1 6 THE HOUSE MOUSE 



produced. Varieties of this species appear to exist, there being 

 visible distinctions and differences between the barn and sewer 

 rats. The habitats of the brown rat are cosmopolitan, in this 

 country embracing hedgebanks, pond sides, corn and strawstacks, 

 drains, barns, granaries, outhouses, warehouses, and dwellings. 

 Its food consists of grain of all kinds, legumes, roots, vegetables, 

 fruit carrying it from stores, gnawing and spoiling great quantities, 

 and the devastation committed in a house of ripe grapes is appalling. 

 It also feeds on breadstuffs, fats, flesh in fact, is a gourmand and 

 scavenger. Its depredations upon poultry and pigeons are well 

 known, also its feat in stealing eggs without breaking them. Bark- 

 ing vines and other ligneous plants is not uncommon work of the 

 brown rat, as well as the wholesale cutting off of ferns in ferneries 

 and plants in plant houses, while its gnawing of woodwork and 

 tunnelling under floors and walls attest its further despoliation. 



The true English or Black Rat (Mus rattus) is smaller than the 

 brown rat, and possesses a blackish-grey fur. Although the black 

 rat has been exterminated by the increase of the brown species, 

 some observers incline to the belief that the scarcity of the former 

 has arisen from the stronger males of the brown rat mating with the 

 black females, and thus producing a brown progeny. 



HOUSE MOUSE (Mus musculus), Fig. 14, is generally of a dusky 

 brown colour, and its mouth, like the rat, is provided with organs 



FIG. 14. THE HOUSE MOUSE. 



adapted for the mastication of a mixed dietary, or one not confined 

 solely to vegetable matters. From six to ten young are produced 

 in a litter, and brought forth several times in a year. In about 

 a fortnight the young are able to shift for themselves, although 

 they are born in a helpless condition. " Albino " or so-called 

 " white mice " are not uncommon. They are whitish or yellowish- 

 white in colour and possess pink eyes. A " piebald " variety is 

 also bred from the house mouse, and, like the albino, is readily tamed 

 and frequently kept as a pet. 

 The house mouse frequents dwellings, buildings, barns, granaries, 



