It is hard to get a new point of view. Having been brought up in the belief that the mole is a nuisance, pure and simple, I find myself unable on short notice to believe that this little blind miner is actually useful. If only he would confine his sphere of usefulness to some other neighbourhood than our lawn! We all think that his underground passages disfigure the lawn. But does the grass die where the tunnels run? I think not. You see patches of dead grass on many lawns, but do you find moles at work in these same lawns? In fact, the brown, dead patches of grass are probably killed by the white grub, arch enemy of grass roots. The mole is arch enemy to the white grub and others of his ilk. According to people who know about moles, we ought to decorate them with medals instead of trapping them and decorating the barn door with their tiny skins. The first mole I ever saw was one brought in by our old cat. She laid it down with a sort of shamefaced air as much as to say, "Things have come to a pretty pass when a self-respecting cat is obliged to bring in the likes of that. It fair turns my stomach!" It was not an attractive object, but we children turned it over and over with a stick. What an odd shape, so unlike the animals familiar to us. Its nose like a gimlet, its fore feet like little shovels; no wonder it could tunnel. No eyes, no ears; but what use has a mole for either? Do you know what Oliver Herford said of the mole? "See, children, the misguided mole, He lives down in a deep, dark hole; Sweetness and light and good fresh air Are things for which he does not care. But say not that he has no soul, Lest haply we misjudge the mole." No one can say that the mole has not a redeeming feature. Surely there is no creature clad in a coat of more surpassing softness and fineness than the mole. Are the exquisite "moleskin" garments sometimes seen in furriers' windows really made of tiny skins of this despised little quadruped? It is not likely that any of us will ever catch many moles. If they are troublesome in your lawn, you and the neighbour boys can do some trapping with mole traps. They are of a kind specially fitted to outwit the mole in his tunnel, and directions accompany each trap. Every boy knows what "knuckle down" means and how sore your knuckles get in marble time. There is usually one boy in the crowd who is lucky enough to have a knuckle dabster, made of moleskin. "There, use that. Soft as velvet, eh? Nope, don't want to sell it. Caught a mole last summer, tanned the skin myself and my mother made this for me, like the one in 'The Boy's Own Book.' Wouldn't take a dollar for it." TRAPPING MUSKRATS