10 ^ *VNM\1L LIFE OF THE BRITISH ISLES. 



Ti.e ^iutcr time is c,pent as a rule in continued sleep ; though 

 he has been known on mild nights in winter to wake up and 

 prowl around for the very few good things then to be found. 

 But he is no intermittent hibernator like the Squirrel and 

 Dormouse ; therefore he makes no provision by laying up 

 winter stores, which are only possible for seed-feeders. For 

 his winter retreat he looks out for a hole in the bank perhaps 

 one that has been gradually enlarged by a colony of wasps to 

 accommodate their continually increasing nest and this he 

 lines with dry leaves and moss, carried in by the mouth. Then 

 he snuggles into his bed and goes to sleep until the spring. 



The Hedgehog's eyesight does not appear to be very good, 



but this is made up to him by a very acute sense of smell. He 



hunts along the hedgebottoms and the sides of ditches, and in, 



some localities he is frequently to be seen in such situations. 



But we have met with signs of his presence high up on the 



moors where ke finds dense cover among the heather and 



bilberry. His common diet of snails and beetles is varied by the 



eggs of the robin .and meadow pipit, and occasionally he 



stumbles upon a huge store of food in the shape of a dozen or 



more eggs of pheasant or partridge. By depressing his spines 



he may even find his way between the bars of a hen-coop, but 



after eating a great part of the hen he may be too portly to get 



out, and then falls a victim to the enraged poultry-farmer. He 



is, of couse, too short-legged to accomplish the operation 



formerly attributed to him that of milking cows unless, of 



course, the cow assented to the robbery and laid down to it. 



But no evidence has been given in support of the charge, which 



is of kindred nature to the aspersions of Pliny, ./Elian and other 



of the ancients that it climbed apple and fig trees, gathering 



and throwing down the fruit, then throwing itself down so that 



its spines would impale its plunder with which it walked off. 



One weak point in the story is the fact that the Hedgehog has 



no use for such fare as apples, and as for the milk any one 



