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LETTER XXXIV. 



THE HEDGE-HOG 



appears to be the porcupine in miniature. It is so 

 generally known, that I shall not trouble you with 

 any description of it. I shall only remark, that it is 

 one of the most inoffensive of animals; and that al- 

 though nature has provided it with a spinous armour, 

 sufficient to protect it from the attacks of the weasel, 

 the foumart, and other beasts of prey of the smaller 

 kind; it cannot secure it from the cruelty of man, or 

 of dogs trained up to the sport of tearing it in pieces 

 merely to gratify the barbarous pleasure of seeing a 

 harmless creature endure with astonishing patience 

 the most wanton and unprovoked outrages. The 

 cruelties inflicted on this inoffensive animal for sa- 

 vage pastime, are ofcen such as must make sensibility 

 shudder. Shocking, indeed, must it be to consider 

 that man, weak and mortal himself, and, liable to a 

 thousand misfortunes, should find a barbarous plea- 

 sure in torturing with savage cruelty beings, which, 

 like himself, are endowed with life an I sensation, 

 and, like himself, are exposed to a variety of physi- 

 cal evils. Although inferior to him in the scale of 

 existence, the consideration of that inferiority ought 

 to excite his compassion, and not to excite him to 

 cruelty ; above all, it ought to stimulate his gratitude 

 to the bountiful Giver of art good, for that pre-emi- 

 nence over the brute creation with which he sees him- 

 self endowed. 



During the winter these animals wrap themselves 

 up in a nest of moss, leaves, and dried grass; and is 

 sometimes so completely covered with herbage, that 

 it resembles a ball of dried leaves: in this situation it 

 remains perfectly torpid, till revived by the cheering 

 influence of spring. The female produces four or five 

 young ones at a .time, which are soon covered with 

 spines, though shorter and weaker than those of the 

 parent animal. It is said that these creatures may be 

 in some degree domesticated; and an instance once 

 occurred in Northumberland, of a hedge-hog per- 

 funning the duty of a turn-spit at a public -inti. 



