WILD MICE 117 



it and into the palm of my hand, where he sat 

 for some time and arranged his fur and warmed 

 himself. He did not show the slightest fear. It 

 was probably the first time he had ever shaken 

 hands with a human being. He had doubtless 

 lived all his life in the woods, and was strangely 

 unsophisticated. How his little round eyes did 

 shine, and how he sniffed me to find out if I 

 was more dangerous than I appeared to his 

 sight ! 



After a while I put him down in the bottom 

 of the boat and resumed my fishing. But it 

 was not long before he became very restless, and 

 evidently wanted to go about his business. He 

 would climb up to the edge of the boat and peer 

 down into the water. Finally he could brook the 

 delay no longer and plunged boldly overboard ; 

 but he had either changed his mind or lost his 

 reckoning, for he started back in the direction 

 from which he had come, and the last I saw of 

 him he was a mere speck vanishing in the shad- 

 ows near the shore. 



Later on I saw another mouse, while we were 

 at work in the fields, that interested me also. 

 This one was our native white-footed mouse. 

 We disturbed the mother with her young in 

 her nest, and she rushed out with her little 

 ones clinging to her teats. A curious spectacle 



