A MOUNTAIN STREAM 159 



on the roots and stems of plants, like the iris, that 

 grow by the sides of the water. It often makes 

 excursions by night to the fields near by. One some- 

 times sees it sitting squirrel-like near the door of its 

 burrow munching some piece of root which it holds 

 in its paws, and a rarer sight is the mother swimming 

 with a young one in her mouth. Water Voles do not 

 multiply so quickly as Rats do, and apart from break- 

 ing down the banks of the stream they are not very 

 harmful. 



The Water Shrew (Crossopus f-odlens) is a little 

 black and white animal, about three inches long in 

 body with two more to the tail, much commoner than 

 most people think. It is not a rodent like Rats and 

 Voles, but an insectivore like Mole and Hedgehog 

 and Land Shrews. So it lives on small insects, Crus- 

 taceans, and Snails, that it finds in the water, and, 

 apart from an occasional dinner of fish fry, it does not 

 do any harm at all. It makes long winding burrows 

 in the banks, with a rounded chamber at the far end. 

 There in spring the five or so young ones are born in 

 a grass-lined nest. They become very pretty little 

 creatures and play about on the banks. Indeed, the 

 Water Shrew is a very engaging animal, which 

 deserves closer study. Its swimming just at the 

 surface, half in, half out, is very neat, and makes 

 hardly a ripple. Although the creature is doubtless 

 derived from a terrestrial stock, common to it and 

 the ordinary Land Shrews, it is now so thoroughly at 

 home in the water that it will rarely leave it except to 

 enter the burrow. 



There are Common Shrews and Field Voles in the 

 meadow, but the creature most in evidence, though 



