The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-12-17

day when the grounding is said to come
out of his hole and stay out. found two
woodchucks in the burrow, with no more
sign of life about them than If they had
been killed. From all outward appear
ances l could have taken them out and
had a game of foot ball with them without
their knowing it.
Squirrels are only partial hibernators,
from the fact that they work all summer
and fall storing great quantities of food TO
supply them when hunger wakes them up
during the winter, If indeed, they spend
much of their time in sleep. Squirrels are
systematic and long-headed providers for
the emergencies of a long winter, and not
only stow away their favorite food in one
grand storehouse, but also make deposits
of II in other places, so that If one gran
airy or nuttery Is destroyed or becomes eX-
hausted the caches can be depended upon
When the snow has lain on the ground
late in the spring. holes may be seen in 1t
at various places in the woods where
squirrels have dug down through 1t to
reach nuts or grain or acorns buried in
the ground there months before for just
such an emergency. The instinct with
which these little animals locate such
spots, covered as they are with maybe a
foot or more of snow, Is unerring and mar
velous. If the snow should happen to be
thickly covered with crust the squirrels
rare thing, toward the end of an unusually
long winter for woodsmen to find SPUR
res dead on the crust. where they had
been digging desperately TO uncover the
cache below, the supplies at the main
store having become exhausted.
"A curious phenomenon OF Information,
according to Prof. Browne, Is shown in an
animal called the loir, native of Sene-
gal. This animal never hibernates in its
native cline, but every specimen that was
ever brought 10 Europe became torpid as
soon as exposed to cold The common land
tortoise, no matter what 1t may be, and it
Is q voracious feeder, goes to sleep in No
Vember and does not wake up again until
May The hedgehog goes to sleep as soon
as the weather gets cold and remains In
unbroken slumber six months
at the beginning of cold weather bats
begin to huddle together in punches in hol-
low trees, dark corners in deserted hous-
es, and in caves and creVices in the rocks.
They gradually lose all sensibility, and
continue in a comatose state until the re-
turn of genuine warm weather When you
see the first bat Of the season flutterlng
at nightful you can be sure that warm
weather has come to stay. The little hooks
at the end of one of the joints of each
wing are what the bat hangs itself up by
when it goes to sleep, whether for a day or
for months. When the bats are clustering
for Information, one of the number hangs
itself up by its hooks head downward, and
the others cling to It. 1t is on record that
sixty bats have been found in one clus-
ter. the entire weight Of the lot being sus-
tanned by the one bat clingng with its
hooks to whatever it had fastened them
TO at the start--a weight of at least ten
pounds The position Of the central bat in
such a cluster would be like that of a
man hanging to something by his thumb
nails, and supporting the weight of fifty
nine other men. So completely is anime-
ton suspended in the bat during the cold
months that no test yet applied has in
duced 1t to show the least sign OF life.
Torpid bats have been inclosed by the hour
in air-tight glass jars and not a particle
of the oxygen in the jars has been ex-
hausted when they were taken out, show
ing that the bats had not breathed.
GAS cold drives certain animals, insects
and reptiles TO a state of torpidity, so heat
and lack of water bring about the same
condition in others. The animal or reptile
that hibernates, or goes to sleep in cold
weather, arranges its body 50 that it will
conduce TO the greatest warmth, while
those that estivate, or become torpid IN
warm weather. place themselves in posi-
lions that show that they want all the
GOODNESS the climate will permit. The ten
ric, tropical animal, carnvorous and in
sectiyerous, becomes torpid during tho
greatest heat and lies on its back with it.
body drawn to its greatest length, and a.
limbs spread wide apart. Snakes estivat.
in the south, all kinds together, just al
snakes hibernate in the north, but instead
Of rolling themselves in great balls. as III,
northern snakes do, they lie singly, ant
stretched to their full length.