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to resist large doses of Prussic acid.—Moles are extremely voracious. Their 
appetite for food, says St. Hilaire, amounts to actual phrensy :— 
“ When kept for a time in a state of abstinence they become outrageous, and will dart with 
violence upon whatever prey is then presented,—plunging their heads into the abdomen of birds 
and other animals, and satiating themselves with blood. They have been observed to refuse 
Toads, but to seize upon Frogs with avidity. With such violent propensities it may be easily 
conceived that they soon die when debarred from food. At the same time their appetites are not 
entirely carnivorous ; at least several authors allege that they occasional^ eat various tender and 
succulent roots, and the bulbs of Colchicum. Though deemed very injurious in gardens, and per¬ 
secuted by farmers even in the open grounds, they do not want advocates who espouse their cause 
as useful agents in the economy of Nature; and their undoubted destruction of grubs and Mole_ 
crickets must prove beneficial to Agriculture. The female, indeed, while furnishing her nursery, 
is a somewhat too active reaper,—402 young stalks of Corn, with the leaves entire, having been 
counted in her nuptial chamber.”—p. 104. 
The animals called Tanrecs ( Centenes ), and which are partially covered with 
prickles, are said to become torpid in summer—an anomaly, certainly, to be 
accounted for on no known principles. Speaking of the food of Bears, we learn 
(p. 105) that “ Sir Stamford Raffles possessed a Malay Bear ( Ursus Malay - 
anus) which gave proof of its refined appetite, by refusing to eat anything but 
mangosteens, or to drink any other wine than champagne.” 
In discussing the nomenclature of the Weasel family, our author justly remarks, 
that “ whenever a Linnaean genus is raised to the rank of a family, the original 
generic title should still be retained as indicative of one of the restricted groups.” 
To this we beg to move an amendment, viz. that that restricted genus be invari- 
bly the typical one. 
Into the investigation respecting the original stock of the Dog we cannot enter, 
further than to observe that our author believes it to have been either the Wolf 
or the Jackal, or perhaps both. Professor Bell is in favour of the former animal. 
It is said that Wolves kept amongst Dogs soon learn to bark, and, on the other 
hand, that Dogs, run wild, lose the talent in an equally short time. 
Bruce informs us that about Libanus, Syria, Northern Asia, and the vicinity 
of Algiers, Hysenas live chiefly on large succulent bulbous roots, especially those 
of Fritillarias, &c., and that he has known large patches of fields turned up by 
them in searching for Onions and other plants. He adds, that these were selected 
with such care, that, after having been peeled, if any small decayed spot became 
visible, they were refused. The above-mentioned author one day locked up a 
Goat, a kid, and a lamb, with a Barbary Hysena which had fasted, and in the 
evening he found the intended victims not only alive but quite uninjured. “ He 
repeated the experiment, however, on another occasion, during the night, with a 
young Ass, a Goat, and a Fox, and the next morning he was, not unreasonably, 
astonished to find the whole of them not only killed, but actually eaten, with the 
exception of some of the Ass’s bones ! This was pretty well for an animal so 
curious in bulbous roots.” (pp. 119—20). 
