COMMON OTTER. 169 



or ponds, and not unfrequently descends to the sea : 

 and the havoc which it makes amongst the finny in- 

 habitants is almost incredible. In feeding, it holds the 

 fish between its fore-paws, eating first the head, and then 

 downwards to the vent, leaving the tail. But it is not 

 only to those which are necessary for its sustenance that 

 its ravages are restricted, for,, as honest Izaak Walton 

 says very truly, " The Otter devours much fish, and kills 

 and spoils much more than he eats." 



The accounts which some writers have given of its 

 habits are greatly exaggerated. We read of its exca- 

 vating a very artificial habitation, burrowing under 

 ground to a considerable distance ; making the aper- 

 ture of its retreat always under water, and working 

 upwards, forming here and there a lodge, or dry resting- 

 place, till it reaches the surface of the ground at the 

 extremity of its burrow, and making there a breathing- 

 hole, always in the middle of a bush or thicket.* This 

 statement is wholly incorrect. The Otter avails itself 

 of any convenient excavation, particularly of the hollows 

 beneath the overhanging roots of trees which grow on 

 the banks of rivers, or any other secure and concealed 

 hole near its fishing haunt ; though in some cases it 

 fixes its retreat at some distance from the water, and, 

 when driven by a scanty supply of fish, it has been 

 accused of resorting far inland, to the neighbourhood of 

 the farmyard, and attacking lambs, sucking-pigs, and 

 poultry, thus assuming for a time the habits of its 

 more terrestrial congeners. This we believe, however, 



* It is worthy of remark that this erroneous account of the retreat of the 

 Otter is almost exactly similar to the haunt of the Ornithorhynchus, as de- 

 scribed "by Mr. George Bennett, in the Transactions of the Zoological Society ; 

 though the former is to be found in books published ages before the latter 

 animal was discovered. 



Z 



