78 Quadrupeds. 



THE SHEEW. (Sorex araneus.) 



THIS curious little animal closely resembles a mouse, ex- 

 cept in its snout, which is long and pointed, to enable it 

 to grub in the ground for its food, which consists of 

 earthworms, and the grubs of beetles. The Shrew, like 

 the mole, is very fond of fighting ; and when two are 

 seen together, they are generally engaged in a furious 

 battle. Like the hedgehog, it has been much scanda- 

 lized by false reports, as will be seen by the following 

 extract from that most amusing and interesting work, 

 White's Selborne : " At the south corner of the area, near 

 the church, there stood, about twenty years ago, a very 

 old, grotesque, hollow pollard-ash, which for ages had 

 been looked upon with no small veneration as a shrew- 

 ash. Now a shrew-ash is an ash whose twigs and 

 branches, when applied to the limbs of cattle, will im- 

 mediately relieve the pains which a beast suffers from 

 the running of a Shrew-mouse over the part affected ; for 

 it is supposed that a Shrew-mouse is of so baneful and 

 deleterious a nature, that whenever it creeps over a 

 beast, be it a horse, or cow, or sheep, the suffering 

 animal is afflicted with cruel anguish, and threatened 

 with the loss of the use of the limb. Against this acci- 



