
28 R. COLLETT. ; 
ones. Next day, we found that'she had given birth to six little. 
ones. That day and the next the mother was scarcely ever in 
the box, and we feared that she had deserted the nest, but on 
looking in on the third day the little ones were seen to be alive. 
On the 21st July — the eighth day — the silky coats of the 
little ones began really to show nicely in their proper colours. 
They were still quite blind and were become exceedingly thin, 
long, and leggy; they began to run out and in å day or two 
later, and from the 24th July, the eleventh day of their age, 
would run about — still blind — in, over, and under the moss 
in the two apartments of their box. 'Two days later (26th 
July) their eyes began to open a very little, and next day were 
fully open; they were now about the size of å common mouse, 
and they began to nibble at the moss and other eatables.” É 
Habits, &c. The trips to and from the nest are, as å rule, 
undertaken with great circumspection, and they appear to visit 
their young chiefly at night. In any case, on several occasions, 
I found nests containing the infant young when the parents were 
neither present, nor did they appear, notwithstanding that I for 
long, and on repeated occasions, sought to find them there. 
At those grassy spots where they had taken up their quar- 
ters, as well as on the mountain pastures, or where grass grew 
richly amongst the brushwood, they might often be seen running 
along beaten tracks leading from one patch of scrub to another. 
It is probable, however, that these paths have been, in part, formed 
[No. 8. 



| 
by the Arvicola ratticeps, with whom they shared the dwelling 
haunts on the sides of the mountains. Up on the mountain proper, 
amongst the tufts of the Rubus chamaemorus and the scrub of 
the Betuta nana, the lemmings were almost sole rulers, but like- 
wise there the beaten tracks might constantly be seen between 
the bushes, or running from one tuft to another. These paths 
terminated beneath a stone or the root of a tree, in å hole, which 
led to their dwelling place during the day. 
This prolifit production of litters, speedily produced and 
complete in numbers, takes place it would appear, exclusively 
on the mountain plateaux themselves, or in their immediate 
