CILAP, IX.] WILD RABBITS. 193 
The rabbit is another animal which has been introduced, and 
has succeeded very well; so that they abound over large parts 
of the island. Yet, like the horses, they are confined within 
certain limits; for they have not crossed the central chain of 
hills, nor would they have extended even so far as its base, if, as 
the Gauchos informed me, small colonies had not been carried 
there. I should not have supposed that these animals, natives of 
northern Africa, could have existed in a climate so humid as 
this, and which enjoys so little sunshine that even wheat ripens 
only occasionally. It is asserted that in Sweden, which any one 
would have thought a more favourable climate, the rabbit cannot 
live out of doors. The first few pair, moreover, had here to 
contend against pre-existing enemies, in the fox and some large 
hawks. The French naturalists have considered the black va- 
riety a distinct species, and called it Lepus Magellanicus.* They 
imagined that Magellan, when talking of an animal under the 
name of ‘conejos’ in the Strait of Magellan, referred to this 
species; but he was alluding to a small cavy, which to this day 
is thus called by the Spaniards. The Gauchos laughed at the 
idea of the black kind being different from the grey, and they 
said that at all events it had not extended its range any further 
than the grey kind; that the two were never found separate ; 
and that they readily bred together, and produced piebald off- 
spring. Of the latter I now possess a specimen, and it is marked 
about the head differently from the French specific description. 
This circumstance shows how cautious naturalists should be in 
making species; for even Cuvier, on looking at the skull of one 
of these rabbits, thought it was probably distinct ! 
The only quadruped native to the island } is a large wolf-like 
fox (Canis antarcticus), which is common to both East and 
%* Lesson’s Zoology of the Voyage of the Coquille, tom. i. p. i68. Ali 
the early voyagers, and especially Bougainville, distinctly state that the 
wolf-like fox was the only native animal on the island. The distinction of 
the rabbit as a species, is taken from peculiarities in the fur, from the shape 
of the head, and from the shortness of the ears. I may here observe that 
the difference between the Irish and English hare rests upon nearly similar 
characters, only more strongly marked. ; 
+ I have reason, however, to suspect that there is a field-mouse. The 
common European rat and mouse have roamed far from the habitations of 
the settlers. The common hog has also run wild on one islet: all are of a 
black colour: the ‘boars are very fierce, and have great tusks, 
