198 
NATURE NOTES. 
shell, but it was quite tame and seemed to like us to rub its head. A saucer of 
water was provided for it. It slept through the winter in its bed in the green- 
house. M. C. W. 
Cats and Squirrels (p. 217). — I was living some years ago about a mile 
from Hackwood Park, in Hampshire, where squirrels were numerous. We had a 
young female cat, who one day show'ed signs of great terror, racing about the 
garden ; we went out to see what frightened her, and saw a squirrel on a branch 
of a large tree. For two or three days the cat was most uneasy, but we felt sure 
she killed the squirrel, although afraid of him at first, for we found him dead on 
the grass. M. A. M. 
Jackdaws. — On about August 22, I was surprised to observ'e jackdaws at 
Hampstead fairly high in the air, hawking insects. In a dry summer w'hen 
ground insects and grubs are scarce, it would not perhaps be surprising ; but is it 
not an unusual occurence? Jackdaws seem ill fitted for quick aerial movements. 
E. G. W. 
Lemmings (p. 177). — The natural food of lemmings is grass, moss, and 
such other vegetable substances as they may find on the high table lands which 
are their principal home, but in confinement they eat much the same food as 
rabbits and other rodents. They are naturally hardy animals, and are quite 
comfortable in the open air if they have a warm nesting place, but still they are 
not easy to keep in confinement, and of the last seven in the Zoological Gardens 
only two survived three months of captivity. The migration of these little animals 
is one of the most curious phenomena in natural history. Perhaps for twenty 
years not a lemming is seen, then suddenly they appear in vast flocks, whose 
numbers have been estimated at millions. They march forward in a straight line, 
devouring everything eatable which comes in their way. Nothing stops them. If a 
stack of corn is in their path they eat it up and p.iss on ; if some object which they 
cannot eat or climb impedes them, they burrow under it. Rather than diverge 
from the straight line they plunge into rivers and lakes, though thousands are 
drowned therein, and so go boldly on to the sea coast, where they either swim out 
to sea and are lost, or w’ander up and down the coast for a few weeks till they die 
of starvation or disease. None ever return from these migrations, and along their 
whole track they leave such numbers of dead bodies that the air and water is pol- 
luted, and often a kind of typhoid fever — termed “lemming fever” follows on 
their trail. No entirely satisfactory reason has yet been given for these irregular 
migrations. F. W. Ashley. 
Kingfisher near London. — Perhaps some of your readers would like to 
know that my father, while walking this morning (September 13) in the Lady well 
Recreation Ground, Lewisham, saw a kingfisher in beautiful plumage on the 
river Ravensbourne, which at this point runs between two railways. Is it not 
unusual for this bird to be seen so near London ? 
Catford. Ethel Mary Britten. 
A Lost Cat. — One of our neighbours has a fine rough cat. During the 
intensely sharp frost of Christmas, 1S92, this animal disappeared suddenly from 
its home. Its mistress made inquiries in all directions, a reward was offered, 
and a thorough search instituted, all to no purpose — no cat was forthcoming, and 
we all agreed that it had been stolen. A week elapsed, and then a charwoman 
in an adjoining house happened to go into a small garden shed where tools and 
old lumber were kept, and while there thought she heard a faint scratching 
proceed from an old wine case which had fallen forward and lay bottom upward 
on the door. She raised the box, and up started an emaciated skeleton of a cat, 
which rushed wildly across the garden, actually managed to jump two fences, and 
then fell almost in a dying state at its own door. It must on one of its marauding 
excursions have leaped on to the wine case, which, overbalancing, had shut it up 
as in a trap, and there the poor creature had remained from Sunday morning till 
Saturday afternoon without food all through the intense cold of that truly Arctic 
week. By judicious treatment, giving small doses of bread soaked in gravy, 
teaspoonsful of milk and brandy, &c. , it was brought to life, and by the end of a 
week was able to creep out into the garden, looking as if it had lost five or six of 
its allotted lives. A. G. 
High [Vycotnbe. 
