MAMMALS OF i^OETHERN CANADA 197 



Caledonia, British Columbia. I never obtained an example 

 during two years' residence at Fort St. James, Stuart's Lake. 

 I was equally unsuccessful at Cumlberland House, lower Sas- 

 katchewan, where I was stationed from 188,9 to 1894. It 

 used to be abundant in the great prairies of the West from 

 that river to the international boundary. Naturalists may 

 be interested in the fact that the total number of skins of 

 this animal sold by the Hudson's Bay Company in London 

 from 1853 to 18Y7, inclusive, was 117,025. The best year 

 was 1858, with 10,004, and the poorest, 1864, with 2,410. 

 There are no foxes of this kind entered in their fur cata- 

 logues for 1902 and 1903. 



White Fox — Vulpes lagopus innuitus Merriam. 



The white fox is numerous most winter seasons on the 

 Arctic coast inhabited by the Eskimos of the Anderson and 

 Mackenzie rivers, and no doubt more or less so on other 

 American polar shores, and, when this is the case, numbers 

 are also met with in the timbered regions to the soutli and 

 on the larger ice-covered lakes and rivers. Even northern 

 sections of the country himted by Indians belonging to some 

 of the Company's trade posts of Cumberland and English 

 Eiver districts have, at times, succeeded in trapping a few 

 examples. In 1876 Cumberland House had 5, in 1873 Moose 

 Lake secured 3, in 1884 the Pas had 2, and Pelican Narrows 

 16, in 1886 Eapid River caught 2, and Lac du Brochet post 

 traded 785 skins, nearly all from its northern inland Eski- 

 mos; in the winter of 1890 Portage la Loche secured an 

 example. A few white foxes have also been trapped on the 

 south shore of Great Slave Lake," but at Fort Resolution the 

 natives of Fond du Lac and the northeastern tract, who resort 

 thereto, seldom fail to bring in some skins every season. The 

 catch there from 1862 to and including outfit 1877 averaged 

 42 a year. Fort Rae, at the northern end of the same great 

 inland sea, also turns out a few skins most years. In 1877, 



