210 ANIMAL COMPETITORS 
shod with moccasins of hair, giving them a firm hold ' 
on the slippery rocks, snow, and ice, over which it 
leaves its tiny tracks from Labrador to the Lincoln 
Sea. Every arctic explorer from Steller down has 
had much to say of this animal, the accounts given 
by Richardson, Feilden, and Nelson being especially 
full and good. The most remarkable feature of its 
history relates to its varying phases of coloration. 
During the short arctic summer its dress is brown 
with the under parts lighter, often drab. In autumn 
this coat is replaced by one of pure white, beneath 
which is a fine wool; and this warm, white dress, 
invisible against the snow, is the normal winter hue 
of the great majority of arctic foxes. A small pro- 
portion, however, are never either white or dark 
brown, but are slate-gray all the year round. This 
double phase may occur anywhere, one or two, per- 
haps, arising from a litter that becomes white; but 
in some rather southerly places the ‘blues’ prevail, 
forming a local race. Such is the case in Greenland, 
Iceland, and in the Aleutian Islands, where blue 
foxes are now carefully preserved and cared for in a 
semidomestie condition, for the sake of their highly 
valuable fur, a certain number’ being killed an- 
nually.’’ 
The American red fox. Returning now to 
the common or red fox, it appears that this is 
one of the most widely distributed of animals, 
for it is hard to distinguish more than such 
