26 
GUIDE TO THE 
hedgehogs and some bats. These singular animals, 
whenever the approach of winter is felt, at first fall 
into a prolonged ordinary sleep, waking, however 
from time to time to take food. At last, their sleep is 
succeeded by a state in which they become benumbed and 
their vital movements feeble, followed by increasingly 
retarded beatings of the heart, and more and more slow 
circulation of the blood, till at length the limbs are 
motionless, the body cold, and the benumbing so profound, 
that the most energetio disturbance of the animal only 
produces the faintest manifestation of life. However, this 
is not death, and under the influence of gentle heat, 
the lethargic condition gradually passes away, and the 
animal resumes its ordinary habits. 
The Gcrbillcs.—As opportunity offers these beautiful 
little animals are represented in this house. One species is 
common over the greater part of India, but not extending 
much to the west, where its place is taken by another of its 
kind. It is gregarious and lives in burrows of considerable 
depth, and in some parts of the country, especially where 
the soil is light and dry, the ground is riddled by its holes. 
It is extremely active, and like a great number of bur¬ 
rowing rodents, it ventures out of its holes chiefly at 
early morning and after sunset. The leading peculiarity 
of the group, is the great development of the hind as com¬ 
pared with the fore leg, the specially intensified portion of 
the limb being the foot which is greatly elongated, and 
thus has great power which enables the animal to effect won¬ 
derful leaps. In some forms the under surface of the sole 
is covered with hair as in the Gerboa, which frequents the 
burning sands of the Egyptian desert, but in the common 
Indian Gerbille, G. indicus , the soles of the feet are bare. 
