64 BADGER 



guisard ; Melos ; Pate (North) ; Sow-brock (Fife), sweetmart 

 (Yorksh.) ; Taxus. 



The name " bawsond," etc., given from white strij)e on its face, 

 the other names mostly explain themselves. The word " boreson " 

 has been given as derived from boar or bear, but this is thought 

 to be a mistake, as the badger belongs to the weasel family. 



Though the badger is mentioned in the Scriptures in Exodus, 

 Leviticus, and Ezekiel (in the 4th chapter of Leviticus, indeed, it 

 occurs no less than seven times), it is now considered that the 

 animal there meant was more akin to the seal tribe, though 

 certainly badgers are still in Palestine. Badgers have been well 

 known always in Scotland, and especially in the wilder parts of 

 the Highlands, though iJghtfoot gives place to a statement in 

 his Flora Scotica that they were not known in the islands (Hebrides) 

 in 1790. In a list of "Vermin" destroyed at Glengarry from 

 Whitsunday 1837 to Whitsunday 1840, sixty-seven badgers appear, 

 or rather were made to disappear. '1 he badger was the only 

 animal absent from a certain great historical feast made by 

 Cormack, son of Tadg, at which there was one hundred of every 

 kind of four-footed animals. The badgers, as the tale of old says, 

 were eventually secured by aid of a Druid, Odran, who said they 

 were human beings transformed by magic. 



A badger's den is called in Gaelic '^ garaidh," and the place to 

 which they resort " broclac h," oftener " braclach," which is also a 

 proper name. Broc-lann is also another term for the den. Baiting 

 a badger used to be a well-known cruel pastime, but he never 

 yielded (true Celt that he is) -without due retribution. His grasp 

 and bite is noted, and in exemplification thereof the following 

 German tale may be quoted. German, hunting badger in Scotland 

 for the first time, pursues it to its garaidh, and impetuously inserts 

 his hand ; his friend, feeling his return past due, seeks him out and 

 asks, "Hast thou then the badger got? " the reply being, "No, 

 but rae the badger has ! " " Beat the badger " was an old Fife 

 game played among boys, supposed to be the same as "Bannet 

 fire," both being relics of the ancient ordeal of " running the 

 gauntlet." 



The badger is a quiet and inoffensive animal and by no means 

 destructive, though it digs out and devours young rabbits. Its fossil 

 remains are found in this country along with the extinct cave-bear, 

 hyena, and tiger. It is concluded, from ancient remains found 

 fossilised, among other places, in Redscraig, Suffolk, I^ngland, to 

 be " the oldest known species of mammal now living on the face 

 of the earth," though the hedgehog competes with it for priority, 

 at least in Great Britain. Its den or garaidh, broc-lann or luidh, 

 like that of many other wild animals, smells strongly, and a person 

 of dirty habits has hence been called a "brock." In J. F. 

 Campbell's Sgeulachdan, or Highland Tales, the saying " Broc agus 



