WINTR Y DA YS 2 5 5 



The manners of these animals when encaged 

 have often been recorded ; it is, however, from 

 those of wild animals that the student should 

 draw his inferences, and this usually requires 

 much patience. But there is a subtle charm in 

 the wilderness which is an additional inducement 

 to study it. The meadow vole is vivacious, even 

 in a cage, but much more interesting when wild. 

 In autumn he hunts for nuts beneath the hedge, 

 and finding one, seizes it by the small end, and 

 bears it away in haste, craning his head above the 

 fallen leaves. So keen is he for this food that he 

 will readily enter a trap which has been rubbed 

 with the kernel of a hazel nut and is baited with 

 the same fruit. He will even take a nut from the 

 hand within two days after capture. In obtaining 

 the seeds of small grasses he sometimes employs 

 a stratagem. Severing the stem at its base in the 

 midst of dead grass, he pulls it down and aside, 

 perhaps along one of the corridors. He again 

 severs the stalk, which slants, trembles, and sinks in 

 successive jerks until the head alone is seen. This 

 soon follows the stem, being dragged out of sight 

 backwards. The mouse is. thus hidden all the time. 



