Aspect of the Forest after a Snow-storm. 79 



tracks visible after a fall of snow. One of the first to stir when 

 the weather clears up is the lynx. I have frequently followed 

 its footprints for miles, now noticing when one had sat on its 

 haunches by a fir stump, watching the outcomings of mice ; 

 then where it had made a spring on the creature, the tiny 

 tracings of whose feet look like as if a large beetle had crawled 

 over the soft surface ; but they terminate abruptly, not however 

 too soon for the mouse's safety, for just as the mighty paw 

 had been on the point of descending, that instant the mouse 

 dived headlong into the snow. The lynx delights in deserted 

 lumber camps, where it is generally certain of a mouse, which, 

 after all, must be a small morsel to such a large animal, yet 

 seemingly a coveted tit-bit, although the hare furnishes its 

 chief subsistence. Like other furred quadrupeds, the lynx is 

 scarcely to be recognized when dressed in its summer and 

 winter robes, — the thickness of the latter giving it the appear- 

 ance of being a much larger animal ; hence, as I have already 

 remarked, the stories of the Indian Devil (puma) may have 

 thus originated. 



The colour of the pile of the American Hare and other 

 mammals that turn grey in winter is brought about most dis- 

 tinctly by climate, a sudden setting in of cold hastening the 

 change, just as it is retarded by a continuance of mild weather 

 at the commencement of winter. The summer or brown coat 

 is rapidly attained in June, and that of winter more gradually, 

 the process of change in the latter being accomplished not 

 only by an actual change in the colouring matter of the hair, 

 but by an additional growth ; the denizens of the colder parts 

 getting their, winter dress sooner than the hares along the 

 Atlantic coasts, where the climate is milder, whilst the tamed 

 individual well sheltered from cold scarcely changes at all* 

 This hare is very prolific, breeding often twice a year, and 



* See an excellent article on this subject by my friend and late brother- 

 officer, Mr. Welch, Assistant-Professor of Pathology in the Army Medical 

 School. — Proc. of the Zool. Soc. of London, April 8, 1869. 



