346 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



partaken of its flesh, speaks of it as a most valuable addition to their 

 scanty cuisine. When captured young, it is easily tamed and becomes 

 an interesting pet. We saw one once in the possession of a Montrose 

 skipper, which allowed itself to be handled and fed out of the hand, 

 but it had an awkward habit of fixing its incisors into the fingers of an 

 incautious admirer on the smallest provocation. During summer they 

 swarm with vermin to such an extent that, although when examined 

 singly they can scarcely be discerned by the naked eye, they change 

 the color of the animal to a dull red. 



The lemming multiplies so rapidly that in the course of ten or 

 twelve seasons food becomes scarce, and, on the approach of some win- 

 ter when the food-question has become one of life or death, the over- 

 stocked market is relieved by an expedient unparalleled in its nature 

 among four-footed animals. This singular little creature is so local in 

 its habits, that, unless under the circumstances we are about to narrate, 

 it never leaves the mountain-regions to establish itself on the plains, 

 where food is more abundant. 



The inhuman suggestion of a modern writer that our paupers should 

 be packed into rotten ships, which should be sent out to sea and scut- 

 tled, is something like the method adopted by the lemmings them- 

 selves to avert the famine which threatens to annihilate the entire 

 species. When the time for the settlement of the question of partial 

 extermination for the benefit of the race, or total extermination by 

 starvation, can no longer be delayed, they assemble in countless thou- 

 sands in some of the mountain valleys leading into the plains, and, the 

 vast army of martyrs being selected, they pour across the country in 

 a straight line, a living stream, often exceeding a mile in length, and 

 many yards in breadth, devouring every green thing in their line of 

 march ; the country over which they have passed looking as if it had 

 been ploughed, or burned with fire. They march principally by night, 

 and in the morning, resting during the day, but never seek to settle 

 in any particular locality, however abundant food may be in it, for 

 their final destination is the distant sea, and nothing animate or inani- 

 mate, if it can be surmounted, retards the straight onward tide of 

 their advance. 



When the reindeer gets enveloped in the living stream, they will 

 not even go round its limbs, but bite its legs until, in its agony and 

 terror, it plunges madly about, crushing them to death in hundreds, 

 and even killing them with its teeth. If a man attempts to stem the 

 living torrent, they leap upon his legs ; and, if he lay about him with 

 a stick, they seize it with their teeth, and hold on to it with such de- 

 termined pertinacity that he may swing it rapidly round his head with- 

 out compelling them to loosen their hold. If a corn or hay rick be in 

 the way, they eat their way through it ; and, on arriving at the smooth 

 face of a rock, they pass round it, forming up in close column again on 

 the other side. Lakes, however broad, are boldly entered, and the 



