Note II-10 — Chapter II · ITINERARY, CONTINUED: ST. PAUL TO LEECH LAKE, SEPTEMBER 22D, 1805-JANUARY 31ST, 1806.

What Pierre Rousseau called a "prairie mole" was the pocket-gopher of this region, Thomomys talpoides. This was first made known to science by Dr. John Richardson in his paper entitled "Short Characters of a few Quadrupeds Procured on Capt. Franklin's late Expedition," published in the Zoölogical Journal, III. No. 12, Jan.-Apr. 1828, pp. 516-520. He named it Cricetus talpoides, taking this specific name from its mole-like appearance, and afterwards called it Geomys talpoides, in the Fauna Boreali-Americana, I. 1829, p. 204. Among the peculiarities of the animal, and indeed of the whole family to which it belongs, are the strictly subterranean habits, and the possession of large cheek-pouches external to the mouth and lined with fur inside: see Coues and Allen, Monographs N. A. Rodentia, 1877, p. 623. The common mole of the United States, from which Pike saw that this gopher was very different, is Scalops aquaticus, of the mammalian order Insectivora (not Rodentia).