HEDGE-HOG. 61 



HEDGE-HOG.* 



Oct. 28th, 1828. HEDGE-HOGS are still about, and 

 on the alert for food. I fell in with one to-day in 

 my walks, in a sheltered part of the garden, which I 

 was enabled to watch unobserved, and which afforded 

 me an opportunity of seeing a little into their habits 

 and mode of feeding. It was creeping up and down a 

 grass walk, apparently in busy search for worms. It 

 carried its snout very low, insinuating it among the 

 roots of the herbage, and snuffing about under the 

 dead leaves which lay about. After a time, it com- 

 menced scratching at a particular spot, to which it 

 seemed directed by the scent, and drew out a very- 

 large worm from just beneath the surface of the 

 ground. This it immediately began to devour, taking 

 it into the mouth by one extremity, and gradually 

 eating its way to the other ; an operation which lasted 

 some time, and was attended by an incessant action 

 of the teeth, which grated upon one another with a 

 peculiar noise. After the worm was all gone, as I 

 thought, I was surprised to see the whole put out of 

 the mouth again ; and, from the appearance of the 

 cast, I was led to believe that it had been only sub- 

 jected to the action of the teeth, for the purpose of 

 being bruised, and squeezing out the soft internal 

 parts of the body, which alone were eaten in the first 

 instance : the skin itself, however, was shortly re- 

 taken into the mouth, and the whole clean devoured. 



From the above observation, it is probable that 



* Erinaceus europaus, Linn. 



