A New Red Fox from Nova Scotia. 55 



broader between the orbits and narrower across the palate. There is also 

 a very striking difference in the upper outline of the skulls when viewed 

 in profile. This line is nearly straight in Vulpes vulpes, while in V. penn 

 sylvanica it dips decidedly in front of the root of the zygoma and rises 

 between the orbits. 



I can find no name based on the large northern red fox. 



Desmarest, in 1820, called the ' cross fox ' Cam's decussatus, and refers 

 to Geoffrey Collection du Museum.* It is given as an inhabitant of 

 " L'Amerique Septentrionale." As all three races of our red fox occa 

 sionally show this color phase, the name cannot be said to apply to one 

 more than another. 



Desmarest's C. argentatus is said to inhabit America and Asia. Cams 

 argentatus ' The silver fox ' dates (so far as I can ascertain) from Shaw's 

 General Zoology, 1800-1826, and is based on Pennant, who says it in 

 habits the forests of Louisiana (in his day the whole lower Mississippi 

 Valley). This name must therefore have been given to the ' silver gray ' 

 phase of the Southern red fox V. pennsylvanica typica. 



Richardson in Fauna Boreaii- Americana, 1829, gives three ' red foxes ' : 



Canis ( Vulpes) fulvus (Desmarest).f 



Cam's fulvus var. /? decussatus (Geoffrey, Coll. du Mus.). 



Canis fulvus var. 7 argentatus (Desmarest). 



Richardson's Canis fulvus is not Vulpes pennsylvanica typica, but the sub 

 species named Vulpes macrourus by Baird in 1852. Richardson assigns 

 no different range to his var. argentatus, which must be assumed to be 

 the ' silver gray ' phase of the same form. He quotes a description of 

 var. decussatus from Joseph Sabine's Appendix to Franklin's Journey, 

 1823, p. 656. All Sabine says as to locality, under the head of this va 

 riety, is "The specimen received from Capt. Franklin and that from the 

 Hudson Bay Company nearly correspond." The animal described might 

 have been an example of any form in the ' cross ' phase and most prob 

 ably was the prairie fox, V. pennsylvanica macroura (Baird). 



While all our red foxes sometimes present the various different color 

 phases, still ' cross ' and ' silver gray ' foxes are more common northward. 

 This corresponds with the general tendency among our mammals which 

 are subject to melanism. It is now known that black woodchucks and 

 black gray squirrels are more often met with at the northern part of the 

 range of these species, and the same will probably prove to be the case 

 with many other species. 



* This reference I have been unable to verify, only one copy of the work 

 bei.ng known to exist, and that in the Paris Museum. Under the head 

 of Canis decussatus Geoff.-in Nouveau Dictionnaire D'Histoire Naturelle, 

 1816, vol. 6, p. 518, appears the following, apparently written by Desma 

 rest : " Cette espece est du nord de 1'ancien continent. Selon M. Cuvier 

 elle ne differe point de celle du renard commun." From this I infer that 

 Geoffrey gave the name Canis decussatus to the European 'Cross Fox.' 



t Canis fulvus of Desmarest, 1820, is, of course, antedated by Canis vulpes 

 var. 6 pennsylvanicus Boddsert, 1785, as shown by Gray (P. Z. S., 1868 

 p. 518). 



