WEASEL. 69 



A local race of smaller size, with some variation in the 

 colouring, is found in Ireland, and some systematic naturalists, 

 eager to swell our short list of native mammals, have dignified 

 it with a separate species name Mustela hibernicus. In Ireland 

 it is known as the Weasel, but no specimens or skins of the 

 true Weasel {Mustela nivalis) have ever been received from 

 that country. Another local race in the Isle of Jura on the 

 west coast of Scotland is similarly given species rank. 



Weasel {Mustela nivalis, Linn.). 



Although of very similar form to the Stoat, the Weasel may 

 be known by its smaller size and by the absence of the black 

 tip which marks the tail of the Stoat. In colour there is little 

 difference in the two species, except that in the Weasel the 

 upper parts are of a redder brown and the under parts a purer 

 white than in the Stoat. The head is narrower and the legs 

 are shorter, whilst the tail, which is a conspicuous feature of the 

 Stoat, is here less bushy and little more than half the length of 

 the Stoat's appendage. The average length of a mature male 

 is nine or ten inches, to which the tail contributes only two 

 inches ; the total length of the female is an inch and a half less 

 than that of the male. 



The long, slender body, short limbs, long neck and small head 

 give it a snake-like appearance which is helped by its active, 

 gliding movements. The snake-likeness is accentuated when 

 only the foreparts are seen protruding from a hole. On one 

 occasion as we passed a stack of cord-wood on the edge of a 

 wood, our attention was attracted by a hissing noise. On the 

 level of our face a snake-like head peered out from between the 

 cord-wood ; and many persons would, no doubt, assume that a 

 snake had threatened them. But the snarling expression ex- 

 posed the canine teeth. The cause of the demonstration was 

 no obvious, but we presumed that there were young Weasels in 



