200 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 
skunk—you know—is strictly American. Our numerous 
species of squirrel, ground-dog, marmot, gopher and sper- 
mophile naturally cut a much greater figure in the land- 
scape than the few corresponding Northwestern Europe- 
ans. Wild rabbits seem to show less fear in Western United 
States: on occasion one met on a narrow spit of land on 
the eastern coast of the Baltic sea jumped into the water 
to escape an unarmed man. 
The migratory rat which swam the Volga river as an 
invading army in 1728 (?), and which reached Salt Lake 
City about 1906 (?), shows according to my observation 
considerable change. While all the specimens I have seen 
here have been undersized (and poorly fed), very large ones 
were often seen in Denmark showing little fear either of 
man, dog or fox, let alone cat—unless the latter be of un- 
usual size and strength. Our pack-rat I cannot speak of 
from personal experience. One of our small bats is re- 
markably courageous when cornered, biting savagely. 
Whale and seal in many species belong to both sides 
of the Atlantic ocean. 
Ruminants of certain families, forty to sixty years 
ago, were still lording it in hundred thousands west of the 
Missouri-Mississippi; and now bison and elk have, practi- 
cally speaking, been sent to the “happy hunting grounds” 
(those in Jackson Hole and Yellowstone excepted), with 
antelope following suit. In 1880 there still were herds of 
the latter counting thousands in Wyoming. The same 
fate has befallen the European bison outside of the very 
large Bialowicz forest in Lithuania where some sixteen 
hundred were still protected by the Czar about twenty-five 
years ago. The World War in 1915 deprived him of this 
forest (and in 1917 of his throne), so the number of the im- 
perial game is not likely to be much greater to-day than 
that of our national game in Yellowstone National Park. 
Of rapacious birds, eagle, falcon, hawk, buzzard and 
kite exhibit much the same features of character, but 
American species of hawks are numerous and some show 
more courage and self-confidence than Europeans do to- 
wards man, for which they are often very poorly rewarded. 
