86 ANECDOTES OF ANIMALS. 



circumference. Within this lower gallery is a chamber, 

 which communicates with the upper gallery by three 

 descending tunnels. This chamber is, as it were, the 

 citadel of the mole, in which it sleeps. 



A principal gallery goes from the lower gallery, in a 

 direct line, to the utmost extent of the ground through 

 which the mole hunts; and from the bottom of this 

 dormitory is another, which descends farther into the 

 earth, and joins this great or principal road. Eight or 

 nine other tunnels run round the hillock at irregular 

 distances, leading from the lower gallery through which 

 the mole hunts its prey, and which it constantly en- 

 larges. During this process it throws up the hillocks 

 which betray its vicinity to us. The great road is of 

 various depths, according to the quality of the soil in 

 which it is excavated : it is generally five or six inches 

 below the surface, but if carried under a stream or 

 pathway, it will be occasionally sunk a foot and a half. 

 If the hillock be very extensive, there will be several 

 high-roads, and they will serve for several moles ; but 

 they never trespass on each other's hunting-grounds. 

 If they happen to meet in a road, one is obliged to 

 retreat, or they have a battle, in which the weakest 

 always comes off the worst. In a barren soil the search- 

 ing galleries are the most numerous ; and those made 

 in winter are the deepest, because the worms penetrate 

 beyond the line of frost, and the mole is as active in 

 winter as in warm weather. 



The females have a separate chamber made for them, 

 in which they bring forth their young. This is situated 

 at some distance from the citadel, and placed where 

 three or four galleries intersect each other. There they 

 have a bed made of dry grass or fibres of roots, and 



