Descriptive List of the Rodents of SoutJi Africa. 201 



hairs ; limbs white, fore feet with four claws and a flat nail to the 

 first finger ; hind foot with five claws, shorter than those of the fore 

 limb ; tail short, hardly half the length of the body, brown above, 

 white below (Peters). 



Dimensions (from Peters' description). Head and body 3-25 ; 

 tail 1-75 ; hind foot -60 ; skull length '79, breadth -47 ; upper 

 cheek teeth -13. From a specimen from Mashonaland, measured 

 in the flesh by Mr. Darling ; head and body 3 '77 ; tail 1/77 ; hind 

 foot '66. 



Distribution. South-East Africa : Mozambique (whence came the 

 type), Mashonaland, Nyassaland, and "the interior of Kaffraria " 

 (probably meaning the Transvaal), whence came the type of S. 

 krebsi; the species is not represented in the South African Museum. 



GEN. MALACOTHEIX. 



Otomys, A. SMITH, S. Afr. Quart. Journ., ii., p. 147 (1834) (nee 

 Cuvier). Type M. ty plena. 



Malacothrix, WAGNER, Schreb. Siiugeth. Suppl., iii., p. 496 (1843). 

 Type N. typicus. 



Small, short-tailed, mouse-like animals w T ith stout bodies, slender 

 limbs, and well-developed ears ; the tarsus and carpus are hairy to 

 the toe pads ; the skull is slender, the antorbital foramen is hardly 

 at all narrowed below, and the perpendicular plate is not well 

 developed. 



The upper incisors are very strongly grooved towards their outer 

 edge, the lower ones ungrooved and rather paler ; the molars 

 resemble those of Steatomys, the anterior upper one with 7 cusps, 

 2 in the anterior and posterior row, and 3 in the median row, 

 the middle molar has 5, the front row 3, of which the innermost 

 is small and not w r ell developed, the back row 2, the posterior molar 

 has 2 small cusps only, side by side ; in the lower molars the cusps 

 are arranged in pairs. 



This genus seems to come close to Steatomys, being distinguish- 

 able only by its very hairy tarsus. 



Only the two species below described are included in it, as Otomys 

 albicaudatus of Smith must apparently be assigned to the Sygmo- 

 dont genus Mystromys. 



MALACOTHRIX TYPICUS, THE MOUSE GERBILLE. 

 Otomys typicus, A. SMITH, S. Afr. Quart. Journ., ii., p. 148 (1834) ; 

 LAYARD, Cat. Mam. S. Afr. Mus., p. 54 (1862). 



