THE PYGMY OR LESSER SHREW 



123 



the larger and more powerful Common Shrew, the present 

 species has not responded by a conspicuous increase in numbers, 

 and it is probably nowhere in that country so abundant as 

 the Wood Mouse.^ 



It is remarkable that the Nearctic representatives of the 

 Pygmy Shrew seem to be better known to American naturalists 

 than the forms representing our familiar Common Shrew. Mr 

 Thompson Seton has brought together quite a full account of the 

 habits of the former, which are especially interesting in winter. 

 According to Mr Nelson,^ " the first severe weather brings them 



Fig. 25. — Skulls of (i) Sorex araneus and (2) i". minutus ; (a) from above, 

 Q) from the side. 



about the trading stations and native villages, and there they 

 forage and penetrate every corner of the houses with all the 

 persistence of the domestic Mouse. Scores of them were killed 

 about our houses at Saint Michael every winter, and they were 

 equally at the other stations throughout the interior. ... 



" After snowfalls they travel from place to place by forcing 

 a passage under the snow, and frequently keep so near the 

 surface that a slight ridge is left to mark their passage. On 

 the ice of the Yukon I have traced a ridge of this kind over a 



' See Irish Naturalist, 1910, 125. 



2 Natural History of Alaska, 1887, 270-271. 



