128 BEACH GRASS 



as meadow-mice, working under the snow, are 

 fond of tender bark. In this winter when seven 

 feet of snow on a level fell during the season, 

 and when drifts sometimes buried trees ten and 

 fifteen years old to their tops, the work that went 

 on under the snow was extensive and not re- 

 vealed until the snow melted. Then it was dis- 

 covered that many trees were completely girdled 

 by the mice whose delicate teeth markings could 

 be seen covering all the wood from which the 

 bark had been removed. Many of the lower 

 limbs were girdled in the same manner and stood 

 out white and bare. The limbs showed also the 

 larger tooth markings of the rabbits, and the 

 leaf and flower buds were removed by their in- 

 cisors as if they had been cut with a sharp knife. 

 One ignorant of these matters, might be led to 

 think that some enemy had, in spite, pruned off 

 all the buds on the lower branches of his fruit- 

 trees. Indeed when one stands under an apple- 

 tree in spring and finds the buds cut off as high as 

 the arm can reach, a human enemy rather than a 

 diminutive cottontail is suggested. When the 

 snow is gone it is difficult to realize the condition 



