6o Cvaiginillar and its Enviiyus. 



hundred of these animaLs to transport to New Zealand, 

 in order to form a natural check to the rabbits which 

 are there increasing in inordinate numbers. While 

 they were forwarded from all parts of Scotland, a few 

 were taken from the environs of Craigmillar. Thoug;h, 

 as indicated, stoats are rarer than weasels, still they 

 are by no means extinct. Stoats are easily known 

 from weasels by being larger, and from their black- 

 tipped tails. In winter they change their coat from 

 its normal brown colour to one of snowy whiteness, 

 with the exception of the black tip on the tail. 

 Weasels, on the other hand, never change their 

 colour. Stoat skins form the valuable ermine fur of 

 commerce, worn by royalty and the judges of our 

 law-courts, and the animal is therefore also known as 

 the ermine weasel. It is a notable fact, however, that 

 stoats in this country have fur much inferior to those 

 of Siberia or other northern regions, the fur of the 

 British stoat having neither their thickness nor the 

 same beautiful snowy whiteness. So recently as last 

 year, when shooting in a field near Craigmillar, we 

 noticed a stoat running in and out of an old stone 



