THE LIFE O# MAMMALS 
the remainder of the order are called Imnsectivora, or true 
insectivores. 
Of these latter the highest are the shrews, — small, mouselike 
animals, with long, pointed heads, slender jaws filled with sharp, 
red-tipped teeth, the incisors long, forward-pointing, 
and curved, a flexible, bewhiskered nose sometimes 
much prolonged, close, rounded ears, and a musky smell. The 
fur is soft and the tail scantily haired. Shrews are found in 
most parts of the world, and in spite of their littleness are 
Shrew. 
COMMON EASTERN LONG-TAILED SHREW. 
wonderfully hardy, existing in far northern regions and on high 
mountains. Even our eastern long-tailed shrew, the smallest 
mammal known in the world, since it is not bigger than the end 
of one’s little finger and weighs but a fraction of an ounce, is 
able to run about in the snow, or to burrow through it, even 
when the mercury stands twenty degrees or more below zero. 
All the shrews are ceaselessly active, wandering about 
underneath leaves, old grass, and logs, and boring their way 
into loose loam or the punky wood of decayed stumps, in search 
of earthworms, grubs, beetles, slugs, and similar prey, including 
young mice and the fledglings of ground-nesting birds, and 
varying this fare by bites from soft-shelled beechnuts, tuberous 
roots, etc. They are astonishingly quick of hearing; are bold, 
pugnacious, and fierce, often killing and eating other shrews; 
difficult to keep alive in captivity, utterly untamable, and 
easily frightened to death.®’ All kinds exhale from glands near 
7° 
