CHAP. vii. THE OTTER. 115 



Speaking of the Otter as a night-reamer, Edward 

 observes : " I am not aware who first burlesqued the 

 Otter as an amphibious animal. He must have 

 known very little of the animal's true habits, and 

 nothing at all of its anatomical structure. The error 

 thus promulgated seems to have taken deep root. 

 That the Otter is aquatic in habits is well known. 

 He goes into the water to fish, but he is forced to 

 come up again to breathe. In fact, a very small por- 

 tion of the Otter's life is spent in the water. There 

 are many birds that are far more aquatic than the 

 Otter. There are some, indeed, that never leave the 

 water night nor day ; yet no one calls them amphi- 

 bious birds. I have seen the Otter, in his free, un- 

 fettered, and unmolested condition, both in the sea 

 and the river, go into the water, and disappear many 

 a time, and I have often watched for his reappearance. 

 The longest time that he remained under water was 

 from three to four minutes ; the usual time was from 

 two to three minutes. I have also watched numbers 

 of water birds, who have also to descend for their 

 food, and I must say that the greater number of them 

 exceed the Otter in the time that they remain below 

 water. Some of them remain double the time. I 

 once saw a Great Northern Diver remain below water 

 more than nine minutes. A porpoise that I once 

 watched, remained down about ten minutes ; and so 

 on with other sea-birds and animals." 



Many of these night-roaming animals such as the 



