440 Lord Glenherv'ie on the devastations of Mice in Forests; 



and when full grown, is considerably larger than the long-tailed 

 Mouse; and Pennant describes his Field Mouse as measuring, 

 from the end of the nose, to the setting on of the tail, only four 

 inches and a half, and the tail as four inches long, while he states 

 the length of his Meadow Mouse to be, from the nose end to the 

 tail, about six inches, and that of its tail only an inch and a 

 "half. We have not yet been able to prove, by actual experi- 

 ment, or observation, that the long-tailed Mice bark the trees, 

 though it is believed, in both Forests, that they do. Both 

 Buffon and Pennant describe both sorts as burrowing under- 

 ground. Buffon says the Campagnol is found in a greater variety 

 of situations than the Mulct ; that the Mulct chiefly frequents 

 high dry ground, woods and neighbouring fields ; the Campagnol 

 not only woods and adjoining fields, but also meadows and gardens. 

 According to Pennant, though the s/iort-tailed Mctise, in its man- 

 ners, and general food, much resembles the Mulct, it differs 

 from it in the places of its abode, and seldom infests gardens. In 

 Dean Forest the few long-tailed Mice that have been taken, were 

 on the wet greens, and never on dry ground ; the short-tailed 

 equally infested the wet and dry ground. According to Buffon, 

 the Mulct establishes himself in holes which he finds already 

 made, or which he forms for himself, under bushes or in the 

 trunks of trees ; that he there amasses a prodigious quantity of 

 acorns, nuts, or beechmast ; that a bushel has sometimes been found 

 in one of their holes ; and, that they collect this provision, not in 

 ])roportion to their wants, but to the dimensions of the hole ; that 

 those holes are ordinarily a foot underground, and often divided 

 into two chambers, one of which they inhabit with their young, 

 and use the other as their magazine. Similar hoards of acorns, 

 nuts, &c. have occasionally been found in both our Forests ; but 

 no divisions have been observed in their holes in either. Buflfon 

 furnishes us with a probable explanation of the cause of the failure 

 during the last several years of our planted acorns. He says, " I 

 have often experienced the injury which these animals (Mulcts) 

 occasion to plantations, they carry off the acorns newly sown, fol- 

 lowing the line of the furrow traced by the plough, and digging 



