Illustration: FOR AN HOUR THEY ENJOYED THE NOVEL SENSATION.]

At night they lived in a tiny burrow, a foot below the surface of the
ground. They had no claim to it, but they had found it empty. Empty
burrows belong to the first mouse that comes along.

Once only did they stay above the surface after sundown. For an hour they
enjoyed the novel sensation. Then the long-drawn wail of the brown owl
drove them below in haste.

Perhaps they realized that prey on the surface is the owl's ideal. It
is also the hawk's. But, where under-keepers are armed with guns, the
night-bird has the better prospects. Both would have their wings clear as
they strike. The owl's great chance comes when the corn is "stitched" in
shocks of ten. Then he quarters the stubble, and nothing clear of shelter
escapes him.

So the summer had passed--the perfect summer that comes once in a century.
Day after day the sun had blazed through a cloudless sky; night after
night the dews had fallen and refreshed the earth. The young mice, though
pink, as yet, about the nose and waistcoat, were as promising as young
mice could be. Everything was altogether and completely satisfactory.

[Illustration: THEN THE LONG-DRAWN WAIL OF THE BROWN OWL DROVE THEM BELOW
IN HASTE.]

So, as the western sky crimsoned and the shadow of each cornstalk gleamed
like copper on its neighbour, the harvest mouse stole down from his
eminence and sought his burrow, for, as I have said before, the nest was
only a nursery.

* * * * *

He was up betimes. He was a light sleeper, and half a noise of that kind
would have roused him. It was clank and whirr and swish and rattle in one.
At first it sounded from the far corner on the right; then it passed along
the hedgerow, growing more and more menacing until it seemed to be within
a yard of him. Then it shrank away to nothing on the left, ceased for a
moment, and, in obedience to human shouting, commenced afresh. So from
corner to corner, _crescendo_ and _diminuendo_. The harvest mouse was in
the very centre of a square field.

[Illustration: HE CLIMBED BETWEEN TWO TOWERING STALKS.]

[Illustration: IN FIVE MINUTES HE WAS UP ALOFT ONCE MORE.]

When the sound seemed at its greatest distance, he climbed between two
towering stalks and strained his eyes in its direction. He could not see
for more than twenty yards before him. The world beyond was wrapt in soft
white mist. Never had he seen anything so unc