JANUARY. 15 



same animal ; for the gamekeeper dislikes otters, and 

 the visitor often remains for good, in a glass case in 

 some one's parlour. There is a sort of fearsome mys- 

 tery about an otter which makes people more fond of 

 putting him than any other beast, stuffed, into a glass 

 case. I can recollect that in my own childhood the 

 otter was a thing of awe, and its footprint on the mud 

 a symbol to be gazed upon with open mouth, and 

 many half-anxious glances at the quaking reeds. 



A MYSTERIOUS BEAST. 



Where the otters which thus come in annual single 

 file to our water are reared no one seems to know, 

 for the animal is not known to breed in any part of 

 the stream, above or below, and there is no neigh- 

 bouring river to send its overflow of animal popula- 

 tion to seek new " spheres of influence." But of the 

 otter it is more difficult to speak with certainty than 

 of almost any other British beast. His habits are 

 nocturnal and very evasive, and it is no uncommon 

 thing for the goodwives of a village to be harassed 

 for months by depredations among their chickens 

 and ducklings, which they put down to cats, dogs, 

 foxes, tramps, stoats, or anything, except an otter. 

 Because who would suspect that so large a beast of 

 prey could live without once being seen by anybody 

 in the six-foot streamlet at the bottom of the garden, 

 where they wash the clothes and dishes ? That the 

 otter is often a wandering animal in winter, "here 

 to-day and gone to-morrow," as the gamekeeper says, 

 may be taken for certain ; but that he performs 

 regular migrations, like so many of the feathered and 



