156 MAMMALS OF PENNSYLVANIA AND NEW JERSEY. 



*753> J 749 an d '50, some idea of the number of wolves and panthers in that 

 then extensive county may be gathered. I give the names and dates merely : 

 " John Boston, Junior, 3 mo., 10, 1753, 2 wolf heads, 6 pounds sterling; 

 Gideon Scull, 3 mo., 15, 1753, panther's head, 15 shillings; George May, 

 12 mo., 3, 1749, wolfs head, i pound ; Indian Sam, 12 mo., 6, 1749, panther's 

 head; Indian Oliver, 4 mo., 4. 1850, wolfs head, i pound; Richard Fry, 

 6 mo., 9, 1850, panther head, 15 shillings." Nearly half of the whole num- 

 ber of entries of payments Jby E. Hopkins are of bounties on wild beasts. 

 Kalm states that at the time the small pox nearly exterminated the Indians 

 in N. J. and Pa. the wolves became very abundant and bold around their 

 villages, and that they were still abundant up country in 1770 in the two 

 states. The inhabitants of the N. J. seacoast used to capture wolves in pits. 

 Such places, used by his ancestors on the farm of Albert Pharo, Tuckerton, 

 N. J., were shown to me in 1891 by the owner, who stated they were used 

 for that purpose in his father's early days. I am told by Dr. T. P. Price, of 

 Tuckerton, that similar pits are to be seen on the Phineas Burton farm farther 

 down shore. - 



Habits, etc. Literature, folk-lore, legend and tradition are so profuse re- 

 -specting the cunning, wisdom, ferocity, cowardice and boldness of this ani- 

 mal, I can add nothing to it. E. S. Thompson's classic chapters on the 

 animal, recently published, apply as directly to the wolves of the east as to 

 those of the west. 



Description of species. No specimens of a Pa. or N. J. wolf, not even a 

 skin or a skull, being known to me, I cannot define their characters. Black 

 and white wolves are not mentioned as being found in the state that I re- 

 member, the gray being typical in our limits. In Godman's American 

 Natural History, vol. i, 1826, p. 260, he says : "The wolf found in Pennsyl- 

 vania is of a reddish-brown color, the hair being tipped with black, but 

 -especially so over the fore-shoulders and sides." It is hoped that any per- 

 sons knowing of the existence of any of the recent remains of our Pa. and 

 N. J. wolf, whether fur, robe, mounted skin or skull, will forward them for 

 preservation in one of our state museums ere all evidence of their characters 

 be lost. The same remarks apply to the Pa. and N. J. panther, lynx, fisher, 

 beaver, fox squirrel and the N. J. deer. 



Family MUSTELID^E ; Otters, weasels, skunks, etc. 

 Genus Lutra Erxleben, Systema Regni Anim., 1777, vol. i, p. 445. 

 Northeastern Otter. Lutra canadensis (Schreber). 

 1776. Mustela hitra canadensis Schreber, Saugthiere, pi. 126 B. 



