THE DOGS' SEPULCHRE 67 
In Schlich’s “ Manual of Forestry,” vol. iv., “ Forest Pro- 
tection,” by W. R. Fisher, p. 103, are the following remarks : — 
The damage done by squirrels is greater than is generally imagined. They 
eat fruit and seeds, cotyledons and buds, and bite off young shoots, remove bark, 
and destroy eggs and young birds. Their utility in destroying beetles, larva; of 
saw-llies and other insects, does not compensate for the harm they do . . . . 
More harm, again, is done by the squirrel digging out seeds and cotyledons from 
the ground, and biting off cotyledons of the beech in seed beds and reproduction 
areas. It also uproots young oak plants to get at the remains of acorns .... 
Protective rules. Protection of the pine marten {Mustela martes), a great enemy 
of the squirrel. .Shooting in spruce seed-years, and in nurseries. 
A letter from a neighbouring observer says : 
I once found a blackbird’s nest in a tree : a squirrel was sitting on the edge of 
the nest, with its head down in the nest. A blackbird was excitedly threatening 
the squirrel as near as it dared. On climbing to the nest I found in it one fresh 
blackbird’s egg with two small holes just made in it, also white of egg and frag- 
ments of egg shells. I once found fourteen nests of goldcrest in about an hour ; 
one contained eggs, the rest had the lining pulled over one side of each nest. I 
have since found several other goldcrests’ nests in similar plight. I hope you 
will not be too hard on squirrels, even if you decide to lessen their numbers. 
Having, I think, made out the squirrel’s evil ways, I hope 
some reader of Nature Notes will take the other side and tell 
us of his good qualities. 
Edmund Thos. Daubeny. 
Market Weston, Thetford. 
THE DOGS’ SEPULCHRE. 
OME little time ago I read in Le Temps an account of 
what was called a Russian superstition regarding bats. 
It was said that these creatures took a special delight 
in attaching themselves to the hair of Russian peasant 
girls, forcing their way through the folds of the hair and holding 
on close to the head, so that the poor girls, in their fright, would 
tear out their hair in their efforts to rid themselves of the 
intruder. 
This legend of the bat, which I had certainly heard before, 
though perhaps more curious than instructive, is no doubt 
founded on fact. 
I remember very well when I was a boy of about ten years 
old, I made my first descent into “The Dogs’ Sepulchre,” 
which is a square hole formed by Nature in the limestone rock 
in Cleeve Woods in Somersetshire, about twenty feet deep and, 
say, four feet across. My brothers and I used to get down by 
means of a rope tied to a tree close by. When at the bottom 
I heard an incessant shrieking close behind me, and this con- 
tinued after I had got up out of the pit. I soon found out the 
cause, which was, as I suspected, a bat, and my brother took 
it from the back of my shoulder, where it had hooked itself on 
