14 MURIDJE. 



The Arvicola neglecta is believed by M. de Selys-Longchamps to be the Mus 

 agrestis of Linnaeus, a species found in Sweden. 



The Squirrel, Sciurus vulgaris, Linn. 



Rutty remarks that the squirrel is " said to have been found in Lut- 

 terel's Town ; " and there is a tradition that this animal was common in 

 Ireland before the destruction of the native Avoods. 



In O'Flaherty's West or H'lar Connaught (1684), the squirrel is 

 amongst the animals enumerated as then inhabiting that district. 



The following extract from a letter, dated Edgeworthstown, 16th July, 

 1848, received by my friend Robert Patterson, Esq., from the venerable 

 Maria Edgeworth (then, as she signed herself, in her 82nd year), is con- 

 clusive as to the recent existence of this species in some parts of Ireland : — - 



" I can assure you that squirrels are to be found in Ireland, to my certain 

 knowledge, and in my neighbourhood ; at Castle Forbes, the seat of the Earl of 



Granard ; and at Carrickglass, the seat of Baron Lefroy As we were 



driving through the woods, at Carrickglass, yesterday, a lady in the carriage 

 looked up and saAv something darting up the stem of a tree. It was a squirrel, 

 new to her, as she was from Cork. In your next edition [Mr. Patterson's 

 " Zoology for Schools " is the work here alluded to] I request you -will enlarge 

 your assertion respecting squirrels in Ireland, and not confine their existence to 

 the County of Wicklow. They not only are to be found, but abound, in many 

 places in Ireland, too numerous here to mention." 



The gamekeeper at Donard Lodge, having formerly lived at Castle 

 Forbes (County Longford), I inquired from him, in August, 1851, whe- 

 ther he had seen squirrels in the latter demesne ; to which he replied, 

 that when he was resident there, in 1836 and 1837, they were abundant, 

 and that they were also numerous in the adjoining demesne of Carrick- 

 glass, but he had not known of their existence elsewhere. They were 

 well known to have been introduced at Castle Forbes, but at Avhat period 

 he could not state. He added, that the late Lord Forbes, imagining that 

 these animals did injury to the young shoots of the trees, offered to give 

 him one shilling a-head for them, and that numbers were killed. On one 

 occasion he shot twenty-five within the space of an hour. After being 

 fired at, they became very wary. 



A gentleman who resided for many years near Newtonmountkennedy 

 (County Wicklow) informed me, in 1851, that they were plentiful in that 

 locality. 



TuNBRiDGE Wells, October 4, 1847. — Squirrels. — My friend Mr. 

 W. Ogilby and I saw several to-day in tliis neighbourhood, and all on 

 beech trees, eating the mast ; oaks, covered with acorns, adjoined the beech 

 trees, but no squirrels were on them. Mr. O. remarked to me that he ob- 

 served, when here last year, that they were never on oak trees, but that 

 he saw them frequently extracting seed from the cones of the spruce fir. 



Common Dormouse, 3Iyoxus avellannrius, Desmar. 



The dormouse is not indigenous to Ireland. Rutty observes that " a 

 vulgar error has prevailed, mentioned in Johnston's Historia Animalium, 

 that the dormouse was not found in Ireland." A sort of description fol- 

 lows, but by no means proving the animal to be the dormouse. 



Harvest Mouse, 3Ius minutus, Pallas.— (il/. messorius, Shaw.) 



This species cannot be given with certainty as a native of Ireland. The 

 only information received by me from any part of the country which 



