130 ZOOLOGY. 



Extreme siaan of hind and fore feet 8.50 inches. 



From heel to end of most projecting toe-nail 1.12 do. 



From wrist to end of most projecting toe-nail .50 do. 



Ears hidden by the long fur of the head; they are quite large and nearly naked; whiskers 

 very short; e3'es small; teeth yellow. 



Note. — The note published in my partial report, chapter 2, of part 2, this volume, was 

 inserted by mistake; it was intended to apply to the other species of field and meadow mice. — S. 



FIBER ZIBETHICUS, C u v . 



Mnskrat. 



Baird, Gen. Rep. Mammals, 1857, 561. 



I have obtained several specimens of the common muskrat from the lakes and fresh waters 

 near Fort Steilacoom, Puget Sound. Two skins of these were sent to Washington, and are now 

 in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution. I have seen some of their stack -like houses 

 on lakes near Fort S. The Indians of the interior carry many muskrat skins to the Hudson 

 Bay trading establishments, where they obtain one charge of powder and ball for each. They 

 take the animal in traps, ammunition being too valuable to expend for them. 



Indian women on the Cowlitz river use the skin of a muskrat in childbed, as a sort of "smel- 

 ling salt" to assist labor. — S. 



LEPUS WASHINGTONII, Baird. 



Western Red IIare< 



[For synonymy and description of this species, see chap. 2, p. 103.] 



This species seems to replace the Lepus sylvaticus in the forest regions bordering the coasts 

 of northern Oregon and Washington. One specimen (No. 142) obtained by me from British 

 America, near the fifty-fifth parallel of north latitude, shows that this hare has a considerable 

 range north and south. I doubt very much whether the species turns white in winter. The 

 Indian from whom I obtained No. 142 assured me positively that it never turns white, and 

 seemed to think with me that the other two skins, which were white, purchased at the samo 

 time, belonged to a different species. I have obtained the Lepus Wasliingtonii at Puget Sound 

 at all seasons; those killed in mid-winter showing no trace of a white winter coat. It raay be 

 that some hares have the property of changing the color only during very severe cold weather, 

 such as is rarely experienced in the vicinity of Puget Sound — the degree of cold, perhaps, regu- 

 lating the change. 



I preserved a specimen in June, 1856, which was killed on White river, near Puget Sound. 



No. 104. — Measurements. 



Head to root of tail 16. 50 inches. 



Tail vertebrae, about 1.60 do. 



Tail to hairy tip 2.50 do. 



Head to tip of nose 4.00 do. 



Height of ears from plane of occiput 3. 87 do. 



Outstretched ears, from tip to tip 8. 25 do. 



Folded ears project beyond nose .50 do. 



Easy girth of head in front of ears 5.75 do. 



