THE VOYAGES OF THE LEMMING 



not usually, specimens at the Zoo. It is a curious fact 

 that a peculiar long-tailed porcupine of the Old World 

 has such a habit of ridding itself of that tail by mis- 

 adventure, that the original specimen was ineptly called 

 Tricky >s lipura. 



THE LEMMING 



There are several kinds of lemmings, at fewest two, 

 which are circumpolar in range, and are found in the 

 extreme of North America and Greenland, in Siberia and 

 the north of Europe. They are little rodents, especially 

 closely allied to the real water-rat, or vole, and belonging 

 like that rodent, to a great family Muridae, which em- 

 braces anything and everything that can be really 

 termed a rat. The most familiar kind of lemming is the 

 little animal which lives in the central highlands of 

 Norway, and whose migrations are referred to in every 

 book on popular zoology. It has been an inmate of the 

 Zoo, though at the moment of writing there are no ex- 

 amples of it. So associated is this little beast with its 

 restless and persevering habits, that but a trifle is known 

 about it when really at home in central Norway. The 

 migrations seem to be associated with hunger ; unusual 

 fertility produced lemmings in excess of available food. 

 It is exactly the same thing that occasionally occurs with 

 other rodents, more particularly with the field vole, of 

 which there were phenomenal swarms in Scotland a few 

 years back. When this event occurs, which is at quite 

 irregular intervals, the lemmings put their best foot 

 forward and set forth on their journey. So suddenly, and 

 in such hordes, do they appear, that in old days they 

 were held to be rained from the skies, as many persons 

 believe with regard to frogs at the present day. They 

 cross streams, descend and ascend cliffs, on their journey- 

 ings, and in fact are impeded by no obstacle surmount- 



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