32 ZOOLOGY. 



inhabited by insects and earthworms, provided it is 

 not too stiff, but yet sufficiently coherent to dig 

 passages in, which will not at once collapse. Its 

 presence is known by the heaps which it throws up. 

 The nest, however, is always found under a larger 

 heap, frequently hidden under tree roots, walls, etc., 

 though sometimes in the open field. It consists in 

 the first place of a nearly round dwelling-chamber, 

 softly upholstered with vegetable substances ; this is 

 surrounded by a labyrinth of passages. From the 

 nest a passage runs to the mole's hunting-ground. 

 The walls of this passage of the labyrinth, and of the 

 nest, are hard. The wider and subterranean channels, 

 which the mole digs out when it is simply catching 

 insects in the soil, easily fall in again, and the animal 

 takes no pains to compact their walls. The highway 

 to the hunting-ground, in which the animal can 

 progress very rapidly, can be at once detected, not 

 like the ordinary passages by a small chain of mole- 

 hills composed of the thrown-up earth, but by a 

 depression, since in its preparation the earth is late- 

 rally compressed and not thrown out. This tube is 

 shorter or longer according as the hunting-ground 

 is in the immediate neighbourhood or further off; 

 it may be 100 or 160 feet long. The mole sleeps in 

 the nest during the time not employed in seeking 

 for food, and goes three times a day on the hunt for 

 insects (early morning, midday, and before sunset 

 in the evening). Having reached the subterranean 

 hunting-ground, it tracks to some distance the insect 

 larvae, and worms found in the soil, being aided in 

 this by its long snout. It daily devours more than 

 its own weight. During summer the mole digs its 

 passages near the surface, since larvae and worms are 

 then found in the uppermost layer of earth. In winter, 

 when these withdraw into the depths of the soil, it 

 digs much deeper channels. It does not fall into a 

 winter-sleep. The young (three to seven) are born in 



