MAMMALIA. TE 
DIMENSIONS. 
Inches. Lines. Inches. Lines. 
Length of head and body 7 8 Length from wrist joint to tip of the middle nail 1 0 
re tail c 1 6 3 heel to end of middle claw 0 10 
oe fore-palm 0 6 Greatest breadth of the hind-foot . 0 3 
Breadth of fore-palm é 0 7 Distance from auditory opening to the end 
Length of middle fore-nail 0 6 of the snout 2 ; z 1 1 
The animal described above inhabits the banks of the Columbia and the adjoin- 
ing coasts of the Pacific in considerable numbers, and is, doubtless, the mole 
mentioned by Lewis and Clarke as resembling, in all respects, the mole of the 
United States. Sir Alexander Mackenzie saw many animals, which he terms 
*<moles,”’ on the banks of a small stream near the sources of the Columbia; but as 
we are led to infer, from the way in which he speaks of them, that they were in 
numbers above ground, I am inclined to think that they were sewellels, belonging 
to the genus aplodentia, and not Shrew-moles*. I did not obtain recent speci- 
mens of the Shrew-mole on the late expedition, and am unable to say what are 
the exact limits of its range to the northward. I do not think, however, that it 
ean exist, at least on the east side of the Rocky Mountains, beyond the fiftieth 
degree of latitude, because the earth-worm on which the Scalops, like the Com- 
mon Mole, principally feeds, is unknown in the Hudson’s Bay countries. On the 
milder Pacific shore, it may, perhaps, reach a somewhat higher latitude. ‘There 
are two specimens of the Shrew-mole from the Columbia preserved in the Museum 
of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and Mr. David Douglas has kindly furnished me 
with others which he obtained in the same quarter. The Columbia animal seems 
to be of larger dimensions, and has a longer tail than the Shrew-moles of the 
United States; but I have not detected any other peculiarities by which it might 
be characterised as a distinct species. Authors, probably from their specimens 
being’ of different ages, have varied considerably in their descriptions of the 
dentition of the Scalops, and several of them have mentioned edentate spaces 
between the incisors and grinders. In the adult animal, from which my descrip- 
tion was taken, no such spaces exist. In a large and apparently very old 
individual, the incisors, and all the small grinders, are so worn and rounded, as to 
appear like a row of small pearls set in the jaw. Baron Cuvier informs us, that 
the animals of the genus Scalops unite to the teeth of the Desmans (mygale) ; 
and the simply pointed muzzle of the Shrews, large hands, armed with strong 
nails, fitted for digging into the earth, and entirely similar to those of the Moles. 
It is evident, from my description of the teeth of the Columbia Shrew-mole, that 
* Mackenzie's Voyage to the Pacific, &c. p. 314. 
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