Wade thought it was fully as large.
"If we were in Maine, I should say it was a small black bear," said Kit; "but I have never heard of a black bear being seen north of Hudson Straits."
The head seemed to me to be too small for a bear.
"Captain, what do you think of that animal?" Kit asked, handing him his glass.
Capt. Mazard looked.
"If it hadn't such short legs, I should pronounce it a black wolf," he replied. "It's too large for a fisher, isn't it? I don't know that fishers are found so far north, either. How is that?"
"Hearne, in his 'Northern Journey,' speaks of the fisher being met with, farther west, in latitude as far north as this," said I.
"But that's too big for a fisher," said Raed; "too thick and heavy. A fisher is slimmer."
"Who knows but it may be a new species!" exclaimed Kit, laughing. "Now's a chance to distinguish ourselves as naturalists. If we can discover a new animal of that size in this age of natural history, and prove that we are the discoverers, it will be monument enough for us: we can then afford to retire on our laurels. Call it a long Latin name, and tack our own names, with the ending ii or us on them, to that, and you're all right for distant posterity. That's what some of our enterprising young naturalists, who swarm out from Yale and Cambridge, seem to think. Only a few weeks ago, I was reading of a new sort of minute infusorial insect or mollusk, I don't pretend to understand which, bearing the name of 'Mussa Braziliensis Hartii Verrill.' Now, I like that. There's a noble aspiration for fame as well as euphony. Only it's a little heavy on the poor mollusk to make him draw these aspiring young gentlemen up the steep heights of ambition. But if they can afford to risk two names on a tiny bit of jelly as big as the head of a pin, say, I think we should be justified in putting all four of ours on to this big beast over here. And, since the captain thinks it's like a wolf, suppose we call it 'Lupus rabidus Additonii Burleighii Raedwayvius'"—
"There, that'll do!" cried Raed. "You've spelt! Go up head!"