620 MURIDiE— EPIMYS 



lead pipes,^ and will even break through cement if they can 

 attack it before it has hardened. Sometimes they construct 

 clumsy nests, like those of the House Sparrow,^ in thick bushes 

 or hedges. 



They have a special propensity for exploring underground 

 passages, such as sewers or drains, where no doubt they pick 

 up much food ; and, as they swim and dive with almost as much 

 facility as purely aquatic mammals, they thus tend to be found 

 in exceptional numbers by streams or rivers, with consequent 

 damage to embankments and reservoirs. 



Where they are abundant they make beaten paths or 

 "runs," distinguishable from those of rabbits by the con- 

 tinuously smoothened surface, since the stride is much shorter 

 than that of rabbits, and by the spindle-shaped droppings. 



^ iu/mJvunn _^^_: .1MMum.Q^ j, 



I 1 1 \ 1 1 I 1 1 1 1 1 — 



I, 5 J,. z S. 1 



Fig. 92. — Spoor of Rat (Diagram from sketch and measurements made by 

 Barrett-Hamilton at Kilmanock.) 



One such pathway leading from burrows to a feeding place 

 is said to have measured 500 paces in length.* 



The tracks of rats (Fig. 92) show that when walking the 

 hind feet tread partly upon and partly to the outer sides of the 

 prints left by the corresponding fore feet, the length of the 

 stride being between 8 and 10 in. As the pace increases 

 the animal breaks into a series of leaps and covers a distance 

 of from 13 to 18 in. at each bound. In these leaps the hind 

 feet strike the ground together a little in advance, and to the 

 outer side, of the prints left by the fore feet ; the latter prints 

 lie side by side close to the centre of the track. The extreme 

 width of the track is about 3 in. 



' Gnawing of lead from a sash- weight — H. Burroughes, Zoologist, 1852, 3473 ; 

 leaden pipes {Field, 17th Feb. 1894, 230 ; ibid., loth March, 353 (illustrated), 

 24th April, 474. Specimens of gnawed pipes are in British Museum (N.H.). 



2 Passer domesticus. Whole "ratteries" were reported as existing in hedges 

 in New Zealand — see Proc. N.Z. Institute, 1870, 47 ; and Zoologist, 1887, 189. 



^ Jesse, op. cit., 231. 



