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The hamsters are very fierce little creatures: constantly fighting with other quadrupeds, and even among themselves; but the polecat is their master and tyrant, and carries on a war of extermination against them following them through the intricate ways of their burrows, and destroying them even in their dens!

The cages, with their loads of guinea pigs, rabbits, hamsters and other live animals to be used in the sacrificial rites of biochemical research were, to put it mildly, a mess.

In these they collect vast stores of food consisting of grain, peas, and seeds of various kinds. Sometimes two or three bushels of provision will be found in the storehouse of a single family. The hamsters do not confine themselves exclusively to a vegetable diet: since it is known that they will kill and eat birds, or even small quadrupeds.

The place assigned to them by some naturalists is with the hamsters, and therefore they are grouped with the rats; but an examination into the habits of these animals shows that they are in reality representatives of the hares and rabbits on the elevated table-lands of Chili and Peru, as also over the whole plain country of La Plata and Patagonia.

He, another recycled being with recycled thoughts, was ostensibly a creature moving forward with the train but in reality a macrocosm of the ideas within him; and these old ideas continued to circulate around the edge of his brain like hamsters whose impressions were that with each push of the nose they would find exits leading to the vertical, the forward, as if there really were a forward within one's cage, within the ideas of one's head.

It may be added that there is scarce one of these species of which there are not two or more varieties, known only to those who have made a study of the Kingdom of Nature. In this group we include not only Rats, but a great many other small rodents, or gnawers, such as Mice, Marmots, Lemmings, Hamsters, Mole-Rats, Jerboas, and Jumping Mice.

There are several species of hamsters in Europe and Asia, and also in North America: for the animal known as the Canada Pouched Rat is of this kind, and so also is the Tucan of Mexico. So also is that very singular and beautiful creature, the Chinchilla of South America so celebrated for its soft and valuable fur.

On the plains, they make extensive excavations, which often prove dangerous to the horse and his rider causing the former to stumble. The Dutch of the Cape know them by the name of Sand Moles. The Hamsters differ considerably from the marmots in their mode of burrowing. They make their underground dwellings very extensive having a great many chambers and galleries.