130 
ZOOLOGY. 
Extreme span of hind and fore feet 
Prom heel to end of most projecting toe-nail • 
From wrist to end of most projecting toe-nail 
8.50 inches. 
1.12 do. 
.56 do. 
Ears hidden by the long fur of the head; they are quite large and nearly naked; whiskers 
very short; eyes small; teeth yellow. 
, Note. — The note published in my partial report, chapter 2, of part 2, this volume, was inserted 
by mistake; it was intended to apply to the other species of field and meadow mice. — S. 
FIBER ZIBETHICUS, Cuv. 
3Iuskrat. 
Baird, Gen. Kep Mammals, 1857, 561. 
I have obtained several specimens of the common muskrat from the lakes and fresh waters 
near Fort Steilacoom, Puget Sound. Two skins of these were sent to Washington, and are 
now in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution. I have seen some of their stack-like 
houses on lakes near Fort S. The Indians of the interior carry many muskrat skins to the 
Hudson Bay trading establishments, Avhere they obtain one charge of powder and ball for each. 
They take the animal in traps, ammunition being too valuable to expend for them. 
Indian women on the Cowlitz river use the skin of a muskrat in childbed, as a sort of " smelling 
salt" to assist labor. — S. 
This species seems to replace the Le-pus sylvaticus in the forest regions bordering the coasts of 
northern Oregon and Washington. One specimen (No. 142) obtained by me from British 
America, near the fifty-fifth parallel of north latitude, shows that this hare has a considerable 
range north and south. I doubt very much whether the species turns white in winter. The 
Indian from whom I obtained No. 142 assured me positively that it never tiirns white, and 
seemed to think with me that the other two skins, which were wJiite, purchased at the same 
time, belonged to a diflerent species. I have obtained the Lepus Washingtonii at Puget Sound 
at all seasons; those killed in mid-winter showing no trace of a white winter coat. It may be 
that some hares have the property of changing the color only during very severe cold weather, 
such as is rarely experienced in the vicinit}' of Puget Sound — the degree of cold, perhaps, 
regulating the change. 
I preserved a specimen in June, 1856, which was killed on White river, near Puget Sound. 
LEPUS WASHINGTONII, Baird. 
Western Red Hare. 
[For synonymy and description of this species, see chap. 2, p. 103.] 
No. 104. — Measurements. 
Head to root of tail 
Tail vertebrae, about 
Tail to hairy tip 
Head to tip of nose 
Height of ears from plane of occiput 
Outstretched ears, from, tip to tip ■ • ■ • 
Folded ears project beyond nose • • • • 
Easy girth of head in front of ears • • 
16.50 inches. 
1.60 " 
2.50 
4.00 
3.87 
8.25 
1 1 
.50 
5.75 
1 ( 
