356 
YEETEBRATA. 
MARMOTS. 
Genus MAEMOT : Arctomys. — Marmot is tlie popular name of the best-known European 
species of this genus, and Arctomys means bear-rat, a rat having a body resembling the bear^ whicli 
is an excellent description of these animals. Like the rest of the ordei-, they are without canine 
teeth, and in the sharpness of the incisors of the lower jaw, they bear some resemblance to the 
great family of rats and mice, though, in other respects, they bear a stronger resemblance to the 
squirrels ; their external forms, and also their manners, are, however, peculiar. They have five 
grinders on each side in the upper jaw, and four in the under, the summits of which have sharp 
tubercles, so that they seem capable of subsisting on insects, and even on the flesh of larger ani- 
mals, as well as on vegetables. Their bodies are thick and clumsy, their legs short and thick, their 
head flat, their ears short and blunted, and their tail short and apparently incapable of motion. 
At all seasons they are gromid animals, and spend the whole of their time, except what is taken 
up in feeding, in their burrows, which they dig with great ease and rapidity, and to a considerable 
depth, always sloping downwai'd, so that the dwelling may be beyond the reach of the intense 
cold of the winter, and yet so contrived as to be in no danger of filling with water during the 
rains or the melting of the snow. 
Some of them are animals of considerable size, not less than the cat, but diff'erently formed. 
Though easily taken, as their progressive motion is slow, and it is not very difiicult to dig them 
out of their burrows, they are of little value to mankind as game. In autumn, when they are fat, 
they are sometimes eaten, but they are not very palatable to those who have a choice of food. 
The European or Alpine Marmot, A. marmotta — the Miis marmotta of Linnteus — inhabits, 
as its name implies, the Alps, and some of the other lofty mountains of Europe ; but it is not 
found even in the most mountainous parts of the British Islands. It is about sixteen inches long 
from the nose to the root of the tail; its color is subject to some variation; but the prevailing 
hue on the upper part is dark gray, with the tip of the tail black. The feet arc whitish, the 
part surrounding the muzzle whitish-gray, and the under part of the body bright brownish-red. 
Its large head, its squat, clumsy body, and its short thick legs, give it what one would be apt to 
consider an expression of stupidity ; but in the case of no animal is the external appearance more 
at variance with the facts. 
In a state of nature it conducts the making of its burrow with greater neatness, and keeps it in 
better order than most of the burrowing rodentia, and its domestic economy is scarcely inferior to 
that of the beaver itself. In fact, though the hut of the beaver is a structure reared, and the 
