Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 18.djvu/268

SKULL. fracture is a simple one and the symptoms are not urgent, an expectant plan of treatment may be employed. Cases occasionally occur in which very urgent symptoms of cerebral pressure, such as unconsciousness or convulsions, persist for a long time and are relieved at once on the pressure being removed.

may be direct or indirect, but in most cases are indirect, that is to say, the bones give way at a point remote from the seat of the blow. At certain parts, however, the bones of the base are so thin that if direct pressure be brought to bear upon them they readily give way. Thus scissors, slate pencils, knitting needles, and other objects have often been thrust into the skull through the orbits or the nostrils and have given rise to wounds which are very serious because of the readiness with which the brain may be thus injured. The only symptoms that can he depended upon as indicating a fracture of the base of the skull are connected either with an escape of the substance of the brain, or blood, or watery fluid, or with an injury done to the nerves as they emerge at the base. Bleeding from the mouth or nose or from the ear occurs in about half the cases. A copious watery discharge from the ear was, until very recently, regarded as a diagnostic sign of fracture of the base; and there can be no doubt that when such a discharge of cerebrospinal fluid occurs either from the ear or nostrils it most probably is connected with fracture. Operative interference is very seldom required in these fractures.  SKUNK (from Abenaki seganku, Cree seecawk, skunk). A fur-bearing mammal of the genus Mephitis (or Chincha) of the weasel family (Mustelidæ), approaching the badgers in the lengthened claws of the fore feet, in the plantigrade hind feet, in dentition, and in habits. Skunks are found only in America, where they are distributed in many species from Northern Canada to Patagonia. All are animals of moderate size with long hair, bushy tails, and black and white markings. All have nocturnal habits, and are renowned for the excessive development of the anal glands, common to most of the family (see, , etc.), from which an acrid, fetid discharge may be projected to a considerable distance. The best-known species to which the name ordinarily refers is the common skunk of Eastern North America (Mephitis mephitica), which is numerous from New England and Canada, nearly as far northwest as timber grows, to Florida and Texas. Its body is about 18 inches long and the tail about 9 inches, but considerable variation occurs, and females are always smaller.

Skunks are wholly terrestrial and live in dens and burrows, usually of their own excavation. They are sluggish in movement and usually show little fear of human beings. Although chiefly nocturnal, they are often seen moving about in the daytime. They hibernate only during the severest part of the winter. Five to seven young are born in May in the Northern States. Their food consists largely of mice, reptiles, insects, and birds' eggs, and they frequently become excessively fat, especially when grasshoppers are abundant. In many parts of the United States they destroy the ‘white grubs,’ a great pest in lawns and meadows. They occasionally rob the poultry yard, but these small depredations are more than offset by their destruction of noxious

mammals and insects. Skunks have been extensively trapped for furs ever since the settlement of the country by white men, and attempts have been made to breed them in confinement, but, although ‘skunk farms’ have been started in several States, the industry has not flourished. The fur is sometimes sold under the name ‘Alaska sable.’ Apparently there is but one molt in a year, and this occurs in late summer or in autumn.

That which particularly distinguishes skunks from other animals is their means of defense, consisting of a characteristic malodorous fluid, which, when ejected, speedily discourages the boldest aggressor. The fluid is secreted by two anal glands similar in character to those possessed by other members of the Mustelidæ, but larger and more muscular. They lie one on each side of the rectum, and are imbedded in a dense, gizzard-like mass of muscle, which serves to compress them so forcibly that the contained fluid may be ejected to the distance of 15 feet. Each sac is furnished with a single duct that leads into a prominent, nipple-like papilla that is capable of being protruded from the anus, and by means of which the direction of the jet is governed. This liquid causes acute distress when in contact with mucous membrane, as, for example, the eyes. Another extraordinary feature of these animals is their tendency to canine rabies. It is popularly believed that they ‘go mad’ with a form of the disease peculiar to themselves, but an extensive investigation of the matter by Dr. Elliott Coues showed that the disease was doubtless canine rabies.

The skunks west of the plains are divided into several species, that of the coast of Great Basin being Mephitis occidentalis. In the Southern and Western United States and throughout Mexico occur also small ‘striped’ skunks of another genus (Spilogale) marked with four narrow stripes breaking into spots and cross-bars on the rump; these are called ‘zorillos’ in the Spanish-speaking countries. Still another well-known form is the ‘conepate,’ ‘mapurito,’ or white-backed skunk (Conepatus mapurito), which is found from Arizona throughout Central and South America.

Consult Coues, Fur-Bearing Animals (Washington, 1874), and the many authorities therein referred to; Merriam, “Mammals of the Adirondack Region,” in Transactions of the Linæan Society of New York, vol. i. (New York, 1882); Howell, “Revision of the Skunks of the Genus Chincha,” in North American Fauna, No. 20 (Department of Agriculture, Washington, 1901) ; Merriam, “Revision of the Genus Spilogale,” in North American Fauna, No. 4 (ib., 1890); Stone and Cram, American Animals (New York, 1902). See Plate of with.  SKUNK CABBAGE (so called because of the fetid odor), Symplocarpus fœtidus. A plant of the natural order Araceæ, growing in bogs and moist ground from Nova Scotia to North Carolina and west to Iowa and Minnesota. The hooded, shell-shaped, rather fleshy variegated purplish spathe appears in earliest spring before the smooth, radical, ovate, heart-shaped leaves. All parts of the plant, especially when bruised, emit a fetid skunkish odor. The fruit, which ripens in September, is a roughened globular mass 2 or 3