1834] DARING FOXES. 197 



black kind being different from the gray, and they said that 

 at all events it had not extended its range any further than 

 the gray kind ; that the two were never found separate ; 

 and that they readily bred together, and produced piebald 

 offspring. Of the latter I now possess a specimen, and 

 it is marked about the head differently from the French 

 specific description. This circumstance shows how cautious 

 naturalists should be in making species ; for even Cuvier, 

 on looking at the skull of one of these rabbits, thought 

 it was probably distinct I 



The only quadruped native to the island * is a large wolf- 

 like fox {Cants antarcticus), which is common to both East 

 and West Falkland. I have no doubt it is a peculiar 

 species, and confined to this archipelago ; because many 

 sealers, Gauchos, and Indians, who have visited these 

 islands, all maintain that no such animal is found in any 

 part of South America. Molina, from a similarity in 

 habits, thought that this was the same with his ** culpeu ; " t 

 but I have seen both, and they are quite distinct. These 

 wolves are well known, from Byron's account of their tame- 

 ness and curiosity, which the sailors, who ran into the 

 water to avoid them, mistook for fierceness. To this day 

 their manners remain the same. They have been observed 

 to enter a tent, and actually pull some meat frpm beneath 

 the head of a sleeping seaman. The Gauchos also have 

 frequently in the evening killed them, by holding out a 

 piece of meat in one hand, and in the other a knife ready 

 to stick them. As far as I am aware, there is no other 

 instance in any part of the world, of so small a mass of 

 broken land, distant from a continent, possessing so large 

 an aboriginal quadruped peculiar to itself. Their numbers 

 have rapidly decreased ; they are already banished from 

 that half of the island which lies to the eastward of the 

 neck of land between St. Salvador Bay and Berkeley Sound. 

 Within a very few years after these islands shall have 

 become regularly settled, in all probability this fox will be 

 classed with the dodo, as an animal which has perished 

 from the face of the earth. 



At night (17th) we slept on the neck of land at the head 



I have reason, however, to suspect that there is a field-mouse. The 

 ' otnmon European rat and mouse have roamed far from the habitations of 

 the settlers. The common hog has also run wild on one islet: all are of a 

 black colour : the boars arc very fierce, and have great tusks. 



t The "culpeu" is the Canis Magcllanicus brought home by Captain 

 King from the Strait of MaB:ellan. It is common in Chile. 



