136 Bulletin American Museum of Natural History, [Vol. XIX, 



and a reddish brown shade over the lower back. They are 

 thus more or less intermediate between the three last de- 

 scribed and the ordinary dark gray phase, as regards the ear- 

 tufts and tail, but more reddish on the lower back and head. 

 It might be inferred that the six light gray specimens with 

 more or less reddish ear-tufts and tails came from some point 

 far to the westward, and thus represent the north European 

 form, were it not that Mr. Bogoras assures me that all of 

 these phases of coloration occur in the region immediately 

 about Marcova. The albinistic phase and the specimens with 

 red ear-tufts and red tails, he informs me, are very rare, and 

 are looked upon by the hunters as 'curiosities.' 



"Russian name, B6l-kah. Although an enormous number 

 of pelts of this handsome little mammal are annually brought 

 to the settlements along the Okhotsk Sea and to Marcova very 

 few are now found in the vicinity of any of these places. 

 Inland, in that vast section of Northeastern Siberia which is 

 covered with coniferous trees, they are still abundant and 

 their skins are the chief source of revenue to the natives 

 inhabiting that territory. A few are still found near the west- 

 ern shore of Okhotsk Sea, along the upper Gichiga and Pen- 

 gina Rivers and along the tributaries of the Anadyr system. 

 From two to five thousand are yearly brought to Marcova; 

 from seventy-five to one hundred thousand to Gichiga ; from 

 one hundred to one hundred and twenty-five thousand to 

 Okhotsk, and about five thousand to Ay an and Ola. For- 

 merly many more than this were brought out at Ay an, the 

 receipts having dropped off four fifths in the past twenty 

 years. They are killed principally by the Tunguses during 

 the winter with old-fashioned small-bore flint-lock rifles. The 

 skins are removed, turned inside out, dried and tied up in 

 bundles of ten, in which shape they are brought to the coast 

 during the summer July and traded to the merchants 

 or at the government magazines for powder, lead, iron, tea, 

 and rye flour. The price varies from eighteen to twenty 

 kopechs each, although the government allows them but fif- 

 teen. Nearly all of them are used in Russia for lining fur 

 garments." N. G. B. 



