COMMON AMERICAN SKUNK. 3I9 



In general we have found the varieties in a particular localitj' marked 

 with tolerable uniformitj". To this rule, however, there are many excep- 

 tions. 



In the winter of 1814 we caused a burrow to be opened in Renssellaer 

 county, N. Y., which we knew contained a large family of this species. 

 We found eleven: they were all full grown, but on examining their 

 teeth and claws, we concluded that the family was composed of a pair 

 of old ones, with their large brood of young of the previous season. The 

 male had a white stripe on the forehead ; and from the occiput down 

 the whole of the back had another white stripe four inches in breadth ; 

 its tail was also white. The female had no white stripe on the fore- 

 head, but had a longitudinal stripe on each side of the back, and a very 

 narrow one on the dorsal line ; the tail was wholly black. The voung 

 differed very widely in colour ; we could not find two exactly alike ; 

 some were in part, of the colour of the male, others were more like the 

 female, whilst the largest proportion were intermediate in their mark- 

 ings, and some seemed to resemble neither parent. We recollect one 

 that had not a white hair, except the tip of the tail and a minute dorsal 

 line. 



On the other hand, we had in February (the same winter) another 

 family of Skunks, captured with a steel-trap placed at the mouth of 

 their burrow ; they were taken in the course of ten days, and we have 

 reason to believe none escaped. In this family there was a very strong 

 resemblance. The animals which we considered the old pair, had two 

 longitudinal stripes on the back, with a spot on the forehead ; in the 

 young, the only difference was, that in some of the specimens the white 

 line united on the back above the root of the tail, whilst in others it ex- 

 tended do%i'n along the sides of the tail till it nearly reached the extremi- 

 ty ; and in some of the specimens the taU was tipped with white, in 

 others, black. We had an opportunity near Easton, Pennsylvania, of 

 seeing an old female Skunk with six young. We had no knowledge of 

 the colour of the male. The female, however, had two broad stripes, 

 with a very narrow black dorsal line ; the young differed considerably 

 in their markings, some having black, and others white, tails. 



In the sand-hills near Columbia, South Carolina, we met along the 

 sides of the highway four half-gro^^^l animals of this species ; they all 

 had a narrow white line on each side of the back, and a small white 

 spot on the forehead ; the tails of two of them were tipped with white ; 

 the others had the whole of their tails black. 



From all the observations we have been able to make in regard to the 

 colours of the different varieties of this species, we have arrived at the 



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