600 U. S. P. R. R. EXP. AND SURVEYS ZOOLOGY GENERAL REPORT. 



[Note continued. ] 

 The following table presents the dimensions of one of the largest of these hares in the London scale. 



Color. Forehead, cheeks, back, sides, arms, and thighs, light brown, mixed with black. The basal portion of each hair is a 

 clear gray, this passing insensibly into a feeble black, followed by a ring of variable breadth, and of a more or less light brown 

 or roe color. The tips of the hairs again are black for a considerable space. The long and stiff hairs are all as described ; 

 between them, however, is a softer, shorter, and waved fur, likewise gray at the base, then light brown, rarely with a black tip. 



The throat is white ; the lower portion of the neck light brown ; the tips of the hairs mostly white, never black ; rest of 

 under parts white ; the base of the fur, however, always gray. 



The fore and hind feet are densely beset with short hairs of a clear, light brown, without black, shading off on the inner side 

 into grayish white. 



The upper pait of the tail is like the back ; the under portion entirely white ; this as well as the white hairs around the anus 

 are more wavy than the rest, and without the usual gray at the base. 



The color is the same summer and winter, varying not the least in the coldest weather. 



The two upper incisors project a quarter of an inch beyond their socket. Removed from the head, each forms an arch, the 

 two extremities half an inch apart. 



The molars are five, distant three-quarters of an inch from the incisors. 



The lower incisors are one line broad. 



The length of the ears, measured in what way you will, never much exceeds two inches, five to eight line?. Brought for 

 wards, they cannot be brought, without violence, to the tip of the nose, Laid back, they reach to the shoulder blade. The tips 

 are rounded off rather bluntly. Internally they have only a few thin, light hairs on the margin. On the outer margin there is 

 a very narrow black border half a line broad, and reaching to the tip, which itself is either not at all black, or else not more so 

 than the dusky border referred to. 



The iris is black. The sclerotica white. 



This animal is far inferior in speed to the European hare. It makes its form usually in the bushes, but also in hollow trees, 

 clefts, and cavities in stone walls. 



From the preceding description it will be seen that this species differs from the European hare : 1, by its invariably smaller 

 size ; 2, by its weight ; 3, by its ears, which, a, if not shorter, at least are not longer than the head, /?, have blunter tips, with 

 only a narrow border of black, y, and are entirely naked behind. 



From the rabbit it differs in the white eyes, and in not digging a burrow. (The white eyes are erroneously given.) 



N. B. The description of Schreber is taken almost entirely from Schoepff, with an occasional interpolation by Pennant and 

 others. 



In comparing this description of the " American hare " by Schoepff with specimens, it will be found to form an exceedingly 

 admirable account of the common gray rabbit, such as is seldom found in the older writers. The most characteristic points are 

 found in the measurements ; as, for instance, the hind feet, 3-^ inches ; the ears, 2^ inches, &c. The fur above is said to be light 

 brown; the basal portion gray, passing into a feeble black, followed by a ring of light brown, and tipped with black. In 

 L. americanut there is no subterminal black ring. The base of the fur beneath is said to be gray ; in L. americanus it is pure 

 white to the roots. The upper part of the tail is said to be like the back, the under part pure white to the roots ; in L. ameri 

 canus it is of a sooty black above, very different from the back ; beneath it is of a smoky, light, plumbeous ash throughout. 



There are many other distinctive features of the gray rabbit, as distinguished from L. americanus, which Schoepff presents in 

 his article so as to leave not the slightest uncertainty as to the species he had before him. 



