4i8 MURID^— EVOTOMYS 



"form" for themselves like a hare. Several observers have 

 found that they appreciate the well-known " wheel," which forms 

 a regular appendage to cages for mice. 



Any excitement such as fighting or pairing is accompanied 

 by much squeaking, the voice being comparatively deep-toned, 

 "a short, grunting squeak," neither so sharp nor so prolonged as 

 that of the Field Mouse or House Mouse.^ One in the possession 

 of Mr F. Norgate ^ fought and squeaked at him when he robbed 

 it of a laburnum seed. The mother of Mr T. V. Roberts's litter 

 was most jealous of her young being seen, and freely carried 

 them about in her mouth, or, when they grew older, drove them 

 into their sleeping compartment. The mother of Mr English's 

 attacked him in defence of her young, and died when caught.' 



Bank Mice are quarrelsome to their own species, and in 

 fighting make a great fuss ; grinding their teeth, they stand 

 upright on their hind legs, and hop round each other, stretching 

 out their fore paws for protection, or bending backwards to 

 avoid attacks.* 



This mouse is not usually associated with "mouse plagues," 

 but Collett mentions several in Norway, chiefly in the north of 

 the country. When food is abundant the numbers increase 

 proportionately, and Mr Cocks noticed that the exceptional 

 beech-mast harvest of 1900 resulted in great swarms of this 

 species and of the Field Mouse at Poynetts, Buckingham- 

 shire ; the normal numbers were not resumed until the following 

 summer. Mr J. G. Millais^and Mr de Winton** attribute the 

 devastation of the Forest of Dean, Gloucester, in 1813-1814, to 

 Bank Mice. Except the fact that woods, and not pastures, 

 were destroyed, and Edward Jesse's description^ of the "short- 

 tailed mouse " concerned as having the upper parts " of a 

 reddish brown," there is no evidence in support of this sup- 



' Rope, oj>. cit. The pairing shriek is " un cri aigu et chevrotant, qui rappelle 

 celui de la Fauvette " (Lataste, 382) ; Collett states that when two meet (in Norway) 

 they frequently utter a loud " tyee-tyew-tyew-tyee," the syllables repeated in rapid 

 succession. 



'^ Zoologist, 1874, 4236. 



3 For accounts of captive Bank Mice, see Rev. H. H. Slater, Zoologist, 1887, 462 I 

 E. R. Alston, Rope, Head (very tame), T. V. Roberts, opp. cit; and Macpherson, 

 Zoologist, 1894, 149. 



< Rope. 6 ii^ 247. 6 In Lydekker. 



Gleanings in Natural History, 6th ed., 1845, 1 1 i-i 14. 



