FOXES 93

(C. vulpes), in its many varieties, is found practically
all round the northern world, and always bears the
same character of being an exceedingly smart indi-
vidual, well able to take care of himself. The Arctic
fox (C. lagopus) changes his coat in winter to a pure
white. The corsac fox of the Asian deserts also
changes his coat, but not to the same extent, his
hairs becoming merely ringed with white. The
largest of the short-eared foxes is the so-called grey-
hound fox of North Britain. The smallest is C.
canus, the hoary fox of Baluchistan. Differing but
slightly from the true foxes are the fennecs, those
quaint little creatures with big, wide ears and bushy
tails, which, in two species, are found in North Africa,
and in Persia and Afghanistan, the intermediate
form being the South African asse fox (C. chama),
which lives to a great extent on ostrich eggs, rolling
them along from their nest to its burrow, and there
breaking them against a stone.

With the bears we enter on the third section of
the fissiped carnivora. The bears themselves are’
so distinct in appearance that there is no difficulty in
identifying them now, but in the past, during the
existence of the dog-like bears and bear-like dogs, it
would not have been so easy to draw the line. There
are but three living genera, Ursus, Melursus and
Ailuropus, the last having but one species, the black-
and-white or parti-coloured bear of Tibet, which is
not really a carnivore but a herbivore ; Melursus also
having but one species, the Indian sloth-bear, which
feeds upon fruits and flowers and ants and honey, and