ioo Field a7id Forest Rambles. 



roots of the hairs plumbeous.* Both are found on the 

 banks of the St. John River, and in the interior. I have heard 

 of black varieties having been captured in the district. 

 The well-known Ground Squirrel (T. striatus) is very common, 

 and comes much about gardens. I have also seen several 

 instances of melanism in this species. The MARYLAND MAR- 

 MOT or " Ground-hog " has also of late years become more 

 sociable and more abundant, and is abandoning the forest for 

 cultivated tracts. Besides the Jumping MOUSE, there is the 

 Short-eared Hamster and the White-footed species, 

 which take the place more or less of the European mouse 

 and rat in the backwood settlements and localities not yet 

 invaded by the latter, the distribution of which is more or 

 less confined to the seaport towns and also the banks of 

 navigable rivers. Neither, as might be expected, stand 

 the cold like the native Muridce, indeed there appears to 

 be a mortality among the European rats and mice during 

 very cold weather, although like other imported animals 

 they get a thick fur in winter; still by exposing live mice 

 to a temperature of 15 Fahrenheit in the open, they survive 

 only for an hour or two, and seemingly from the posture in 

 which I have found them, death must have been rapid, inas- 

 much as two individuals exposed during a cold north wind, 

 when the glass registered about 16 Fahrenheit, were quite 

 lively when placed in the cage, and in the course of a few 

 minutes I found them frozen to death and seated on their 

 hind-quarters with their eyes open ; whereas the native mice 

 above mentioned may be seen running about, apparently 

 unaffected by much lower temperatures. 



* Since the above was written I find P. Sabrinus is included in lists of 

 the mammals of Nova Scotia, and has therefore most probably been 

 hitherto overlooked in Maine and New Brunswick.— See Gilpin, Trans. 

 Inst. Nat. Hist. Nova Scotia, vol. ii., p. 14. 



