168 Merriam — J^our Nev^ Arctic Foxes. 



the old world, and none at all from America. Our National 

 Museum is decidely better off, especially with reference to 

 material from Alaska and Labrador, but we still lack reliable 

 ilesh measurements, and also lack series of skins and skulls put 

 up according to modern standards. 



An examination of the specimens in the collections of the 

 Biological Survey and the National Museum shows that several 

 unrecognized forms exist. The animal inhabiting the mainland 

 of Alaska and Canada from the mouth of the Yukon and Point 

 Barrow easterly to Hudson Bay and Cumberland Island ditfers 

 both from true lagopus of Scandinavia and from the animals 

 inhabiting islands in Bering Sea.* 



The most perplexing Arctic foxes I have seen are from Pribi- 

 lof Islands in Bering Soa.f The skulls from St. Paul Island 

 are of throe sizes; a very large and long skull with long and 

 rather slender rostrum, like a red fox; a very snuiU skull with 

 small teeth (smaller even than our sj)ecimens of haUensis)', and 

 one which is intermediate in size and characters between the 

 others and which agrees essentially w4th the common Arctic fox 

 of the Alaska mainland. The collections contain a number of 

 skulls of each of these three forms, though the number of the 

 smallest size is much less than of the others. What do these 

 facts signify? Three theories occur to me: (1) that the large 

 skulls represent a large resident species while the two others 

 are stragglers from St. Matthew [or some other] Island and the 

 mairdand respectively, reacliing tlic Pribilofs by means of the 

 pack ice; (2) that the large skulls represent a lai-ge resident 

 species; the small ones stragglers from St. Matthew [or some 

 other] Island, while the middle sized ones are hybrids between 

 these two; (3) that all three belong to a single species which 

 presents extraordinarj^ and un]>recedented variati/ms in size. 



Personally, I believe that the large animal is a well marked 



*A specimen in (he National Museum from Cumberland Island is es- 

 sentially identical with specimens from Alaska except that the lower 

 premolars are somewliat larfjer, in this respect resembling the Labrador 

 form, which is here described as subspecies unyava. 



fThe National Museum has a series of skulls and several skins from 

 St. Pavil Island, collected by Dr. F. W. True, Dr. D. W. Prentiss, and 

 Mr. >Ym. Palmer; and durin<r my visit to the islands in 1891 I secured 

 several specimens on St. George Island. 



