SQUIRRELS, BEAVERS, DORMICE, AND RATS 257 



lemming is at the present day an inhabitant of Scandinavia, but 

 was once widely distributed over Europe, and only recently 

 became extinct in Northern Portugal. 1 Its remains are found 

 fairly abundantly in Southern and Eastern England, and in 

 North-east Ireland, dating from the Pleistocene period. 



Cuniculus torquatus. THE BANDED LEMMING 



The Banded Lemming differs from the True Lemmings of 

 the genus Myodes in coloration, in the almost complete absence 

 of an outer ear, the shorter, thicker feet, of which the first toe 

 in the fore feet (the thumb) is reduced to a mere claw, and also 

 by the exaggerated length of the claws on the third and fourth 

 toes in the fore feet. The molar teeth are less specialised, and 

 more like those of the voles. But, except for this, the genus 

 Cuniculus is a much more specialised form than the true lemming. 

 Its colour is a curious mingling of chestnut, orange, black, 

 pale gray, bluish-gray, and umber, the fur on the back having- 

 an undulating gloss which looks like watered silk. The belly 

 and throat are bluish-gray, and there is a black line from the 

 nose along the back to the short tail, broken completely or 

 partially by a gray collar round the neck. The present range of 

 the banded lemming is circumpolar. It is found in the extreme 

 north of Russia and Novaia Zemlia (but not in Spitzbergen), in 

 Northern Siberia and the extreme north of America and Green- 

 land ; but during the Pleistocene period it inhabited Southern 

 and Eastern England, and existed to an even later date in 

 Germany, Belgium, and France. 



1 A closely allied species inhabits Siberia, Alaska, and Northern Canada. 



