304 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
MAMMALIA. 
Dormouse in Hampshire.—In Mr. Rope’s article on ‘‘ The Range of 
the Dormouse in England and Wales,” he says, “ Reports from Dorsetshire 
and Hampshire are very meagre; perhaps this may arise from the com- 
monness of the species rather than its rarity.” The Dormouse is, or was, 
very common in this part of Hampshire. I have known as many as seventy 
or eighty in the College at one time, the boys not unfrequently carrying 
them about in their pockets; the price paid for them at the cottages was 
threepence or fourpence. The last year or two they have not been so 
plentiful; in fact, they have been scarce. We have a number of hazel 
copses, and generally speaking considerable numbers of Dormice are found 
when the underwood is cut, there being a large extent of beech and oak 
wood in our neighbourhood. ‘ Old-man’s-beard” is very plentiful in our 
hedges. Some years since I lived at Leighton Buzzard in Bedfordshire, 
and the Dormouse was frequently found by the woodman in King’s Wood 
and Baker’s Wood, about three or four miles from that town. The variety, 
or rather example, with a white tip to its tail is by no means rare, but is 
thought a good deal of by the boys, it not being the “ common” mouse. 
It is not an unfrequent occurrence to see one of these little animals with a 
“stump” tail—that is, with part of the tail gone; they are said to bite 
their own tails off when kept short of water. Occasionally they show 
carnivorous propensities; we once had half-a-dozen in a cage, and were 
surprised one morning to find one of them dead with half of his head eaten 
away. I have at different times sent several Dormice through the post to 
my friends, and in every instance they arrived safely. I have seen an 
instance in which this little animal was so tamed that when at liberty in a 
room it would come to its owner when called, and would run up his body 
into his hand or on to his shoulder—Joun A. WiLLMoRE (Queenwood 
College, near Stockbridge, Hants). 
BIRDS. 
Pied Flycatcher and other Birds at Bolton.—In the beginning of 
June I spent two delightful days at Bolton, in Yorkshire, attracted far 
more by the beautiful scenery of the River Wharfe than by the old Priory 
situated on its banks. Sketching by the river all one morning, I took up 
my position on a large boulder half-way out in the stream, where I was 
able to get an exquisite view and make myself comfortable, except for the 
numerous flies. Luckily there seemed an abundance of all sorts of birds, 
ee 
