208 WASTE-LAND WANDERINGS. 



It was a pretty sight to see the mice when forced to 

 quit their airy quarters in a smilax thicket. Be the 

 vine ever so slender, they took no uncertain steps, but 

 tripped lightly down from point to point, always de- 

 scending and never arriving at a confusing corner, and 

 so at a loss as to what direction next to take. One fe- 

 male mouse with two young ones clinging to her teats 

 turned just twenty corners before she reached the ground. 

 Once there, she suddenly disappeared. This is always 

 the case, but just where they go when they reach terra 

 firma remains to be shown. The prevalent impression 

 is that every mouse has a subterranean retreat directly 

 beneatli the bush-nest, and passes from one to the other 

 as fancy dictates. Their actions, indeed, seem to bear 

 out the truth of this, but I have never been able to dis- 

 cover these supposed underground retreats. In some 

 cases it was clearly impossible that such should exist. 

 That they take refuge, at times, in the intricate tunnels 

 of the meadow-mice, I know, and that any burrow would 

 be entered, when these mice are driven from the bushes, 

 is quite certain ; that they construct one expressly for 

 such a contingency is quite another question. 



Why, it will probably be asked, do so many of these 

 mice quit their cosey quarters in or on the ground, and 

 which have served them every purpose, and take all this 

 trouble to build a new home in the bushes for the win- 

 ter ? It has been suggested that the old nest was worn 

 out, and better fitted for entomological research than for 

 hesperomoid habitation. I had myself thought of this, 

 but have never detected such abundant evidences of this 

 disastrous condition as would warrant the removal ; and 



