270 
Sagacity of the Mole. 
> 
gentlemen’s families, and are also, perhaps, your personal friends, a 
suggestion from you to them requesting them to embody the keepers’ 
report occasionally in their communications, could not fail of being 
highly interesting and novel. Take the following, as narrated to me 
by one, on whose veracity T can rely, as an instance of sagacity. 
He took a Mole out of a trap that had just sprung, for the purpose 
of ascertaining if Moles could swim, as it was caught close to a large 
pond, into which he threw it to about the centre. It there lay motion¬ 
less for a short time, but then began to swim in an involved circle, 
gradually extending it, until after half an hour’s exertion it reached 
the bank of the pond, and soon disappeared in its own element. That 
Mole went for upwards of half a mile before any indications of its 
work shewed itself, and then afterwards it always worked differently 
from other Moles, by throwing up a hill, and then diverging twenty 
yards in a different direction, and throwing up another. On the incident 
being mentioned to the old mole-catcher, he said that he had now got 
his master, for that he should never be able to catch it; and such 
proved the fact, for although he lived some years afterwards in the 
neighbourhood, it was not caught while he remained there, but it could 
always be discovered where it had been, from the peculiar manner in 
which it had been at work. 
In summer time. Moles work at a great distance under ground, and 
except in rainy weather, they cannot work near the surface. Hence 
a dry summer destroys a greater part of them, and they are frequently 
found dead in woods, apparently from fatigue and want of food, as 
their emaciated state evinces their want of strength to regain their own 
element. 
P. S. In one of the last volumes of the Society of Arts, I think 
there is a Water-proof Composition Receipt. They offered a pre¬ 
mium for the best, and of course I infer that they have published one. 
Will you be so kind as to publish it in your Magazine.^ 
\ 
* We will enquire, and endeavour to givfe otir tloirespondenl ah ahsWel' Ih 
our next.— Conductors* 
