AN OCTOBER DIARY. 267 



wide dashes of shadow. Each chattered to its neighbor, 

 and their united voices, as the birds flew over the trees, 

 sounded strangely like hail falling through the leaves. 

 I half held out my hand to catch the ice-drops, 



October 2. — This is the first respectably rainy day 

 since August. When the rain, at last, does come, plant- 

 life promptly responds; but not so the animal world. 

 Tired of waiting for a shower, the birds generally 

 wander to within the nearest rain-belt. Of course, our 

 small mammals cannot migrate to this extent, but they 

 do have a curious habit, during these "dry spells," of 

 leaving their summer homes and taking up temporary 

 abodes in swampy nooks and about bubbling springs. 

 Even field mice will leave the uplands, at such a time, 

 and settle by the ditches. There they come in contact 

 with the resident meadow mice, and jolly rows occur at 

 times. Indeed, I have known a regular pitched battle 

 to be the result. When it comes to a contest between 

 the feral " domestic " mice and the true meadow mouse, 

 the former seldom hold their own, in spite of their 

 greater agility, but are usually driven off. On the 

 other hand, when an army of upland meadow mice in- 

 trude upon the quarters of their cousins in the low- 

 lands, then the result is undeterminable, for the indi- 

 viduals cannot be distinguished. It is, however, war to 

 the knife, and many are killed. 



The milder-mannered white-footed Hesperorays are 

 less affected by dry weather, but still have no fancy for 

 a practically anhydrous condition. It may, of course, 

 be merely a coincidence, but is far more probably a de- 



