no Game of Europe, W. & N. Asia & America 



the animals are killed during winter, when the fur is at its best. In these 

 skins the fur does not turn yellow from being stained by oil ; and this 

 immunity is said to be produced by dragging the skins in the snow as soon 

 as they are removed from the bodies of the animals. 



THE WOLVERINE 



{Giilo hi sens) 

 (Plate II. Fig. 6) 



Owing to considerations of space, the smaller quadrupeds which have 

 any claim to be regarded as game animals are for the most part excluded 

 from the purview of the present volume. But an exception is made in 

 the case of the wolverine, or glutton, as it is often called, on account ot its 

 being one ot the comparatively few that undoubtedly have a circumpolar 

 distribution. The wolverine is one of the few animals that Linnsus 

 described twice over, first as Mustcia gu/o, and secondly as Ursus luscus ; 

 the former title applying to the Scandinavian form of the animal. When 

 these two were found to be identical, and it was also manifest that the 

 creature belonged neither to the genus Mustcia (marten) nor to IJrsus 

 (bear), it was made the type of a new genus under the title Gulo luscus — 

 a name which has been very generally adopted ever since. Since, how- 

 ever, the typical Scandinavian form is the one to which the specific title 

 gulo was originally applied, purists in nomenclature would probably prefer 

 to call the animal Gulo gulo. 



Originally the wolverine and the musk-ox appear to have had a very 

 similar geographical distribution, the range of both in prehistoric times 

 including a large portion of Western and Central Europe as well as the 

 northern parts of both hemispheres. Whereas, however, the musk-ox has 

 long since disappeared entirely from the Old World, the wolverine still 



