164 THE INDUSTRIES OF ANIMALS. 



entrance to some of the principal burrows is some- 

 times four to six feet across the mouth, and sometimes 

 it is deep enough for a tall man to stand in up to 

 the waist. 



It is not easy to tell what induces a Vizcacha to 

 found a new community, for they increase very slowly, 

 and are very fond of each other's society. It is 

 invariably one individual alone who founds the new 

 village. If it were for the sake of better pasture he 

 would remove to a considerable distance, but he 

 merely goes from forty to sixty yards ofif to begin 

 operations. Sooner or later, perhaps after many 

 months, other individuals join the solitary Vizcacha, 

 and they become the parents of innumerable genera- 

 tions in the same village : old men, who have lived 

 all their lives in one district, remember that many 

 of the Vizcacheras around them existed when they 

 were children. 



It is always a male who begins the new village. 

 Although he does not always adopt the same method, 

 he usually works very straight into the earth, digging 

 a hole twelve or fourteen inches wide, but not so 

 deep, at an angle of about 25" with the surface. After 

 he has progressed inwards for a few feet, the animal is 

 no longer content merely to scatter the loose earth; 

 he cleans it away in a straight line from the entrance, 

 and scratches so much on this line, apparently to make 

 the slope gentler, that he soon forms a trench a foot 

 or more in depth, and often three or four feet in 

 length. This facilitates the conveyance of the loose 

 earth as far as possible from the entrance of the 

 burrow. But after a while the animal is unwilling 

 that earth should accumulate even at the end of this 

 long passage, and proceeds to form two additional 



