THE ZOOLOGIST. 
THIRD SERIES. 
Vou. V.] JUNE, 1881. [No. 54. 
ON THE WINTER NEST OF THE HARVEST MOUSE. 
By Prorrssor H. ScHLEGEL.* 
Tue mode of nidification of the Dwarf or Harvest Mouse, 
essentially different from that of its congeners, is a fact well 
known to naturalists, and so singular in its nature that it must 
attract the curiosity of every one. 
Little, however, is known about the varieties which the nests 
present, and nothing at all about the very différent kinds of nests 
which the little animal builds in certain localities for its retreat 
in the cold season. 
Although spread over a great part of Europe as far as Western 
Asia, the Harvest Mouse is generally reputed a species of rare 
occurrence. ‘This fact finds its explanation in several circum- 
stances. The little creature easily escapes the attention of man 
on account of its diminutive size and the rapidity of its motions. 
In other instances it is taken, notwithstanding the difference in 
colour, for the young of the common Wood Mouse, Mus sylvaticus: 
The nests are generally regarded by the people as birds’ nests, 
and this goes so far that even experienced hunters could not be 
convinced of the contrary. When I called the attention of some 
mowers to these nests, they assured me that they had occasionally 
seen them in the fields, but had always looked upon them as a mere 
conglomeration of dry grass. The greatest difficulty to observe 
these little animals lies in the particular mode of their distribution 
* Extracted from ‘ Notes from the Leyden Museum,’ vol. iii., pp. 283—28 
(January, 1881). 
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