720 Retrospective Criticism. 



plain, elevated a very few feet above the level of the river 

 Tees, in the county of Durham. Again, the place where I 

 met with the ermine, or white stoat, on the 23d of January, 

 1832, is in the North Riding of Yorkshire, in N. lat. 54° 12' 

 nearly, and W. long. 1° 13' nearly: it is situated at a very 

 considerable elevation, and in the immediate neighbourhood 

 of the lofty moorlands called Hambledon Hills. These con- 

 stitute the south-western range of the Cleveland Hills, which 

 rise in height to 11 00 ft. or 1200 ft. above the sea. At the 

 time, the ermine was making towards the hills, where, no 

 doubt, he either lived, or frequently haunted; and, conse- 

 quently, the great coldness of the atmosphere, even in [a 

 mild winter like the last, upon such an elevated and bleak 

 spot as that moorland, would satisfactorily account for the 

 appearance of the animal in its white fur ; although the place 

 is in a direct line, more than twenty-three miles distant to the 

 south of the fields, near the Tees, inhabited by the brown 

 stoat. And it is somewhat worthy of remark, that the hedge 

 where I noticed the first ermine, or white stoat (in February, 

 1823), is on the same plain, and within a mile of the place 

 in which I saw the brown stoat in December, 1831, and at 

 much the same height above the river. But in that winter 

 the extrerne coldness of the air would cause the same vicissi- 

 tude of colours, even at so low an elevation. 



I have already observed that a kind Providence has given 

 to most animals such colours of the fur, plumage, and skin, 

 as shall best conceal them from the sight of their enemies : I 

 may now remark that the same Providence has ordained 

 that many animals shall experience a change of colour, when 

 the colour itself of their natural abodes shall likewise change ; 

 and that both the colour of the animal and that of the ground 

 shall still harmonise and become the same. Such is the case 

 with many animals that inhabit the frozen regions and the 

 cold latitudes of the world ; the polar and the alpine countries. 

 The wolf, the fox, the hare, the ptarmigan, &c., undergo this 

 variation in the colder tracts ; and even in the temperate 

 climate of our island, among others, the ptarmigan and the 

 hare do so. Concerning the latter, the zoologist before 

 quoted (Pennant, Brit. ZooL, vol. i. p. 130.) relates : — "In 

 the winter it " (the varying or Alpine hare) " entirely changes 

 to a snowy whiteness, except the edges and tips of the ears, 

 which retain their blackness. The alteration of colour begins 

 in September, and first appears about the neck and rump : in 

 April it again resumes its grey coat. This is the case in 

 Styria (Kramer, Atistr.fp. 315.); but in the polar tracts, such 

 as Greenland, it never varies from white, the eternal colour 



