450 
COMMON MOLE. 
tion in nature to adapt the one to the other. As 
it is allotted a subterraneous abode, the seeming* 
defects of its formation vanish, or rather are turn- 
ed to its advantage. The breadth, strength, and 
shortness of the fore feet, -which are inclined out- 
wards, answer the purposes of digging, serving to 
throw back the earth with greater ease, and to 
pursue -the worms and insects which are its prey ; 
had they been longer, the falling in of the earth 
would have prevented the quick repetition of its 
strokes in working ; or have obliged it to make 
a large hole in order to give room for their ex- 
ertion. The form of the body is not less admira- 
bly contrived for its way of life. The fore part is 
thick, and very muscular, giving great strength 
to the action of the fore feet, enabling it to dig 
its way with amazing force and rapidity, either to 
pursue its prey, or elude the search of the most 
active enemy. By its power of boring the earth, 
it quickly gets below the surface ; and it has been 
seen, when let loose in the midst of a field, instantly 
to sink into the earth ; and the most active la- 
bourer, with a spade, in vain attempted to pur- 
sue it. 
The smallness of its eyes, which induced the 
ancients to think it was blind, is, to this animal, 
a peculiar advantage. A small degree of vision 
is sufficient for a creature that is ever destined to 
live in darkness. A more extensive sight would 
only have served to shew the horrors of its prison, 
while nature had denied it the means of an escape 
Mad this organ been larger, it w ould have been 
perpetually liable to injuries, by the falling of the 
earth into it ; but nature, to . prevent that incon- 
venience, has not only made them very small, but 
very closely covered them with hair. Anatomists 
mention, beside these advantages, another that 
