MICE AND VOLES 335 



If, during the summer, you come across them at close 

 quarters, and "stow them up," they'll dive, and coming 

 up again at a distance, put their noses just above water, 

 as does a coot, and eye your every movement. During the 

 summer and autumn they fill their store-houses with grain 

 stuff, and most especially with horse-beans, when a patch 

 grows near their burrow, as is often the case. Directly the 

 first frosts come, and the reed-tassels and the money-spinner's 

 webs are turned into jewels, they take to their houses, and do 

 not appear again till the binding frosts have gone. On the 

 mild days in winter, however, some are to be seen, but it 

 seems doubtful whether they all venture forth from their 

 cosy storehouses on such occasions. 



But even they have their enemies. Hungry pikes in the 

 dikes, and herons hard pressed, will eat them, whilst the 

 fenmen shoot them as food for their fierce ferrets. 



Nevertheless, enough of these harmless creatures survive 

 to add an interest to the secluded dike-ways, which they most 

 frequent, preferring them to the more busy tide-ways, and 

 the " black " voles at times, moreover, wander as far as the 

 farmers' stacks. 



