MOLE

A species of the genus Talpa (which see), common in this country and other parts of Europe. This I quadruped exhibits in perfection that modification of ' structure by which the Mammiferous animal is adapted I to a subterranean life. Its head is long, conical, and tapering to the snout, which is strengthened by a bone, and by strong gristles worked by powerful muscles. The body IS almost cylindrical, thickest behind the head, and gradually diminishes to the tail. There is no outward indication of a neck, that part being enlarged to the size of the chest by the ma ive muscles which act upon the head and fore-legs. These, which are the principal instruments by which the mole excavates its long and intricate burrows, are the shortest, broadest, and strongest, in proportion to the size of the animal, which are to be met with in the Mammiferous cla . The rapidity with which the mole can make its way through a favourable soil is such, that it may be said to swim in the earth; and, since it must displace matter so much denser than water, so do its fore-limbs display a mechanism correspondingly superior in strength to the analogous extremities or pectoral fins of the dolphin. The food of the mole consists of worms and insects: its voracity is great, and it soon perishes if food be scarce or wanting. The ardour of the sexual appetite is not le intense and characteristic of this curious quadruped. The sense of sight is very feeble, the eyes being minute «nd rudimental; but the other faculties of smell and hearing, as being more serviceable in its dark retreat, are extremely acute. The female prepares a nest of dry herbage, roots, and leaves, in a chamber commonly formed by excavating 759 MOLLUSKS. and enlarging the point of intersection of three or four pa ages. The young are brought forth to the number of four or five in April, and sometimes later. The farmer views the operations of the mole as destructive to his crops by exposing and destroying their roots, or by overthrowing the plants in the construction of the mole-hills; his burrows, moreover, become the haunts and hiding-places of the field-mouse and other noxious animals. The mole is also accused of carrying off" quantities of young corn to form its nest. Hence, every means are devised to capture and destroy it, and men gain a livelihood exclusively by this occupation. Some naturalists, however, plead that the injury which it perpetrates is slight, and that it is more than counterbalanced by the benefit which it produces by turning up and lightening the soil, and especially by its immense destruction of earth worms, and many other noxious animals which inhabit the superficial layer of the ground, and occasion great injury to the roots of gra , corn, and many other plants. The soundest practical conclusion lies probably in the mean of these opinions; and the enlightened agriculturist, while he takes prompt measures to prevent the undue increase of the mole, would do well to reflect on the disadvantages which might follow its total extermination. Mole. In Engineering, a ma ive work formed of large stones placed in the sea by means of coffer-dams, extended either in a right line or an arch of a circle before a port, which it serves to close, and to defend the ve els in it from the impetuosity of the waves, . It is sometimes used synonymously with harbour. [s. 772]