OTTER

A quadruped adapted to amphibious habits by its short, strong, flexible, palmated feet, which serve as oars to propel it through the water, and by its long and strong tail, which acts as a powerful rudder, and enables the animal to change its course with great ease and rapidity. The teeth, which consist, in each jaw, of six pointed incisors,two strong and sharp canines, and ten trenchant and cuspidated molars, determine the piscivorous diet and predatory habits of the species. The otter used to be met with in most of the British rivers and lakes; but the increase of population, and the unintermitting hostility which its destruction of the valuable fish of its native streams have called down upon it, have greatly thinned its numbers, and have exterminated it from many of the localities where it was formerly common; so that the otter, as a captive in our menageries, is now regarded with almost the same interest which an exotic species usually excites. The otter selects for its retreat some convenient excavation concealed by the overhanging roots of the trees which grow from the banks of rivers, or other natural screen. The female goes with young nine weeks, and produces from three to live cubs in March or April. The usual weight of a full-grown male is from twenty to twenty-four pounds. The fur of the otter is remarkably fine and close. It consists of two kinds of hair; the longer and stiller shining hairs, which are greyish at the base and a rich brown at the point, concealing an extremely fine and soft fur of a whitish gray colour, brown at the tip. The hair and fur of the under part of the body, the cheeks, and the inner parts of the legs, is of a brownish gray throughout. The otter is hunted in many parts of England, and especially in Wales, with dogs especially trained for this kind of sport, with all the form and circumstance of the chase. " When the otter is found," says Mr. Bell, " the scene becomes exceedingly animated. He instantly takes the water and dives, remaining a long time, underneath it, and rising at a considerable distance from the place at which he dived. Then the anxious watch that is kept of his rising to 'vent,' the steady purpose with which the dogs follow and bait him as he swims, the attempts of the cunning beast to drown his a ailants by diving while they have fastened on him, the baying of the hounds, the cries of the hunters, and the fierce and dogged resolution with which the poor, hopele quarry holds his pursuers at bay, inflicting severe, sometimes fatal wounds, and holding on with unflinching pertinacity even to the last, must altogether form a scene as animated and exciting as the veriest epicure in hunting could desire." {British Quadrupeds, p. 133.) The few species of otter which have been recognised in distant parts of the world do not greatly differ from the Lutra vulgar is of Europe. The sea-otter is an animal of larger size, and presents such modfications of its palmated feet, and of its teeth, as to form the type of a distinct subgenus (Enhydras), which connects the otter with the seal. [s. 882]