60 The Zoologist — February, 1866. 



in the mole, had been devoured. At another time a large rat was dis- 

 posed of in like fashion ; mice and frogs were also eaten, but shrews 

 were rejected. Towards the end of October the hedgehogs appeared 

 not to be thriving ; one of them died, and the other two were set at 

 liberty. On the 6th of July last I saw a hedgehog's nest, which had 

 been mown over on a bank ; the two young ones, ajjparently about a 

 week old, were deserted by their mother. The nest was placed in a 

 hollow in the bank, and was a large domed structure of moss and dead 

 leaves. The young ones were hideous little brutes, with large shape- 

 less heads, swollen toad-like bodies, and short sjirawling limbs : their 

 backs were thinly covered with short spines, which were rapidly 

 becoming hard ; some were dark and others white. The rest of their 

 skins was livid, naked and wrinkled, and their eyes were not yet 

 open. White of Selborne (in his thirty-fourtl) letter) describes a 

 lilter of these "little pigs" as having small haiigiiKj ears, but this 

 was not the case with the present specimens, which 1 have preserved 

 in s|)irils. 



Brown Rat. — In sun)mer many rats live in burrows in banks and 

 hedge-rows, returning to tlic houses and farm-yards when winter 

 approaches. When pursued by dogs 1 have often seen them cliaib 

 trees, showing a great deal of activity among the branches. Mr. Buck- 

 land, in his 'Curiosities of Natural History' (first series, p. 91), gives 

 an account of the way in which rats gnaw the elephant-tusks in the 

 ivory-warehouses of London, and it would appear tlial this is not their 

 only peculiar and expensive taste ; some years ago a large quantity of 

 amber pipe mouth-pieces were destroyed in a tobacconist's shop in 

 Glasgow by these animals, the marks of their sharp incisors being 

 distinctly visible on the remaining fragments. So little has been 

 recorded of the progress of the great murine invasion of the last 

 century that I am induced to quote the following passage from the 

 'Statistical Account of Scotland' (by the parish ministers), thinking 

 that it will probably be new to most of your readers : — " Tlieir first 

 appearance (in Pecbleshire) was in the minister's glebe at Selkirk, about 

 the year 1770 or 1777, where they were found burrowing in the earth, 

 a propensity which occasioned considerable alarm, lest they should 

 undermine houses. They seemed to follow the courses of waters and 

 rivulets, and passing from Selkirk they were next heard of at the 

 Mill of Traqhair ; from thence, following up the Tweed, they appeared 

 in the mills of Peebles ; then, entering by Lyme Water, they arrived at 

 Fleminglon Mill in this parish (Newlands), and coming up the Lyme, 



