THE ARCTIC FOX 59 



being quite recognisable. The Arctic fox was 

 apparently represented in the museum of Sir Ashton 

 Lever. 



At the present day the Arctic fox is an animal of 

 considerable commercial importance, by reason of 

 its valuable fur. Blue pelts are the most esteemed, 

 especially when nearly black a rare form ; these 

 summer skins fetch, or used to fetch, as much as i 

 apiece at the annual sales in Copenhagen, while in 

 Greenland they fetch two rigsdaler (45. 6d.) as against 

 three marks (is. i^d.) for white skins. In S.W. 

 Greenland the coast supplies blue foxes mostly, the 

 white ones being commoner in the north and on the 

 north and east coasts ; but the blue foxes, even in 

 winter, seem to be commoner than the white ones, 

 since Mr. R. Brown, in 1868, stated that 3,000 blue 

 and only 1,000 white skins were annually taken in 

 Greenland, and a return for forty years showed an 

 average of ten blue to seven white. The Esquimaux 

 take these animals in an ingenious trap made of 

 stones, and shaped like a small arched hut. A single 

 square aperture is situated on the top of the trap, 

 and is closed apparently securely by a platform 

 of whalebone. The fox stepping on to the platform 

 to reach the bait is unceremoniously lowered through 

 the skylight, while the elasticity of the whalebone 

 springing back allows the trap to be instantly re-set 

 for a fresh victim. Captain Lyon states that he 

 once captured fifteen foxes, one after the other, in 



