HISTORY AND HABITS OF THE ERMINE. 131 



be taken in a net, or by the hand. In winter, after a snow 

 stwm, the ruifed grouse has a habit of plunging into the loose 

 snow, where it remains at times for one or two days. In this 

 passive state the Ermine sometimes detects and destroys it. 



'' Notwithstanding all these mischievous and destructive 

 habits, it is doubtful whether the Ermine is not rather a bene- 

 factor than an enemy to the farmer, ridding his granaries and 

 fields of many depredators on the product of his labour, that 

 would devour ten times the value of the poultry and eggs 

 which, at long and uncertain intervals, it occasionally destroys. 

 A mission appears to have been assigned it by Providence to 

 lessen the rapidly multiplying number of mice of various spe- 

 cies and the smaller rodentia. 



"The White-footed Mouse is destructive to the grains in the 

 wheat fields and in the stacks, as well as the nurseries of fruit- 

 trees. Le Conte's Pine Mouse is injurious to the Irish and 

 sweet potatoe crops, causing more to rot by nibbling holes in 

 them than it consumes, and Wilson's Meadow-mouse lessens 

 our annual product of hay by feeding on the grasses, and by its 

 long and tortuous galleries among their roots. 



"Whenever an Ermine has taken up its residence, the mice 

 in its vicinity for half a mile around have been found rapidly 

 to diminish in number. Their active little enemy is able to 

 force its thin vermiform body into the burrows, it follows them 

 to the end of their galleries, and destroys whole families. We 

 have on several occasions, after a light snow, followed the trail 

 of this Weasel through fields and meadows, and witnessed the 

 immense destruction which it occasioned in a single night. It 

 enters every hole under stumps, logs, stone heaps and fences, 

 and evidences of its bloody deeds are seen in the mutilated re- 

 mains of the mice scattered on the snow. The little Chipping 

 or Ground Squirrel, Tamias Lysteri [se. striatus] takes up its 

 residence in the vicinity of the grain fields and is known to carry 

 off in its cheek pouches vast quantities of wheat and buckwheat, 

 to serve as winter stores. The Ermine instinctively discovers 

 these snug retreats, and in the space of a few minutes destroys 

 a whole family of these beautiful little Tamicc; without even 

 resting awhile until it has consumed its now abundant food, its 

 appetite craving for more blood, as if impelled by an irresistible 

 destiny, it proceeds in search of other objects on which it may 

 glut its insatiable vampire-like thirst. The Norway rat and the 

 Common House Mouse take possession of our barnSjWheat stacks. 



