CULTURE OF FUR-BEAKERS 245 



The ermine and his family. Naturalists 

 distinguish over 20 species and subspecies 

 of weasel in North America. Most of them, 

 however, belong to the West and far North, 

 and they differ little in general character; 

 such 'peculiarities as belong to each Dr. C. 

 Hart Merriam, their monographer, connects 

 with their food. Thus he finds that the group 

 represented by our common eastern species 

 (Putorius cicognani) flourishes only in the 

 country where the meadow-mice abound; the 

 large western weasel (P. longicauda), does not 

 range much outside of the region inhabited by 

 the pocket-gophers ; the black-footed one ( P. ni- 

 gripes) frequents only the prairie-dog country 

 southward; and . " in the far North, where 

 the frozen tundras are inhabited by lemmings 

 as well as voles, two weasels are present : the 

 tiny, narrow-skulled 'rixosus,' which feeds 

 mainly on mice, and the large, broad-skulled 

 'arcticus' (analogue of the true ermine) on 

 lemmings and rabbits. ' ' With these fine points 

 of classification we need not here concern our- 

 selves. A weasel, in the Old World or in the 



