FLESH-EATING MAMMALS. 71 



Europe they are all paler above, with the under-parts dusky. There can, 

 however, be no question but that these are all of one species, and it is there- 

 fore very interesting to find one instance of the occurrence of the Southern 

 variety assuming that the Warwickshire specimen was not an imported 

 animal in this country. 



Proceeding eastwards into Asia, we find two large foxes differing very 

 markedly from the ordinary English form. The first of these is the yellow 

 fox of Central Asia, formerly regarded as a distinct species under the name of 

 C. flavescens, and characterised by its general pale and yellowish colour, and 

 the large size of its magnificent brush. It has, however, still the dark ears 

 and white brush-tip of the English fox, arid there can be no doubt that 

 modern writers are right in regarding it merely as a pale variety of the 

 latter. This variety inhabits open country, and lives in burrows, or among 

 rocks or bushes. 



The handsome animal known as the mountain-fox (the so-called C. 

 montanus) of the Himalaya, although nearly allied to the last, is frequently 

 so strikingly different, when in its winter dress, from the ordinary English 

 fox, that most sportsmen would regard it as a distinct species. The fur of the 

 back varies in colour from chestnut to iron-grey, and the shoulders are often 

 marked by a conspicuous dark transverse stripe, while the under-parts, and 

 especially the throat, are more or less dusky. The black outer surfaces of the 

 ears and the white tip to the brush proclaim, however, the affinity of this fox 

 to the southern variety of the European fox ; and it appears to be merely 

 another variety of the latter. This Himalayan fox differs from the Central 

 Asian variety in that it does not excavate burrows, but lives in thickets or on 

 cultivated land. When we add that the so-called Nile fox (C. niloticus) is but 

 another variety of the same species, it will be evident that if he can but obtain 

 a pack of hounds and suitable ground, the sportsman may hunt one and 

 the same species of fox, whether he be in England, in the South of Europe, on 

 the banks of the Nile, in the deserts of Central Asia, or in the vale of Kashmir. 



This is, however, by no means all, for if the fox-hunter cares to cross the 

 Atlantic he may again hunt the common fox in Virginia and other parts of 

 North America. It is true, in- 

 deed, that these large North 

 American foxes have been con- 

 sidered distinct species, underthe 

 names of the red fox (C. fulvus) 

 and the cross-fox (C.pennsyhani- 

 cus). The cross-fox is, however, 

 obviously but a variety of the red 

 fox, distinguished by the presence 

 of a more or less distinct dark 

 stripe across the shoulders ; and 

 since both forms have the black Fig. 41. THE COMMON Fox. 



ears and white tail-tip of the 



European species, there can be little hesitation, in spite of their variation in 

 colour, in regarding them merely as local races of the same widely-spread form. 



Again the so-called silver or black fox (C. argentatus) from California and 

 the Western United States, so valued on account of its beautiful fur, is only a 

 melanistic (dark) variety of the red fox, and is therefore merely another race 

 of Canis vulpes. The silver fox, we may observe in passing, is a comparatively 

 rare animal, of which perfectly black skins, with only the characteristic white 



