116 CLASS MAMMALIA. 



on, and soon get into regular order again, and have even 

 been sometimes known to endeavour to board or pass over 

 a vessel. On their passage over land, if attacked by men, 

 they will raise themselves up, uttering a kind of barking 

 sound, and fly at the legs of their invaders, and will fasten 

 so fiercely at the end of a stick as to suffer themselves to 

 be swung about before they will quit their hold, and are 

 with great difficulty put to flight. It is said that an in- 

 testine war sometimes takes place in these armies during 

 their migrations, and that the animals thus destroy each 

 other. 



The major part, however, of these hosts is destroyed by 

 various enemies, and particularly by Owls, Hawks, and 

 Weasels, exclusive of the numbers which perish in the 

 waters ; so that but a small number survive to return, 

 which they are sometimes observed to do, to their native 

 mountains. 



In their general manner of life they are not observed to 

 be of a social disposition, but to reside in a kind of scat- 

 tered manner, in holes beneath the surface, without laying 

 any regular provision, like some other animals of this tribe. 

 They are supposed to breed several times in a year, and to 

 produce five or six at once. It has been observed that the 

 females have sometimes brought forth during their migra- 

 tions, and have been seen carrying some in their mouths 

 and others on their backs. In some parts of Lapland they 

 are eaten, and are said to resemble squirrels in taste. 



It was once believed that these animals fell from the 

 clouds at particular seasons, and some have affirmed that 

 they have seen a Lemming in its descent ; but an accident 

 of this kind is easily accounted for, on the supposition of a 

 Lemming escaping now and then from the claws of some 

 bird which had seized it, and thus falling to the ground; a 

 circumstance which is said not unfrequently to take place 

 when the animals are seized by Crows, Gulls, fyc. 



