Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1918-02-04
EFFICIENT HOUSEKEEPING.
BY Henrietta GFauei.
A MOUSE WITHIN MY HOUSE.

ooh, John, there's r rouse IN The
pantry" "Set q trap, says John. cts
no use 70 do that, never could take the
poor, nasty, cute little thing out of o. :.
Next morning: Well John. the mouse
is dead. | spread poison on piece of cake
baked and IT ate il. " That was great
waste" SAYS John Wife: Il don't see
why, | only used little piece" John:
''Of the poison, mean. philosopher or
Folly.
All right for you, Mr.. Ted Robinson,
YOU may think mice are creatures to Joke
about in YOUR laugh factory, but YOU can
! not make a woman see anything funny
about mouse. AS long as there Is such a
boarder IN the pantry the house is not in
order, and so there IS bound 10 De con-
tinual contest of wits until mouse or mis-
tress succuInbs.
Mice are wonderfully persevering. They
seem TO have. az much love for their nests
as cats have for their homes. Two ex-
periences prove this TO me Last fall
found nest of field mice in an empty bee
| hive was moving from the orchard to a
shed. As | dislodged them, the beautiful,
grey, little mother moved slowly through
the grass and | saw there were eight
babies cllnging TO her trembling body.
A few DAYS ago found time 70 open this
bee stand again 10 prepare 1t for the
coming season, and there she was IN
another nest with the first family sur
rounding her (well grown now and ne~
lot OF babies hiding from me. how do
know it was the same Mrs. MouseE
Just know it was.
The other instance Was when we tore
| an old cupboard out from the wall in our
ba.,Sa Z Rod ba-ar, in ono Mo
for forty years, and IN one corner was 8
tiny hole that knew was travelled through
by a wee small mousie. We placed the
cupboard in a summer kitchen adjoining
the room ii had been IN, but quite ten feet
from the old wall \ young man who had
! once lived in the house was looking at the
changes We had made, and he said: You
| moved the cupboard, didn't YOU? | won
der if my mouse's hole is still there.
He looked Ii WAS. He lifted up the cup
board and peered down the hole. 1t was
tunneled through the base board and in
the wall was Madam Mouse He said 1t
was the same one he had known when a
bov and | could not dispute 1t. She had
little family and We tished them out
with W.re and a stick and transplanted
them to 4 spot IN the rose garden across
the drive She came back, she got there
almost As soon as we did, and she is there
yet Every night and every morning |
say. Il wish that mouse was gone!"A
The government has published PAM
phlets telling how many millions of bushels
of grain a mouse can eat IN year, and
books have been written telling all about
their habits and habitats, but how TO ge
rid of them Is still mystery.
If YOU use a trap you must do as Mr..
Robinson says-"Tahe the poor, little
nasty things out of it" You must scald
the trap, too, or else no more will enter it,
and it is no good setting the trap in the
same place twice. so if you have one
mouse hole and one trap and several mice
in the family a trap is not much good
after all Poison works pretty we'll, but
after a while one learns to bake cake 50
that fatal results are not to be depended
upon Perhaps if we wrote poetry and
read it where they could hear it they would
leave would if | could-wouid leave
mean.