The skull is very strong and massive, and the jaws bear altogether thirty-eight teeth. The number of the incisors, canines, and premolars corresponds with that we have found in the Arctoids; but the molars are reduced to one on each side in the upper, and two on each side in the lower jaw.[165] The mode of progression is semi-plantigrade, and the animal’s movements are, compared with those of its nearest allies, the Martens and Weasels, slow and clumsy; unlike these, too, it is not a good climber, although the older accounts of its customs stated that it was in the habit of climbing trees, and dropping suddenly down upon large animals as they passed, and then destroying them as they fled in terror at the unexpected attack. In this, as in many other instances, the imagination has largely been called into play to supplement what was deficient in the actual observations of the writers. Probably few animals have given rise to so many or such wild fables as the Wolverene. Its name of _Glutton_ is due to the mythical account of its habits given by an early writer, Olaus Magnus, who says: “It is wont, when it has found the carcass of some large beast, to eat until its belly is distended like a drum, when it rids itself of its load by squeezing its body betwixt two trees growing near together, and again returning to its repast, soon requires to have recourse to the same means of relief.” It need hardly be said that this story must be taken _cum grano salis maximo_. [Illustration: GLUTTON.]