496 MURIDA—ARVICOLA 
equal to that of the mole.” Their food is stated to have been 
chiefly the roots of grass and thistles, quantities of which were 
found as if stored in the runs. Eventually the island was 
flooded by order of the owners, the Humber conservators, but 
probably the “plague” would have disappeared in the usual 
way. Judging from contemporary accounts it was three or 
four years coming on. 
There is some disagreement as to whether the Water Rat 
accumulates winter stores of provisions, this habit not having 
been recently reported. The only positive evidence consists 
of the statement’ by Gilbert White that a neighbour when 
ploughing a dry chalky field, removed from any water, ‘‘ turned 
out a Water-rat, that was curiously laid up in an _hyber- 
naculum, artificially formed of grass and leaves. At one end 
of the burrow lay about a gallon of potatoes, regularly stowed, 
on which it was to have supported itself for the winter.” The 
occurrence puzzled White, and since there is no evidence that 
he ever examined the rat himself, one is tempted to identify the 
store with that of a Brown Rat and to mark the identification 
as a mistake. Fleming, commenting on the above anecdote, 
remarked that he had twice witnessed the same thing, but 
since he seems to have believed that Water Rats hibernate in 
winter, the addition of a store is easily imaginable. On the 
other hand, since Collett states that such stores of potatoes 
and other food are usual in the Norwegian A. ¢errestris, it is 
probably right to regard the observations as correct descrip- 
tions of a habit rarely developed in mild climates. 
The voice of the British Water Rat has not been described, 
but M. Lataste mentions that his continental captives emitted 
a small sharp cry and hissed. Adams caught one alive which 
emitted ‘‘low whistling squeaks” while struggling to escape ; 
these sounds would have been inaudible at a distance of two 
or three yards, 
The eyesight is probably poor, and M, Lataste suggests 
that all “voles” suffer from myopia. He thus accounts for the 
fact that a captive, finding itself accidentally on the balcony of 
a room high above a street, deliberately precipitated itself into 
space. M. Lataste suggests that it is a like bad eyesight that 
1! Letter xxvi. to Thomas Pennant, 8th December 1769. 

