1885.] DR. ST. G. MIVART ON THE ARCTOIDEA. 381 



acerees. Les pieds anterieurs sont semi-digitigrades, les posterieurs 

 plantigrades." 



Gulo '. — This Bear-like musteline form consists of but one 

 species, which ranges over the extreme riorth of both continents — 

 Siberia, Russia, Scandinavia, Canada, only to the extreme north of 

 the United States towards the Atlantic but down possibly to 

 Northern California in the Western region. It has very small ears, 

 inconspicuous, and hairy on both sides, very small eyes, a naked 

 muzzle with groove and very hairy palmar and ])lantar surfaces with 

 small pads amongst the hairs. A short tail, about the length of the 

 head, clothed with long hairs ; the feet are large and the habit 

 semiplantigrade. 



Its ferocity appears to have been exaggerated, and Audubon 

 and Bachman speak of having seen one which was so gentle that 

 the owner of the show, in which it was confined, took it out and 

 opened its mouth " to enable us," they say, " to examine its teeth, 

 and it buried its head in our lap while we admired its long 

 claws and felt its woolly feet." It had been taught to sit on 

 its haunches and hold a pipe in its mouth. It was adverse to the 

 light of the sun, and seemed attached to a Marmot in the same 

 cage. The same authors say that it feeds principally on the carcases 

 of beasts killed by accident, and destroys disabled quadrupeds, 

 eating also Marmots, Mice, and other rodents. They deem the 

 assertion that it attacks large healthy game incredible. But it is 

 after all a formidable beast, and bold dogs would not enter its 

 burrow a second time. Richardson saw one chasing a Hare which 

 was being, at the same time, harassed by a Snowy Owl. The Glutton, 

 however, was much too slow in its movements to catch it. Captain 

 Ross says that in midwinter it climbed the snow-wall round his 

 vessel and came on deck, where, undismayed by the presence of a 

 dozen men, it seized a canister of meat, which it ate so ravenously 

 that it allowed itself to be snared by a noose and strangled. 



There are 14 or 1.5 dorsal, .5 lumbar, 3 sacral, and 15 or 16 caudal 

 vertebrae. The metacarpus is at its maximum relative length amone;st 

 Arctoids, and indeed amongst Carnivores if we except Cynoid aud 

 HycenidcE. The inner condyle of the humerus is perforated ^. 



> Gtih, Gesner, Quad. Vivip. (1551) p. 623 ; Aldrovandus, Quad. Dig. (1645) 



p. 178. 

 Mustela gulo, Linn. S. N. i. (ed. 10, 1758) p. 45, no. 3 ; Erxl. Sys. Ann. (1777) 



p. 477, no. 15. 

 Ursvs ffiilo, Schreber, Saug. iii. (1778) p. 525, pi. 144, 144a. 

 Mele.iffido, Pallas, Spic. Zool. xiv. (1782) p. 25, pi. 2. 

 Gulo borcalis, Wagn. Supp. ii. (1841) p. 246; Grav, P. Z. S. 1865, p. 120; 



Cat. Cai-niv. B. Mus. 9s. 

 Gulo arcficns, Desm. Mamm. i. (1820) p. 174 ; Less. Mamm. p. 142 ; Fischer, 



Syn. p. 154. 

 Gulo htsciis, Richardson, F. B. A. I. 1829, p. 41 ; Fiseh. Syn. p. 154 ; 



Audubon & Bacbman, Quad. N. A. I. p. 202, pi. 26 ; Baird, ]S. A. Mamm. 



p. 181 ; Sabine, ' Supp. Parry's 1st Voyage,' p. 184 ; Coues, Fur-bear. An. 



p. 34 ; P. Gervais, Mamm. ii. p. 108 ; Buffon, H. Nat. xiii. p. 278, & Supp. 



iii. 240, pi. 48; De Blainville, Osteog. Mustela. 

 ^ Owen, Anat. of Vertebrates, vol. ii. p. .509. 



