BREEDING HABITS OF THE LONG-TAILED FIELD MOUSE. 128 



speak confidently. So fast did the young attach themselves that 

 the females could scarcely move without pulling two or three 

 after them. 



The young were reared in the small box, but the mothers 

 had a care over their movements outside, and carried them "back 

 to the nest until they reached the age of three weeks. They 

 were not caught at the back of the neck, as is usual with dogs 

 and cats when carrying their young, but generally by the side of 

 the belly, midway between the fore and hind legs ; the mother 

 then raised the young one completely off the ground, and with 

 head erect conveyed it to the nest. Sometimes the parental 

 authority was attempted to be exercised on an "old" young one, 

 and a species of dragging was then resorted to. The entrance to 

 the breeding-box was narrow, and it was not possible to carry 

 the young through it. This the mothers soon learned, and they 

 overcame the difficulty by dropping the young one at the entrance 

 and then, going in themselves, they turned round and dragged it 

 in head foremost. 



It has been said that Mus sylvaticus is easily tamed, but my 

 pets were always timid and easily frightened. As to food, a sod 

 of grass was put in every morning, and in this they delighted to 

 root until the whole of it was scratched about the cage. The 

 blades of grass were seldom eaten, the roots being much pre- 

 ferred, but the leaves of clover, and especially dandelion, were 

 greatly relished, and for an unexpanded flower of dandelion nearly 

 everything else would be deserted: the fortunate possessor of 

 this delicacy would carry it off to a corner to be free from inter- 

 ruption. A tiny saucer of milk was always in the cage, and they 

 drank it eagerly. Oats, wheat, barley, chesnuts, beech-nuts, 

 walnuts, arbutus berries, gooseberries, apples, grapes, and, in 

 fact, every variety of fruit was eaten. Almonds were not much 

 liked. Every corner of the cage was a storehouse ; a grain of 

 wheat or other food would be covered up with the nose, after the 

 manner of a dog burying a bone, and sometimes the hind legs 

 would be used in scraping the floor of the cage backward to assist 

 in heaping materials to hide it. The Field Mouse hides many 

 things in the one place ; I do not know that dogs have ever been 

 known to do this. 



