THE SURVIVAL OF THE OTTER 121 
sight, hearing, touch, and smell, its muscular equip- 
ment, so marked in the grip of its jaw, the back- 
stroke of the hind-legs, and the sweep of the steering 
tail, for the mammals we mentioned above are not 
deficient in these qualities, and yet they have 
nowadays a tenure of life much less secure than 
the otter’s. 
What particular virtues has the otter that enable 
it to keep its foothold in spite of man’s persecution 
and the reduction of natural preserves? The 
general answer is probably that the otter has rela- 
tively few wild enemies, and that it is one of the 
most elusive of beasts, in great part nocturnal in 
its activities, shy of repeating itself, shifty in its 
hunting, and very thoroughly amphibious. Mr. 
Tregarthen calls attention also to the faintness of 
the otter’s scent, ‘‘ noticed by few dogs save hounds 
that have been trained to own it,” and to its re- 
sourcefulness and endurance when hunted. Part of 
the secret of survival must also lie in the catholicity 
of appetite, for while the otter depends in the main 
on eels, trout, salmon, pike, flatfish, and the like, it 
condescends to the mussels on the seashore (biting 
through their shells), the limpets on the rocks, and 
the frogs on the marsh, and rises to wild-duck and 
rabbit. It must also be remembered, as in regard 
to fox-hunting, that whatever be our humanitarian 
or artistic views in regard to the otter-hunt, the 
probability is that sportsmen, who leave the cubs 
unmolested, make for the otter’s survival rather 
than for its disappearance. The exgis of sport 
