THE IRISH STOAT 437 



their colour in tlie winter, tliere are individuals which seem to 

 have lost the power of change, and others which change in an 

 apparently capricious manner, not influenced hy season or cold. 

 Like so many other animals, tlie Stoat appears at times to 

 migrate, wliicli it does in large parties. Such parties are 

 said to be dangerous, and will attack a man who crosses 

 their path. 



The Weasel, P. vulgaris, has much tlie same colour as the 

 Stoat, but is a smaller animal ; it differs also by undergoing 

 no seasonal change. It is equally agile and ferocious, and 

 ought to be encouraged, as it vents its ferocity largely upon 

 Voles and Moles, which it can pursue underground. Like other 

 species of Putorius, it seems to kill its prey by biting through 

 the brain-case. 



The fourth British species is the recently -described Irish 

 Stoat, P. hihernicus. It is somewhat intermediate between the 

 last two. 



Poecilogale is a genus recently instituted by Mr. Thomas for 

 a small South African Weasel, P. alhinucha, coloured like the 

 Zorilla, i.e. with whitish stripes upon black, but differing in its 

 reduced molar formula, which is Pm |^ M ^ or ^y. 



Lyncodon ^ is thought to be more doubtful ; it is South 

 American (Patagonian), with the same molar formula as the most 

 reduced forms of the last genus, i.e. Pm |^ M ^. The ears are 

 short and almost invisible ; the claws of the anterior limbs are 

 long, those of the hind limbs short. It is not quite certain that 

 it is not " an aberrant southern form of Putorius hrasiliensis." 

 That its distinction is justifiable appears to be shown by the 

 discovery in the same region of a fossil species, L. luganensis. 

 Matschie places it near Galictis. 



The Eatel, Mellivora, is common to India and West and South 

 Africa. It is a black animal with a grey back and grey on the 

 top of the head, the contrast of colour suggesting a dorsal 

 carapace. It runs with a swift trot. The animal lives much on 

 the ground, but can climb trees. It is exclusively nocturnal in 

 Its habits. It has the reputation in India of feeding upon dead 

 bodies, a view which has probably no foundation in fact save 

 that it can burrow. The molar formula is Pm i| M \. There are 

 fourteen dorsal vertebrae. The African and Indian species are 



^ See Matschie, SB. Ges. Naturf. Berlin, 1895, p. 171. 



