THE MOLE. 105 



pastures in the spring a very unsightly appearance, and 

 in grounds designed to be mowed, occasion much 

 trouble, by obliging us frequently to spread and remove 

 them; and in newly-sown corn-lands, they disturb by 

 their runnings the earth at the roots of the grain. But, 

 perhaps, these trifling complaints, these almost imagi- 

 nary grievances, are the only evils that can be attribut- 

 ed to them. In those wild creatures that are not imme- 

 diately applicable to our use or amusement, we are 

 more generally inclined to seek out their bad than their 

 good qualities ; and though I cannot produce any in- 

 stance in which the utility of the mole is manifested, 

 yet it is reasonable to conclude, that they are eminently 

 so, either directly or collaterally, nature having pro- 

 vided in an especial manner for a constant supply,* and 

 their increase is prodigious when they are not molested. 

 I have killed for two years in succession, between forty 

 and fifty each season, in a very few acres of ground ; 

 and notwithstanding all our stratagems for their destruc- 

 tion, and the ease with which they are entrapped, still 

 plenty always remain to recruit our annual waste of 

 them. These creatures are supposed to have a very im- 

 perfect vision, and, like insects, have not any external 

 ear, or manifest organ through which sounds can be 

 received ; yet we can jn no way for a moment suppose 

 that they have been created with any deficiency of 

 power to accomplish all the objects of their being, but 

 that every possible exigency has been provided for. 

 Perceptions may be conveyed in very many instances 

 by intelligences unknown to us, and unquestionably are 

 so. The defect of one power is frequently supplied by 

 the increased activity of another ; and the sense of 

 smelling in the mole must be unusually acute, to en- 

 able it to pursue and capture its prey with the facility 

 that it does. Its sole food, we believe, is worms ; and 

 these sensitive creatures retire immediately upon the 

 smallest moving of the earth in which they reside. 

 Now, as it follows them through all their meanderings, 

 in which neither eyes nor ears would assist it, a fine 



* See Ray's Synopsis. 



