A LIVELY OLD MOUSE.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4498, 5 June 1883, Page 2

A LIVELY OLD MOUSE.

In these days of widespread oulture.it is scarcely surprising to find that even the „ backwoodsman, living far away from the * haunts of civilisation, is ready to devote *^ some of bis spare leisure to the i£ri|estiga> tion of problems in natural history. This particular backwoodsman is an American. The account is taken from his " notes." In the "fall"of 79, while digging ma bank, be unearthed a mouse, "frozenstiff and apparently/dead." The mouse was taken home as a cariosity and thrown carelessly on the floor. After a little whila he began to show signs of. returning consciousness, opened his eyes, and began to breathe slowly, " blinking like a rent* able Kip Van Winkle," and eventually hopped about " as lively as possible." As the animal had evidently been in a torpid : state for some time, the Jjackwoodaman determined to try some experiments. Every two or three nights he put the mouse out of doors. On opening' the cage in the morning it would be "as hard as a butternut," but, upon thawing was "as active as ever." One night the unfortunate mouse was thrust out of doors, the thermometer registering 30 deg. below zero; but even this did not kill him. Eight times was he subjected to this freezing process; each time he came round. When spring came, the mouse lost his appetite, and di«d an apparently natural death. The body of this remarkable auimal was 3* inches long; ha could easily clear 4 or 5 feet at a hop. "Many insects freeze up in the winter and thaw out in the spring," adds the naturalist, " but I was not aware that a mouse did it. That seems to be » fact,