26 



SKETCH or THE HISTORY OF MAMMALIA. 



12. — Teeth of Dormouse. 



as the lerot (M. nitela, Fig. 15), yet its distribution is 

 very extensive. It ranges from the south of Europe as 

 far north as Sweden. The favourite resorts of this little 

 animal are dense thickets, low woods and coppices of 

 hazel, bushy dells, and tangled hedgerows. It creeps 

 about the branches with a quick but gliding sort of 

 movement, and with singular facility. It leaps nimbly, 

 and makes its way so quickly through intertangled brush- 

 wood, that it cannot be easily captured. (Fig. 13.) The 

 dormouse appears to be in some degree gregarious, or 

 at least to colonize favourite spots, and ten or a dozen of 

 their nests have been seen at no great distance apart in 



