548 DBS. OEOE&E AND FEANCES E. HOGGAN ON 



he thought were tactile nerve-endings are now known not to be 

 nerve-endings, and that the hairs upon all the rest of the surface 

 of the animal's body are now proved to be provided with nerve- 

 terminations equally (if not more so) with the hairs of the tail. 



It was from the result of similar watching of the movements 

 of a pet Mole that we, in entire ignorance of Jobert's researches, 

 were led to look upon its tail as a tactile organ, and to discover, 

 as we thought at the time, the real tactile nerve-terminations upon 

 the hairs of the tail. There are still good reasons for holding that 

 in the Mole the tail is specially a tactile organ, in comparison with 

 the tail in other animals ; and as the appearances which led us to 

 make the research are interesting in themselves, as well as ex- 

 planatory, if not even contradictory, of much which now passes 

 current as the habits of the animal, it may be advisable that we 

 should relate them here. 



JSahits shown hy a Mole in Confinement. 



Our pet Mole, " Jimmy," was presented to us by our friend 

 Mr. Betts, of King's Langley, who caught it on the surface of 

 the ground in one of his fields. Shortly after capture it greedily 

 took worms even from our fingers, without manifesting the slightest 

 shyness or appearance of fear. "With the intention to watch its 

 habits, we afterwards placed it for safety in a large cage or box 

 (in our garden laboratory, in Loudon), made of strong boards 

 or planks an inch in thickness, which in previous years had suc- 

 cessfully withstood the gnawing of innumerable generations of 

 tame rats. The box was placed upon its side, and had a sleeping- 

 compartment at one end. The front was covered with a piece 

 of strong small meshed wire netting. 



The sleeping-compartment was fiUed with earth, an act of 

 forethought the Mole seemed fuUy to appreciate. During the 

 day it would often feel all over the wire netting with its proboscis, 

 but whether in search of liberty or food was never quite certain ; 

 probably it began with the desire of liberty and ended with that 

 of food, which latter was generally given it through the netting. 

 We fed it with earth-worms, a morsel of meat, or part of a mouse. 

 If a very small piece, it would eat it on the spot and seek for more j 

 but if the morsel was large, it would carry it off to the darker 

 corner, there to devour it at leisure. We observed that, although 

 the spot where the Mole received the morsel was quite two feet 

 distant from the inner chamber, it never turned to run back 



