NOTES AND QUERIES. 223 



handled the Whiskered Bat uttered a sharp cry, but the Long-eared Bat 

 was quite silent, and seemed very sleepy until let loose in a room, when they 

 all flew about for fifteen or twenty minutes, finally settling on the cornice. 

 None of them would touch food, though we kept them alive for two or three 

 days. Hoping this information may be of some use to you, I beg leave to 

 correct a printer's error in the name " Fernilee," which is spelt without 

 the i on the page above referred to. — T. A. Coward (Higher Downs, 

 Bowdon, Cheshire). 



Hesperomys versus Mus. — When I returned to West Cliff, Custer 

 Co., Colorado, last autumn, after an expedition to other parts of the State, 

 I found my house swarming with a species of Mouse, Hesperomys 

 sonoriensis, LeConte, which is conspicuous for its somewhat yellowish 

 colour and white feet. During the winter, however, specimens of Mus 

 musculus appeared, became more numerous, and fiually took the place of 

 the Hesperomys, which became extremely rare. It was evidently a case 

 like that of Mits decumanus and rattus, so familiar to everyone, though it is 

 not very easy to conjecture the precise reason that the presence of the Mus 

 should be the cause of the extinction of the Hesperomys. Later on, 

 I procured a cat, which has proved fitter than M. musculus, and has 

 survived at its expense — but that is easier to understand. Dr. C. Hart 

 Merriam, of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, to whom I submitted the 

 Hesperomys for identification, states that it is sonoriensis as the nomen- 

 clature now stands, but suggests that the name may have to be altered when 

 a revision of the group is undertaken. — T. D. A. Cockerell (West Cliff, 

 Custer Co., Colorado, U.S.A., April 23rd). 



BIRDS. 



The late Mr. J. P. Wilmot's Egg Collection.— The collection of 

 British Birds' Eggs formed by the late Mr. Joseph Pratt Wilmot, and by 

 him bequeathed to his friend the late Mr. G. L. Russell, has lately been 

 presented to the University of Cambridge by Lady Caroline Russell and 

 Mr. Cecil Henry Russell, in memory of the husbaud of the one and the 

 father of the other. The collection is accompanied by many letters, from 

 correspondents of Mr. Wilmot, and other papers, which will materially aid 

 the compilation of a Catalogue of its contents ; but, for the better under- 

 standing of these documents, an examination of Mr. Wilmot's own letters is 

 much desired. Accordingly I would ask any one who is in possession of 

 such letters to be so good as to submit them to me. I will promise that 

 they shall be duly returned to the senders. It will be remembered that a 

 considerable proportion of the eggs figured by Mr. Hewitson, especially in 

 the last edition of his well-known work, were drawn from specimens in his 

 friend Mr. Wilmot's collection.— Alfred Newton (Magdalene College, 

 Cambridge, May 8th). 



