228 THE HAUNTS OF LIFE 
beetles, both of which began to trouble the 
earthworms in their retreats. Ages and ages 
passed and the third great invasion occurred, 
which led on to creatures like burrowing 
blind-worms, burrowing slow-worms, and, 
long afterwards, burrowing moles. And so, 
to cut a long story short, the earthworms 
which once were so safe, having discovered a 
new haunt, are among the most persecuted of 
animals. So they have become nocturnal. 
When one begins to count up, one finds that 
the number of subterranean animals is much 
larger than one at first supposed. Mr. Ed- 
mund Blunden had a fine vision of them when 
he wrote his “Gods of the Earth Beneath” 
(The Waggoner, and other Poems, 1920). 
“JT am the god of things that burrow and creep, 
Slow-worms and glow-worms, mould-warps working late 
Emmets and lizards, hollow-haunting toads, 
Adders and effets, ground-wasps ravenous: 
After his kind the weasel does me homage, 
And even surly badger and brown fox 
Are faithful in a thousand things to me.” 
CAVE ANIMALS 
The animals that live below the ground are 
mostly of a strenuous nature. ‘The mole, for 
