194 SOCIABLE ANIMALS. 
In habits marmots are essentially sociable 
animals, inasmuch as they live in little colonies ; 
but, unlike some of the prairie marmots, these 
rock-whistlers, when married, have a house of 
their own; and if blessed with a family—a blessing 
seldom denied them—they kick out the youthful 
pledges of affection as soon as they can nibble up 
a living for themselves. The burrow, which is 
quite two feet in diameter, is dug invariably ina 
slanting direction, generally at the base of a rock, 
standing up like a pedestal, on which they love 
to sit and whistle. Wide trails, bare-like roads, 
lead in all directions from their holes to the 
feeding and drinking-places ; their hours of repast, 
sensibly chosen, are early in the morning, when 
the grass and herbage is wet with dew. 
For only a few months, during summer, is this_ 
quaint little miner permitted to revel in the 
luxury of light; for seven dreary months out 
of the twelve does he sleep out his drowsy 
existence. What a wise and wonderful provi- 
sion, to secure from utter extinction animals 
compelled to live in these icy regions, is hyberna- 
tion! Growing wondrously fat during the sum- 
mer, they retire, when the nipping cold and deep 
snow comes, into burrows lined with soft warm 
bedding ; there become semi-torpid, and literally a 
