MARTES 365 



form but never greatly flattened and never very robust, the 

 rostrum always at least as long as broad ; external form slender, 

 the legs usually rather short ; feet digitigrade ; toes partly 

 webbed ; tail varying in length, slender or bushy, never con- 

 spicuously muscular. 



jReviarJcs. — As here understood the sub-family Mustelinse 

 contains the three genera, Martes, Mustela and Vormela, all of 

 which occur in Europe. 



Genus MARTES Pinel. 



1792. Martes Pinel, Actes Soc. d'Hist. Nat., Paris, i, p. 55 {M. domestica 



Pinel = M. foiiia Erxleben). 

 1820. Martes Nilsson, Skaucl. Fauna, i, p. 38 {M. foina and M. sylvatica — 



martes). 

 1829. Zibellina Kaup, Entw.-Gesch. u. Natiirl. Syst. Europ. Thierw., i, 



p. 31 (M. zibellina). 

 1857. Mustela Blasius, Siiugethiere Deutschlands, p. 211. 

 1911. Martes Thomas, Proc. Zool. Soc, London, p. 139, March, 1911. 



Type species. — Mn-stela martes Linnieus. 



Geographical distrihutioyi. — Noi'thern hemisphere from the 

 limits of tree growth south to the Mediterranean, the Malay 

 Archipelago, and the central United States ; in Europe west to 

 Ireland. 



Characters. — Skull narrow, moderately high (depth of brain- 

 case much more than half mastoid breadth), the dorsal profile 

 moderately curved, the zygomatic arches not specially wide- 

 spreading, and po.storbital region not unusually narrowed (distance 

 between region of greatest narrowing and zygoma normally less 

 than breadth of postorbital constriction) ; rostrum narrow and 

 somewhat elongate, its width noticeably less than that of inter- 

 orbital region, the distance from anterior rim of orbit to gnathion 

 exceeding width of rostrum between anteorbital foramina; auditory 

 bullae moderately inflated, the meatal tube evident though short, 

 the longitudinal diameter of bulla greatest ; paroccipital process 

 small, slightly projecting, partly distinct from bulla ; dental 

 formula : i^, c t], pm i* m ^~- = 38 ; cutting edges of five small 



.i-y 1-1 -*■ 4-4' 2-2 ^ o <::> 



premolars (2 upjjer and 3 lower) capable of trenchant action ; 

 upper carnassial long and narrow, not triangular in outline and 

 without crushing surface, the small inner lobe standing as an 

 offset to antero-internal extremity of crown, the sectorial portion 

 consisting of a high anterior and low posterior cusp with some- 

 what concave connecting ridge ; upper molar pyriform or pan- 

 durate in outline, its long axis nearly perpendicular to that of 

 tooth -row, its crown mainly flat, but with a small paracone, still 

 smaller, sometimes obsolete metacone, and crescentic ridge-like 

 protocone ; lower carnassial wider posteriorly than anteriorly, 

 the anterior triangle much distorted, the metaconid reduced to 



