THE WORLD'S WONDERS. 681 



of country, from North British America as far a.s any explorer 

 has ever gone toward the pole. They feed on the bark and 

 catkins of the willow, and lie on the stony sides of worn-down 

 rocks in order to protect themselves from the wind and snow- 

 drifts. They do not burrow like our rabbits, but squat in crevices 

 or under large stones. Their average weight is about nine pounds. 

 Esquimau dogs hunt them pertinaciously and regard them with 

 such relishing appetite that they cannot be relied on as an assist- 

 ant to man. The arctic hare is enabled to penetrate the snow 

 crusts and obtain food where the reindeer and the musk-ox 

 perish in consequence of the glazed covering of their feeding 

 grounds. 



A TRADITIONARY ANIMAL. 



THE Esquimaux, like all barbaric people, are much given to 

 exaggeration, so that it will not do to place reliance in many of 

 their statements. Their country being a strange one, sometimes 

 it is impossible to decide between truth and misrepresentation, 

 for they do frequently describe things that appear improbable to 

 us, and yet their statements are true. For example, during 

 Capt. Hall's five years' residence among these people he had 

 often described to him an animal which the Esquimaux call arda, 

 but which is not mentioned in any work of natural history, nor 

 did he ever see a specimen himself, yet he was indisposed to 

 declare it mythical. The natives speak of this animal as being 

 larger than the bear, and as very ferocious and much more difficult 

 to be killed. It has grayish hair, a long tail, and short, thick 

 legs, its fore feet being divided into three parts, like the part- 

 ridge's : its hind feet are like a man's heels. When resting it sits 



O " * 



upright like a man. A Neitchille Innuit, crawling into a hole for 

 shelter, 'in the night, had found one sound asleep and quickly 

 dispatched it with his knife. It may be added here that Ebierbing, 

 who was Hall's interpreter, now residing in the United States, 

 confirms such accounts of the arcla, and says that the animal 

 once inhabited his native country on Cumberland Sound. 



We know that stranger-appearing creatures than this once 

 roamed over the earth, some of which are known to us through 



