568 MURID^— MICROMYS 



but not usually so many as of the House Mouse, are killed 

 when a rick is thrashed*; and White (Letter Ix.) made the 

 observation that on one occasion the dogs devoured the 

 Harvest, but rejected the Common Mice ; the cats, vice 

 versd. Blasius describes it as not rarely entering houses in 

 autumn ; this is not unlikely in the colder portions of Central 

 Europe, although such a habit does not appear to have been 

 observed in Britain. 



The late Professor SchlegeP was so fortunate as to find 

 the winter nests of the Harvest Mouse in a wide ditch near 

 Leyden, Holland. These, composed of moss, were attached 

 to and between the stems of several reeds, and resembled, 

 though more fusiform, the nests of the Reed-warbler. Their 

 height was from 6 to 12 inches, their breadth 3 to 4 inches; 

 they hung about a foot over the water, without visible means 

 of ingress, so that when .entering a mouse had to find its way 

 through the comparatively loose upper portion. In some cases 

 the deserted nests of Aquatic Warblers had been adapted by 

 provision of a cap of grass. The colony consisted of about 

 fifty nests, and in summer these were replaced by the usual 

 globular structures, of the average size of a man's fist, and 

 with a small circular opening near the top. 



The summer nests always contain a bed of soft shredded 

 grass. They are placed in coarse, rank herbage ; in low 

 bushes in open country ; but preferably near or on growing 

 corn-stalks. The nest described by White (Letter xii.) "was 

 found in a wheatfield, suspended in the head of a thistle " ; 

 that found by Macgillivray in Fifeshire was in the midst of a 

 tuft of Aira ccespitosa, and about 9 inches from the ground ; 

 Blasius found nests in grass near a pond, and once saw 

 "thousands" of the mice climbing and hanging on grass 

 stalks over flooded ground ; Schlegel found nests in Rubus 

 fruticosus, Rumex acetosa, Epilobium, and in Purging Buck- 

 thorn* on sand-dunes in Holland. Other nests have been 

 recorded in the boughs of a wild Clematis * ; in long grass 



1 'L2lxAo\%, Zool. Garten, 187 1, 163. 



2 Notes from the Leyden Museum, iii., 23-28, 1881 ; reprinted in Zoologist, 1881, 

 233-37- 



^ Hippophae rhamnoides. * W. Hewett, Zoologist, 1843, 349- 



