Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 55.djvu/646

626 The northern shrike is generally given the credit of living to a certain extent on mice, but the only evidence pointing in that direction that I have ever seen is that, like the mouse-eating hawks and owls, he comes quickly enough to the call; nor is there any need of concealment when dealing with this bird. He will come fearlessly within a few yards of you, hopping and flying from twig to twig, with his long tail continually moving up and down in his excitement, apparently impelled more by motives of curiosity than hunger.

But when it comes to calling up to you such shy creatures as the mink or fox the utmost caution is necessary, for although lacking the keenness of eyesight possessed by birds, the acuteness of their sense of smell and hearing is something marvelous; yet when conditions are favorable they may sometimes be brought quite close and studied to advantage.

Standing one day beside an old tumble-down rail fence that ran along between the woods and salt marshes, half hidden in the brambles and tall grass, I caught the merest glimpse of a mink slipping along between the bottom rails. As he was evidently unaware of my presence, I determined to see more of him, and squeaked in as mouselike a manner as possible, and quickly had the satisfaction of seeing him make his appearance on a projecting stake much nearer than when I had first seen him. Stretching himself along the stake, he appeared to listen and look in my direction, but although I was standing in plain sight on the edge of the marsh hardly a rod away, the fact that he was obliged to look directly into the sun made it quite impossible for him to clearly distinguish what he saw. At the end of a few moments he dropped into the grass and started in my direction, the trembling grass blades clearly indicating his progress as he approached nearer and nearer, until almost at my feet he vanished, and, in spite of the most patient waiting on my part, absolutely refused to show himself again.

The last instance of the kind that has come under my notice happened on a clear moonlight night as I was wheeling along a lonely road between old apple orchards. Some part of the machine squeaked at intervals in a way that might possibly have been mistaken for a mouse. At all events, an owl appeared to have been deceived thereby, for he came flapping out of the orchard and flew alongside, at times coming quite close and again swinging off into the shadow, till at last, convinced that his supper lay not in that direction, he put on fresh speed and left me far behind. Perhaps he would have done as he did if the bicycle had not squeaked, but, judging from his behavior, I am inclined to think otherwise.