THE BADGER— ^HE PRAIRIE DOG. 39 



wherein they foi'merly exercised unquestioned sway. The Badger 

 has long ago been driven out of the land ; the otter is but seldom 

 seen in the rivers where it was once so plentiful ; the polecat and 

 martens have retired into the deepest recesses of the few forests 

 which are still left to us, but over which the demon of bricks and 

 mortar already casts a longing glance ; and the stoat and weasel 

 only hold their own on account of their diminutive size, and the 

 comparative ease with which they obtain a supply of food. They 

 are ai];iong the animals which 'are gradually eliminated out of ex- 

 istence by the encroachments of man, and it may- be that in a few 

 years a stoat or weasel may be as rare in England as a Badger is 

 at the present day. 



The fossorial limbs of the Badger are useful in various ways ; 

 for not only do they enable their owner to dig a domicile which 

 none dare invade without the help of man, but they aid him in 

 obtaining a kind of food to which he is particularly partial. The 

 Badger is tolerably omnivorous, but has a special liking for in- 

 sects in their immature state, and will dig up the nests of wasps 

 and other subterranean hymenoptera, for the sake of devouring 

 the larvae. Some writers say that the Badger scrapes out the 

 wasp-combs on account of the honey contained in than, but as no 

 British wasp makes a cell that can hold honey, or is capable of 

 gathering and storing that sweet substance, the Badger might 

 scrape for a very long time before it earned a meal. 



In like manner the Mink, the Vison, and other weasels of 

 Northern America are in the habit of retiring 4o holes and crev- 

 ices, but do not appear to form burrows for themselves. The 

 Honey Eatel {Mellivora EateT) does, it is true, scrape deep holes 

 in the ground with very great rapidity, but then the creature can 

 not be ranked among the true weasels, and by many authors is 

 thought to approach closely to the bears. 



The exact classification of animal habitations involves a task 

 not easily accomplished, inasmuch as so many of them partake 

 of characteristics which might entitle them to be placed under va- 

 rious categories. The rabbit, for example, might be considered 

 either as a social or a burrowing animal, and the same may be 

 said of the common wasp, the humble bee, and many other insects. 



The Prairie Dog {Spermophilus Ludovicianus) may, like the 

 rabbit, be considered equally as a burrower or a social animal, 

 and we will therefore place it in the former of these categories. 



