A HISTORY OF LEICESTERSHIRE 



Mr. Lees, of Castle Street, Hinckley, being fed on 

 sopped bread and other soft food. Towards the end 

 of its life, so I am informed, an extra claw or two 

 appeared on one of its fore-feet (the left one my infor- 

 mant believes), and this grew to about three times as 

 large as any of the others. I addressed Mr. Lingham 

 Lees on the subject, and he replied : ' The growth 

 on the squirrel's foot was a perfect toe with an abnor- 

 mally large claw. All who saw it will agree with me 

 that this was the case.' Mrs. Perry Herrick, writing 

 in April, 1889, informed me that squirrels used to 

 come for some years to take nuts from little stone 

 boxes which had been placed for them outside the 

 windows at Beaumanor, but they had then left off 

 coming for some years. The last one I saw ran across 

 the road, when I was driving between St. George's, 

 Swannington and Staunton Harold, in October, 1906. 

 It afterwards returned to a large ash-tree overhanging 

 the road, and watched my progress from his coign of 

 vantage. Mr. W. J. Horn, writing to me in 1906, 

 mentions having once watched a squirrel searching the 

 ivy of a dwelling-house. When it found a house- 

 sparrow's nest it apparently searched the interior for 

 eggs. The late Dr. Macaulay reported 'a pure white 

 squirrel, with pink eyes (albino), in the possession of 

 the Rev. A. Matthews, which was caught by a spaniel 

 in Gumley Wood on 25 November, 1891.' 



20. Dormouse. Muscardinus avellanariut, Linn. 



Bell Myoxus avellanarius. 



Locally, Hazel-Mouse, Tufted-tail Mouse. 



Rare. Harley wrote : ' Not common. Met 

 with in a small wood which lies against Ravenstone 

 and Normanton-on-Heath,' but in no other woods of 

 the county did he discover it. The late Mr. Wid- 

 dowson wrote, in 1885 : 'Not heard of for a 

 certainty, save one brought in a load of oak-bark.' 

 The late Mr. Ingram informed me in 1885 'that he 

 had never met with it.' 



21. Brown Rat. Mul decu-nanus, Pallas. 



Locally, Common Rat. 



Its distribution in the county is unfortunately too 

 general. Varieties occasionally occur. Mr. H. A. Payne 

 informed me that a very light cream-coloured rat was 

 killed in Martinshaw Wood, in 1876, and was in the 

 late Lady Stamford's possession. The late Mr. A. 

 Paget presented to the museum a white example, 

 which was captured in his garden in West Street, 

 on 6 November, 1886. The specimen was a female. 

 Varieties such as these must not, however, be con- 

 founded with the white rats so often kept as pets ; 

 these singularly enough so Mr. Oldfield Thomas 

 tells me being albinos of the black rat. 



Relative to the latter species, Mr. F. T. Mott 

 recorded a rather interesting young, dark variety of 

 the common rat caught at ' New Parks,' in the early 

 part of 1886 as a bona-fide example of Mus rattus? 

 This he exhibited to section ' D ' of the Society on 

 15 September, 1886. The specimen, which by the 

 kindness of the owner, C. Adcock, I have been enabled 

 to examine, is dark brown above and light brown 

 underneath, and except in size of body, does not 

 resemble the black rat, the length of the ears being 

 3% in. as opposed to ^ in. occurring in two of the 



latter species which I received in the flesh from 

 London ; the less breadth of the ears is also very 

 marked, and the length of the tail is only 5^ in. as 

 opposed to 83- in. 



An enormous male specimen shot with a bullet 

 from a '410 walking-stick gun at Blaby Villa on 

 7 March, 1889, by Mr. W. A. Vice, was presented 

 by him to the Leicester Museum. 



Mr. W. J. Horn, writing at the end of 1906, said 

 that he had recently seen a rat running about the 

 upper branches of a high oak tree with the agility of 

 a squirrel, and when his terriers surprised one in a 

 hedge-bottom, it ran to the topmost twigs of the thorn 

 fence. He adds : ' Rats also dive well, keeping under 

 water even longer than a water-vole, in fact till quite 

 exhausted.' 



[Black Rat. Mus rattus, Linn. 



Not mentioned by Potter, and probably long 

 extinct in the county, despite the assertion of its 

 having been ' seen in some old cellars in Leicester 

 within the last twenty years.' 10 The late Rev. Andrew 

 Matthews, who resided in Leicestershire thirty- 

 four years, had never heard of its occurrence, and the 

 late Mr. Widdowson and Mr. Ingram, writing 

 in February, 1885, were likewise agreed as to its 

 extinction in this county. Indeed, anyone acquainted 

 with the history of the black rat in this country must 

 know how unlikely it is to occur, except in ancient 

 seaports. Vide note on the preceding species.] 



22. House-Mouse. Mus muiculus, Linn. 



Far too common. Several specimens of a curious 

 variety were caught at Kibworth on 23 March, 1885, 

 in taking down a cornstack belonging to Mr. Buzzard. 

 One of them was of a dingy white, with the exception 

 of the back, which retained faint traces of original 

 mouse-colour, caused by the tips of the hairs being of a 

 dusky whity-brown. As the specimen was placed in 

 spirits I was unable to judge if the eyes were pink or 

 black, but they appeared to be of the latter colour 

 and indeed this has since been stated to be the case. 

 Whether a cross between escaped albino mice and 

 the common mouse, or merely an accidental variety, 

 it is hard to say, but as the owners of the house do not 

 appear to have ever kept 'white mice,' the presump- 

 tion is in favour of the latter supposition. Mr. W. J. 

 Horn writes in 1906: 'These also climb well. 

 Many people who have creepers trained all over a 

 house wonder how it is mice are found in the bed- 

 rooms.' Two curious nests made from tow and string 

 and built in poppy-heads, were presented in 1 899, to 

 the Leicester Museum, by Mr. E. W. Squires of that 

 place. 



23. Long-tailed Field-Mouse. Mus sylvaticus, Linn. 



Locally, Wood-Mouse. 



Resident and generally distributed. Harley recorded 

 that, in 1846, he examined the winter retreat of one 

 of these mice near Bradgate Park, and was astonished 

 at the quantity of stores which had been carried in, 

 and which he computed at the fourth part of an 

 imperial bushel. I received one from Belvoir on 

 4 July, 1885, and since then I found one dead on a 

 small grass plot at a house, so near to the town as 

 the Aylestone Road, and another on 1 1 December, 

 1 888. Mr. J. Whitaker records a pale cream-coloured 



' Trans. Liic. Lit. and Phil. Sac. Jan. 1887, p. 39. 



164 



10 Mid. Nat. 1884, p. 302. 



