500 Life-histories of Northern Animals 



ABUN- The species is not common In the parts of Manitoba where 



DANCE 



I lived and trapped. During several years at Carberry I col- 

 lected only five specimens. I should say indeed that the 

 south-western prairies of the Province are the north-eastern 

 fringe of its range. At Pembina it began to be more plentiful. 

 V. Bailey not only found it common on the prairies there, in 

 the summer of 1887, but adds that^ *'it seems to be about the 

 only Mouse of economic importance. It lives near the grain 

 fields and cuts down a small quantity near the edges. It cuts 

 some grasses on dry ground for the seeds, but is not numerous 

 enough to be of great importance." 



sociA- Like arcttcus, it is neither sociable nor gregarious; usually 



one pair of adults is all that are found in one burrow. 



Bailey observed^ that it lived in the same holes with the 

 Grasshopper-mouse, but this may have been a sort of para- 

 sitism on the part of the latter, as in New Mexico I found it 

 similarly sharing the quarters of Perodipus. 



VOICE, Captive specimens kept by Kennicott had a soft, clear 



voice and used it but seldom.^ It is not known whether the 

 creature drums with its toes as a means of inter-communication, 

 but seemingly it has the song habit discovered already among 

 other members of the group. 



SINGING The only evidence I have of this is an article contributed 



to the American Naturalist by W. O. Hiskey, of Minneapolis, 

 Minn. He writes as follows:" 



"A communication in the Naturalist some time ago, in 

 regard to ' Musical Mice,' prepared me for a phenomenon which 

 recently came under my observation, which otherwise would 

 have astonished me beyond conception. I was sitting, a few 

 evenings since, not far from a half-opened closet door, when I 

 was startled by a sound from the closet of such marvellous 

 beauty that I at once asked my wife how Bobbie Burns (our 

 canary) had found his way into the closet, and what could 

 start him to singing such a queer and sweet song in the dark ? 



^ Loc. cit. * Loc. cit. "Quad. 111., 1857, p. 95. 



*Am. Nat., May, 1871, p. 171. 



