THE FAERY YEAR 



matured, can hand down to future generations of 

 gnats the power to live and multiply. But, on the 

 face of it, the pursuit of the gnat column is simply 

 pleasure. 



The Midget of Mammals 



To return to the supposed power of stoats and 

 weasels to tempt by antics the bird from its tree. 

 I have been talking of this with one whose life has 

 been spent in watching and pursuing English birds, 

 Mr. Hart, of Christchurch. Incidentally, he has 

 studied in some detail lesser mammals, such as the 

 stoat, the weasel, and the shrew. In his collection 

 is the midget of all mammals, the pigmy shrew, 

 which he captured one day with a butterfly net. 

 Here, too, is a pair of those daintiest of furred 

 things, the frisky, charming water shrews. I 

 know this shrew, happy among the cress springs, 

 where it will gambol and hunt for food, let the ice 

 hang in stalactites from tiny gorge and runlet and 

 the cress be singed and blackened by the frost. 

 Yet perhaps even a water shrew can feel cold. One 

 bitter early morning, during that terrible snow and 

 frost in 1 880-81, my friend saw a water shrew 

 come through a rent in the ice at the edge of the 

 stream, and, creeping up to the retriever's tail, lie 

 down and nestle on it. The retriever, perfect in 

 training, needed but a word from his master, softly 

 spoken, to know he must not stir. He sat stock 

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