348 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [1898. 



A NEW CHIPMUNK FROM NORTHEASTERN CHINA. 

 BY GERRIT 8. MILLER, JR. 



In a paper recently published in these Proceedings (1898, pp. 

 120-125) Mr. S. N. Rhoads refers two chipmunks from the Pro- 

 vince of Pechili, northeastern China, to Eutamias asiaticics (Gmelin). 

 Through the kindness of Mr. Witmer Stone I now have the speci- 

 mens before me. They agree perfectly — allowance being made for 

 difference in pelage — with a skin in the United States National 

 Museum taken near Peking, and differ widely from published 

 descriptions of Eutamias asiaticus 1 and from a skin of the latter (in 

 the National Museum) labelled ' Fort TJlba, Siberia.' 2 Considering 

 the isolation of the region inhabited by the Pechili Chipmunk, and 

 the extreme plasticity of the genus Eutamias, it is not surprising 

 that the animal should prove to be distinct from its Siberian con- 

 gener. The question immediately arises, however, as to what true 

 Eutamias asiaticus really is, and at present it is impossible to give 

 a wholly satisfactory answer. Gmelin based his Sciurus striatus 

 a asiaticus primarily on the Sciurus striatus of Pallas, 3 a compos- 

 ite of the Asiatic and American species, but composed chiefly of the 

 former. The range of the Asiatic animal extends, according to 

 Pallas, from the Dwina River in Russia, east through the whole of 

 Siberia. That only one species of Eutamias occurs in this vast area 

 is almost beyond the possibility of belief. But however many forms 

 there may be, and whatever one Pallas may have had in hand when 

 he wrote his description, the animal that he described was approxi- 

 mately like the ' Ulba ' specimen, and consequently very unlike the 

 Chinese form. Roughly speaking, the Chinese animal is a pale, 

 grayish, brown-striped form much like Eutamias merriami and E. 

 senex, while the ' Ulba ' specimen, together with those usually re- 



1 See, for instance, Allen, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., Ill, pp. 71, 72, June, 

 1890. 



2 This locality I have been unable to find on any map. In the Government 

 of Tomsk, however, there is a river whose name is variously spelled as Uba, 

 Ouba and Ooba. The name on the Museum label may be a lapsus pennse 

 for Uba. 



s Glires, p. 378. 



