250 



MOLE. 



not known ; but it may serve either as a sally-port or 

 as a means of drainage. 



We shall suppose the fort constructed in the 

 manner that has been stated ; but, even though it is, 

 the labours of the animal may be said to be little 

 else than begun, unless, indeed, the castle is con- 

 structed upon, or closely adjoining, a previously-made 

 run, which is almost always the case where moles are 

 numerous, and occupy a considerable breadth of 

 ground. There is one main thoroughfare or high- 

 way, which is either the one by which the mole 

 arrives at and constructs the castle, or one made 

 leading from it ; generally, we believe, it is the for- 

 mer, unless where a mole breaks ground in a new 

 place altogether. Besides this, there are other gal- 

 leries branching out in all directions from the habita- 

 tion, generally ramified into new branches after a 

 little distance, and very often bending round until 

 they come into the main road or roads. Some of 

 these are sufficiently near the surface for the mole 

 to throw up heaps at least in the first formation of 

 them ; and others are too deep for this ; but in all 

 cases of a second passage along the same gallery the 

 body of the animal smooths it, and converts it into a 

 permanent passage. Those passages cross and meet 

 each other in a variety of directions, and those of one 

 mole not unfrequently cross those of another. It 

 does not appear that, even when there is this kind of 

 territorial interference, the one mole wages voluntary 

 battle upon the other ; but, if two happen to meet, 

 there is a mortal combat, and no quarter. 



The feeding of the mole is in new runs opened up 

 from one or another of these galleries, and thus its 

 distance from the castle always becomes greater and 

 greater, while the intermediate ground is mined in 

 all directions. There is thus a very considerable 

 resemblance between the working of a mole under 

 ground and the working of a coal-mine by narrow 

 galleries ; but whether the directors of coal-mining 

 ever studied the under-ground plan of the mole, it is 

 impossible to say. 



The degree of strength which the mole gives to 

 its habitation is always very nicely proportioned to 

 the degree of danger to which it is exposed. In safe 

 and secluded places the crown of the dome is only a 

 few inches thick, while in exposed ones it is a foot 

 or more. It is the same with the main roads, and 

 all the galleries which are used as permanent pas- 

 sages. The instinct which regulates those adap- 

 tations is a very curious one, and quite inexplicable 

 upon any principle with which we are acquainted. 

 That it depends upon anything like a knowledge of 

 the circumstances on the part of the animal, in any 

 way analogous to our knowledge, cannot possibly be 

 true ; and therefore, as is the case with all that we 

 call animal instincts, it is impossible for us to explain 

 it upon any principles of our philosophy. The very 

 word instinct might tell us this, and thus spare us 

 the idleness of wondering about it ; because the real 

 meaning of instinct is that which proceeds entirely 

 from the animal itself, and to the cause of which we 

 have therefore no clue, though we may observe the 

 phenomena. It has often been observed that when 

 a mole carries its gallery against the foundation of a 

 wall, a large stone, or any other obstacle through 

 which it cannot make way, it turns downwards, up- 

 wards, or to a side, according to circumstances ; and 

 that, when it crosses a footpath, it mines more deeply 

 than when it is approaching or leaving such a 



situation. We have even heard it said that moles 

 work more deeply in places pastured by cattle than 

 in those pastured by sheep ; but we cannot vouch for 

 the truth of its instinct extending to this extraordinary 

 length. Its instincts are so curious, however, and 

 impressions are made on its senses by means so 

 different from those that affect us, that our judgments 

 respecting it must, in all cases, remain very imperfect. 

 The size of the galleries, even the principal ones, 

 which connect the castle with the most remote 

 pastures, are never so large as to admit two moles, 

 though they are always such that a single one can 

 move freely along. The hunting run, from which the 

 earth is thrown up in successive heaps, is at first no 

 bigger than to allow the animal to squeeze itself along ; 

 and this tightness assists it in digging, by giving it a 

 firm hold on the sides of the passage. Should the 

 run be afterwards converted into a road, which is 

 very frequently the case, the mole casts up no more 

 earth, but presses the sides with its body as it goes 

 along, and thereby gives the passage sufficient con- 

 sistency for keeping it open. Of course there is an 

 end to all hunting after the sides of the passage are 

 thus compressed, and indeed a mole rarely hunts 

 twice in the same run. On the contrary, its under- 

 ground food is almost entirely obtained by digging 

 anew in the earth, so that the animal has need of all 

 its stimulating appetites. When alarmed, the mole 

 can proceed along those main roads, which are 

 worked smooth, with a degree of rapidity far greater 

 than one would suppose, if the fact had not been 

 established experimentally by an author of undoubted 

 veracity. M. Henri le Court, who was driven from 

 Paris by the horrors of the French revolution, 

 retired to the country, and observed nature with the 

 same earnestness and the same unobtrusive quietness 

 as our illustrious Gilbert White ; and it is a fact 

 worth mentioning that the great Ray himself studied 

 nature when in retirement from political persecution. 

 The French naturalist above mentioned paid parti- 

 cular attention to the natural history of the mole, 

 and was the first who threw much light on its habits, 

 or elevated it to that rank which it is entitled to hold 

 among the productions of nature. The method upon 

 which he fell to ascertain the full speed of the mole 

 was very ingenious. He found a mole road of con- 

 siderable length, into which he placed straws, inter- 

 secting the passage perpendicularly, and placed on 

 the tops of them, above ground, little flags of paper. 

 When all was ready for measuring the time, and he 

 had ascertained that the mole was in the road, he 

 went to a horn which he had placed in the road 

 more distant from the mole's castle, and then, " wind- 

 ing the horn with a hideous cry," as Geoffroy St. 

 Hilaire says, he sent the mole post haste to its 

 castle, leaving the worms to their fate. On com- 

 paring the time and distance, it was ascertained that 

 the speed of the mole was nearly the same as that of 

 an ordinary horse trotting ; from which it should 

 seem that the passion of fear operates as powerfully 

 on the mole as the passion of hunger ; and this still 

 farther establishes the character we have endeavoured 

 to show that it possesses of intense energy in all its 

 animal action. Whether it may run as fast at other 

 times we have no means of ascertaining ; but cer- 

 tainly its motion on the surface of the ground is very 

 slow as compared with this. Along the run, when at 

 this velocity, its mode of action cannot be seen ; but 

 it is understood to be a very curious kind of gallop, 



