42 NATURAL HISTORY 



I have procured some of the mice mentioned in my for- 

 mer letter, 1 a young one and a female with young, both of 

 which I have preserved in brandy, from the colour, shape, 

 size and manner of nesting, I make no doubt but that the 



THE HARVKST MOUSE. 



species is nondescript. They are much smaller, and more 

 slender, than the Mus domesticMs medius of Eay ; and have 



^ i[^ more of the squirrel or dormouse colour : their belly is 

 white ; a straight line along their sides divides the shades 

 of their back and belly. They never enter into houses, are 

 carried into ricks and barns with the sheaves, abound in 



j^-.'^o harvest, and build their nests amidst the straws of the corn 

 above the ground, and sometimes in thistles. They breed 

 as many as eight at a litter, in a little round nest composed 

 of the blades of grass or wheat. 



One of these nests I procured this autumn, most artifi- 

 cially plaited, and composed of the blades of wheat, per- 

 fectly round, and about the size of a cricket-ball, with the 



body of a dirty yellow colour, but with the usual black bars. See Pen- 

 nant, " Brit. Zool." 1768, p. 560. It was shot in the adjoining parish of 

 Faringdon. ED. 



1 Letter X. pp. 35, 36. 



