202 WASTE-LAND WANDERINGS. 



sncli by those wlio are unacquainted witli its habits. It 

 swims and dives well" This would indicate that some- 

 where the meadow-mouse is quite as amphibious as ter- 

 restrial in its liabits ; but into the marsh, only a few 

 rods distant, with its acres of wild - rice, or " oats " as 

 Mr. Ord calls it, the mice nowadays seldom if ever 

 come. The pretty picture of their sitting at high tide 

 upon tangled blades of the reeds, I have never seen ; 

 and why should they, if they desired to go elsewhere ? 

 Mr. Ord says, " it swims and dives well." That it can 

 swim we know. Until recently I had never seen it dive, 

 but did not question its ability so to do because I had 

 not seen it. 



As with all mammals, their proper liabits, as indicated 

 by their anatomical structure, are not closely adhered 

 to, for not only do we find land animals at home in 

 the water when necessity requires it, but this meadow- 

 mouse, so generally supposed to be a vegetarian, is by 

 preference as carnivorous as a cat. During the early 

 weeks of the current summer I found tliem to be sys- 

 tematic egg-hunters, and that they had destroyed both 

 the eggs and young of song-sparrows, brown thrushes, 

 and one nest of a chewink. If I have ever, in earlier 

 ■writings, spoken a good word for this little mammal, let 

 me recall it. A creature that will destroy a song-bird's 

 nest is a pest, and whether furred, feathered, four-legged, 

 two-legged, or a small boy, ought to be exterminated. 



It is probable that nests placed but a little way above 

 the ground are not molested, and equally j)i'obable that 

 the persistent persecution suffered by the song-sj^arrows 

 and brown thrushes has induced them generally to aban- 



