AMPHIBIOUS QUADRUPEDS. 247 



terrestrial animals, rats, insects, and even sheep 

 themselves. Nature, however, has given it the 

 power of continuing a long time without food ; 

 and although during that season it is not render- 

 ed quite torpid, like the marmot or the dormouse, 

 yet it keeps much more within its retreat, which 

 is usually the hollow of a bank worn under by 

 the water. There it often forms a kind of gal- 

 lery, running for several yards along the edge of 

 the water ; so that when attacked at one end, it 

 flies to the other, and often evades the fowler by 

 plunging into the water at forty or fifty paces dis- 

 tance, while he expects to find it just before him. 



We learn from M. Buffon, that this animal, in 

 France, couples in winter, and brings forth in the 

 beginning of spring. But it is certainly different 

 with us, for its young are never found till the lat- 

 ter end of summer ; and I have frequently, w r hen 

 a boy, discovered their retreats, and pursued them 

 at that season. I am, therefore, more inclined to 

 follow the account given us of this animal by Mr 

 Lots, of the Academy of Stockholm, who assures 

 us that it couples about the middle of summer, 

 and brings forth at the end of nine weeks, gene- 

 rally three or four at a time. This, as well as the 

 generality of his other remarks on this subject, 

 agrees so exactly with what I remember concern- 

 ing it, that I will beg leave to take him for my 

 guide ; assuring the reader, that however extra- 

 ordinary the account may seem, I know it to be 

 certainly true. 



In the rivers and the lakes frequented by the 

 otter, the bottom is generally stony and uneven, 



