[27.] 3. Canis ( vulpes) Virginianus. (Gmelin.) The Gray Fox.
Gray Fox. • Catesby, Carolina, vol. ii. p. 78. t. 78. Kalm, Travels, (Pinkerton's Coll.) vol. xiii. p. 467.'
Pennant, Arctic Zool., vol. i. p. 48.
Canis virginianus. Gmelin, Syst., voL i. p. 74. Sabine, Franklin's Journey, p. 654. Harlan,
Fauna, p. 89.
Virginian fox. Shaw, Zool., vol. j. p. 325. •
Canis cinereo-argenteus. Say, Long's Encped., vol. ii. p. 340.
.The Gray Fox (Canis cinereo-argentatus). Godman’s Nat. Hist., vol. i. p. 280.
This animal, which is said to be the most common species of fox in the southern
parts of the United States, did not come under our notice on the late Expeditions^
but it is here introduced to mark its most northern limit. Its skins are sometimes
included amongst the Hudson Bay Company’s importations from their most
southern Canadian posts. Kalm says that the Gray Foxes are very common in
Pennsylvania, and in the southern provinces ; but scarce in the northern ones, on
which account the French call them Virginian foxes. He also says that they
are smaller, less destructive, less active, and have a less rank smell than the
European foxes. The Gray Fox has been confounded by some writers with the
Cross Fox, which it much resembles, though it is smaller in size ; by others with
the Kit Fox, which has also gray colours. Dr. Godman informs us that the
chase of this animal affords more pleasure to the American sportsmen than that of
the Red Fox*, “ because it does not immediately forsake its haunts and run for
miles in one direction, but after various doublings, is generally killed near the
place where it first started !” Catesby, on the contrary, says that “ they give no
diversion to the sportsmen, for after a mile’s chase they run up a tree. ’’ The same
author informs us that they breed in hollow trees, Langsdorff relates that in
California he saw a great number of foxes following the cows, and living upon the
most friendly terms with the young calves.
* He alludes here, not to the Canis fulvus, but to the C. vulpes vulgaris of this work.
[28.] 4. Canis ( vulpes vulgaris) vulpes ? (Linn.?) The Fox?
Canis vulpes. Harlan, Fauna, p. 86.
Canis fulvus. Godman, Nat. Hist., vol. i. p. 276.
M. Frederick Cuvier and M. Desmarest, who admit and describe the American
Red Fox (C. fulvus) as a distinct species, state the Common Fox to be also an
inhabitant of North America. It does not exist in the countries north of Canada
lying to the eastward of the Rocky Mountains, and consequently did not come
under our notice on the late Expeditions ; but it is admitted into this work, as
being most probably an inhabitant of New Caledonia. Several of the voyagers
who have visited the Atlantic coast of North America mention two kinds of red
fox skins, in possession of the natives ; the one having a fine, long, silky fur, of a
reddish-yellow colour (C. fulvus ?); the other of a smaller size, having shorter and
coarser fur, and less lively tints of colour (C. vulpes ?). I think it very probable that
an investigation into the characters of the American foxes will shew that the reddish
Fox of the Atlantic states is a variety of the Canis cinereus, which has been mistaken
for the European Fox. Dr. Godman states that these reddish foxes “ are numerous
in the middle and southern states of the Union, and are every where notorious
depredators ’on the poultry yards.” Kalm says, “ the red foxes are very scarce
here (New York) ; they are entirely the same with the European sort. Mr.
Bartram, and several others, assured me, that, according to the unanimous
testimony of the Indians, this kind of fox never was seen in the country before the
Europeans settled in it. Rut of the manner of their coming over I have two
different accounts : Mr. Bartram, and several other people, were told by the
Indians, that these foxes came into America soon after the arrival of the
Europeans, after an extraordinary cold winter, when all the sea to the northward
was frozen. But Mr. Evans and some others assured me that the following
account was still known by the people. A gentleman of fortune in New England,
who had much inclination for hunting, brought over a great number of foxes
from Europe, and let them loose in his territories, that he might be able to
indulge his passion for hunting. This, it is said, happened at the very beginning
of New England’s being peopled with European inhabitants. These foxes were
believed to have so multiplied, that all the red foxes in the country were their
o