THE OTHER GREAT STAPLE FURS 145 



fine as swan's down, crisp as mink. When ermine was dotted with 

 black spots, it was known as the miniver of royalty ; but with the 

 doffing of many of the trappings of royalty in modern life — except 

 for coronation occasions — ermine does not command the prices 

 of a century ago. He mates with several wives and each bears 

 a family of 10 to 14 young. Secure in his snowy habitat of the Far 

 North, there is little fear of his extermination. Like death and 

 taxes, the ermine we shall always have with us. 



The old way to distinguish ermine from white baby rabbit was 

 the shading of sulphur yellow to his black tail tip ; but this has been 

 imitated to defy detection ; and I should say the best way to detect 

 imitation ermine to-day is that rabbit is soft and silky, ermine is 

 a crisp, thick fur, stubby in its thickness and incapable of being 

 stroked the wrong way, where you can stroke rabbit and cat flat 

 in almost any direction. The fur of ermine, though soft as swan's 

 down in the young, has a grain and lies in the same direction. 



Ermine is sold in bundles of 10 to 50 and used to command 

 prices of 20 shillings to 40 shillings a bundle. This year, it brought 

 prices of $1.85 to $1.50 a skin, going low as 16^ for poor skins, 

 high as $3.50 for good. The quantities of ermine sold in 1920 sales 

 ran 295,000 in St. Louis ; 200,000 in London ; almost 74,000 in 

 New York ; but these figures are not enlightening ; for when the 

 price goes off — as it did in ermine — London holds the best furs 

 off the market. 



Hare and Rabbit 



Hare and rabbit are among the furs small in size but so huge 

 in aggregates that they stagger calculation. Hornaday gives the 

 distinction between them that hares are long-eared, long-legged and 

 lope ; rabbits are short-eared, short-legged and leap or jump with 

 a thump ; but for fur purposes, they must be grouped as one. 



They are coming along in quantities to swamp markets ; yet 

 the market is never swamped ; but the dye houses enlarge depart- 

 ments for rabbit, or coney, or hare, or whatever the trade calls them. 

 What matter if they sell only at $1.40 to $3.15 a pound ? WhenEng- 



