ORDER CARNASSfER. 167 



re-production begins to be felt by these animals, and the 

 young are born in the course of the month of May. The 

 period of gestation is not precisely known. The young 

 come into the world covered with small prickles entirely 

 white, and their reddish skin may easily be perceived be- 

 tween them. Their eyes are closed, . and what is very re- 

 markable, their ears also. This is a very singular pecu- 

 liarity, and not observable, as far as we are aware, in any 

 other species of the mammiferous animals. Some of the 

 Bats, as we observed in our last number, possess the faculty 

 of voluntarily closing the ears ; but this character of having 

 them closed at and a little after birth, is exclusively con- 

 fined, we apprehend, to the Hedgehog kind. The length of 

 these young Hedgehogs is rarely above two inches, and the 

 tail is very short. In a little time, their prickles increase 

 both in size and number, and become coloured, and towards 

 the Autumn, they differ little from the adults, except in 

 magnitude. 



When the Hedgehog has grown to its full dimensions, 

 it is about nine inches in its greatest length, and all the 

 upper parts of its body are covered with thorns, gray at 

 their origin, then of a brownish black, and finally termi- 

 nating in a white point. Its head, and the circumference 

 of its ears, are clothed with harsh and brownish hairs, and 

 the upper part of its fore-paws and all the lower parts of 

 its body are covered with whitish hairs. The paws them- 

 selves, the extremity of the muzzle, and the tail, are very 

 nearly naked, but some rudiments of weak mustachios may 

 be seen on the sides of the upper lip. The prickles are re- 

 tained in the cuticle only by a very small pedicle. The 

 eyes are simple, extremely projecting, and the pupil is 

 round. The ear, small and rounded, is also of a very simple 

 construction. The tragus and antitragus cartilarge, and 

 very closely approaching to each other, so that the interval 

 between them is but a small cleft above the auditory nerve. 



