42 PONDS, PADDOCKS, AND AVIARIES 



in Egypt, Palestine, and Cyprus, where it commits great 

 ravages upon dates and other fruit. I have living 

 specimens of the four European species of dormouse, but 

 have nothing of any general interest to record about 

 them, except that one species, known as the ' garden 

 dormouse,' does not exhibit the drowsy^ tendencies of our 

 common English dormouse or the two others of this 

 family in the day-time, but is always remarkably active, 

 and ready to bite and scratch whenever handled. We 

 have during the last two years bred a good many of the 

 exceedingly pretty striped mouse of Africa, known as the 

 Barbary mouse, from a pair procured for me by a friend 

 in Morocco. We have not taken the trouble to make 

 special pets of any of these mice, but they are not only 

 very tamable but also capable of a considerable amount 

 of education : a lady who paid us a visit last year brought 

 one of these little animals with her, and had taught it 

 to sit up on a doll's chair, open a little cupboard, take 

 sugar from a drawer, hold up and drink milk or tea from 

 a teacup, sham dead at her command, and perform 

 other tricks ; in fact, this mouse displayed quite as 

 much intelligence, in his degree, as an average lady's 

 lap-dog. 



" Although we have had many losses among the birds 

 of prey, some of the oldest denizens of our aviaries are 

 of this class ; in fact, the most ancient living creature in 

 the collection is a white-tailed or sea eagle, taken from 

 a nest in the south of Ireland in the early spring of 1854, 



