■f 1. L ipura H udsonia. (Illiger.) Tail-less Marmot.
Genus, Lipura. I l l ig er .
Tail-less Marmot. Pennant, Arct. Zool^rol. i. p. 112. Hist. Quadr., voL ii. p. 137-
Bewick, Quadr., p. 374.
Daman de la bale d’Hudson. Schreber, t. 240. C.
Arctomys Hudsonius. T urton, Linn., vol. i. p. 90.
Hyrax Hudsonius. Sh a w , Zool., v o l. ii. p. 225.
This animal was first described by Pennant from a specimen preserved in the
Leverian Museum, and said to have been brought from Hudson’s Bay. It has not
been obtained from that quarter since Pennant’s time, and there is much reason to
doubt the habitat assigned to the animal, though there appears to be none to
question the genuineness of the specimen.
The characters attributed to the genus lipura, by Illiger, are: “ two superior
incisors; four inferior ones, obliquely truncated; an interval between the incisors
and the grinders, which are composed of folded layers of enamel; a pointed
muzzle; body covered with coarse hair; no tail; feet, with four toes, armed
with flat nails.
Pennant describes the animal as being of the sige of the common marmot
(i. e. head and body, 16 inches long) with short ears; head and body of a
cinereous brown; the ends of the hairs white; two cutting teeth above, four
below; no tail,”
[72.] I. E quus c a b a l l u s . (Linn.) The Horse.
The Horse. Warden, United States, p. 234.
Wild Horse. L ong, Jowm., voL ii. p. 313; vol. iii. p. 107-
Herds of wild horses, the offspring of those which have escaped from the
Spanish possessions in Mexico, are not uncommon on the extensive prairies that
lie to the west of the Mississipi. They were once numerous on the Kootannie
Lands, near the northern sources of the Columbia, on the eastern side of the
Rocky Mountain ridge, but of late years they have been almost eradicated in
that quarter. They are not known to exist in a wild state to the northward of
the fifty-second or fifty-third parallel of latitude. The young stallions live in
separate herds, being driven away by the old ones, and are easily ensnared by
using domestic mares as a decoy. The Kootannies are acquainted with the
Spanish-American mode of taking them with the lasso. Major Long mentions
that “ horses are an object of a particular hunt to the Osages. For the purposes
of obtaining these animals, which in their wild state preserve all their fleetness,
they go in a large party to the country of the Red Canadian River, where they are
to be found in considerable numbers. When they discover a gang of the horses,
they distribute themselves into three parties, two of which take their stations at
different and proper distances on their route, which by previous experience they
know the horses will most probably take when endeavouring to escape. This
arrangement being completed, the first party commences the pursuit in the
direction of their colleagues, at whose position they at length arrive. The second
party then continues the chase with fresh horses, and pursues the fugitives to the
third party, which generally succeeds in so far running them down as to noose
and capture a considerable number of them.”
The domestic horse is an object of great value to the nomadic tribes of
Indians that frequent the extensive plains of the Saskatchewan and Missouri, for
they are not only useful in transporting their tents and families from place to
place, but one of the highest objects of the ambition of a young Indian is to
possess a good horse for the chase of the buffalo, an exercise of which they are
passionately fond. To steal the horses of an adverse tribe is considered to be
nearly as heroic an exploit as killing an enemy on the field of battle, and the