1868.] MR. R. BROWN ON THE MAMMALS OF GREENLAND. 351 



the Rat's. At some of the more southern settlements they can occa- 

 sionally survive the winter and beget abundantly. Both the Mouse 

 and Rat were introduced as far north as Kane's and Hayes's ships 

 wintered, but I cannot learn that they got naturalized.] 



8. Lepus glacialis. Leach. 

 L. aicticus, ibid. 



Grcenl. Ukalek. 



The Ilare is a common animal over the whole coast, from north 

 to south, east and west. It is, however, seen more seldom in the 

 north of the Danish trading-limits, and there are only a few hun- 

 dreds shot annually. They are said to be rather rare on the east 

 coast. I cannot see why its beautiful white skin is not more used. 

 At one time the Danes used to send quantities home, but they could 

 get no market for it. From the Hare the natives spin a kind of yarn 

 which they occasionally knit into caps, for a summer head-dress, for 

 the men and children. It is difficult (indeed, almost impossible) to 

 give characters whereby this species can be separated from the Lepus 

 variabilis of Europe when the former is in its summer dress ; and the 

 skull presents equal difficulties. 



I have, however, preferred to look upon it as nominally disthict, 

 though I really believe that it is only a climatic variety of L. 

 variabilis, Pallas. 



9. [Sus scrofa, Linn. 

 Grcenl. Polike. 



It is kept at some of the southern settlements.] 



10. OviBOS MoscHATUs (Gmcl.), Blainv. 



Grcenl. et Esk. Umimak. 



In the 'Fauna Grroenlaudica,' p. 28. no. 17, Fabricius has classed 

 Bos grimniens, L., as one of the animals of Greenland, because he 

 thought that he had found (on a piece of drift ice) some remains of 

 it, consisting of the greater portion of the skull of an animal " very 

 like an Ox." He was of opinion that this was a portion of the Yak. 

 He did not, however, consider it to be a native of Greenland, but 

 rather to have been drifted from northern Asia on the ice, the flesh 

 having been eaten by Polar Bears. Any one can see, by examining 

 the figure which Fabricius afterwards gave of this specimen (Bid. 

 Selsk. Skriv. N. Saml. iii. 82), that it was the Musk-Ox ; and, 

 indeed, he afterwards acknowledged so himself (Bid. Selsk. Skr. 3. 

 N., vi.). It is therefore, after this, somewhat surprising to find 

 a zoologist so well acquainted with the Greenland fauna as the elder 

 Reinhardt stating that the Musk-Ox, which, like Fabricius, he called 

 Bos grunniens, rarely comes from Melville Island to Greenland*. Mr. 

 Murray seems to doubt on which side of Greenland Fabricius met 

 with his specimen ; but there need be no doubt on that matter, as it 



* Isis, 1848, p. 248; Schmarda's ' Geogi-apli. Verbreitung(1853), ^.dl(i;Jide 

 Murray's ' Greogr. Dist. of the Mammals,' p. 140. 



