BADGER. 161 



place of partial protection, and there baited by numerous 

 Dogs, collected without much regard to breed, though 

 the Rough Terriers were the favourites ; and it would 

 be difficult to say whether the cruelty were greater to 

 the persecuted Badger, or to his canine tormentors. 



The gradual cessation of these barbarous and dastardly 

 sports is indeed one of the necessary results of the 

 spread of education, which at once produces a taste 

 for the substitution of intellectual for mere animal 

 sources of enjoyment, and supplies the means for its 

 indulgence; but there is, in the present instance, another 

 cause for the decline of this amusement, perhaps as 

 efficient as the former, which is, the numerical decrease 

 of the species itself: and were it not for this, it is to be 

 feared that a humane interposition to save an unhappy 

 Badger from this tormenting persecution, might still 

 chance, in some places at least, to be met with honest 

 Dandie Dinmont's astonished exclamation, " Lord save 

 us, to care about a Brock!" The recollection of the 

 custom, however, will continue to be interesting to the 

 philologist when the custom itself shall long have passed 

 away, as having given rise to a common expression, 

 which will probably be perpetuated as part and parcel 

 of our language. A person who is beset by numerous 

 assailants is said to be " badgered." 



The Badger is taken in various ways. The favourite 

 mode, and that which is perhaps the most successful, is 

 by catching him in a sack placed at the entrance of his 

 hole. The haunt of a Badger being ascertained, a moon- 

 light night is chosen, when he is out feeding, and a small 

 sack is placed within the mouth of the hole, fastened at 

 the outside, with the mouth of the bag outwards, and 

 having a running string round it. Two or three couples 

 of hounds are then thrown off at some distance : and as 



Y 



