be a male mole, one of those little creatures 

 they hang on trees. Well, sir, you must then skin it 

 and dry the body in the oven, and then powder it, and 

 you must take as much of the powder as will lie on a 

 shilling every day in gin. You must take it for nine 

 days running, and then miss nine, and then take it nine 

 days more, and then miss nine. By this time you are 

 cured.' " 



The Rev. Wood ruffe- Peacock writes in the Naturalist, 

 Sept., 1900 : "Lincolnshire folklore says the mole leaves 

 the ground but once a year, to take a little fresh air in 

 the daylight." 



My friend Mr. J. R. B. Masefield, of Cheadle, 

 Staffordshire, tells me that at Cheadle a working man 

 told him that a mole has only one drop of blood. This 

 notion has most likely arisen from the fact that if a mole 

 is so wounded as to show a very little blood, the wound is 

 really very serious, the thick tough skin preventing the 

 escape of blood from an ordinary hurt. 



Dr. Addenbrooke, of Birmingham, informs me that 

 in Smethwick, S. Staffs., there is a superstition that moles 

 which are found wandering about in the daytime are 

 " moonstruck." 



An old mole-catcher at Clifton, Derby, once informed 

 me that moles were blind, but they had eyes on the soles 

 of their feet. 



Mole-hills arc locally known in Staffordshire as 



