150 MAMMALIA. 



SpalaXj Gulden. 



The Rat-Moles have also been very properly separated from the 

 Rats, although their grinders are three in number, and tuberculous, 

 as in the true Rats, and the Hamsters, and are merely a little less 

 unequal. Their incisors, however, are too large to be covered by 

 the lips, and the extremities of the lower ones are trenchant, recti- 

 linear, and transverse, not pointed. Their legs are very short; 

 each foot has five short toes, and as many flat and slender nails. 

 Their tail is very short, or rather there is none ; the same observa- 

 tion applies to their external ear. They live under ground like the 

 Moles, raising up the earth like them, although provided with much 

 inferior means for dividing it, but they subsist on roots only. 



S. typhus ^ M. typhus, Pall. Glir. pi, viii, Schreb. 206. (The 

 Zanni, Slepez or Blind Rat-Mole.) A singular animal, which, 

 from its large head, angular on the sides, its short legs, the 

 total absence of a tail and of any apparent eye, has a most 

 shapeless appearance. The eye is not visible externally, and 

 we merely find beneath the skin a little black point, which ap- 

 pears to be organised like one, but which cannot serve for the 

 purpose of vision, since the skin passes over it without opening 

 or even growing thinner, and being as much covered with hair 

 as any other part. It is rather larger than our Ratj its fur is 

 smooth, and of an ash colour, bordering on a red. This is the 

 atiimal, in the opinion of Olivier, to which the ancients alluded 

 when they spoke of the Mole as being perfectly blind. 



The islands in the straits of Sunda produce a Rat-Mole as 

 large as a Rabbit, of a deep grey colour, with a white longitu- 

 dinal stripe on the head, the Spalax j avanus. 

 From the Rat-Moles themselves should have been separated the 



Bathyergus, Illig. Orycteres, Fr. Cuv. 



Which, with the general form, feet, and truncated incisors of that 

 genus, have four grinders throughout. Their eye, though small, is 

 visible, and they have a short tail. 



B. maritimus; Mus maritimus, Gm.; Taupe des dames, Buff. 

 Supp. VI, xxxviii. (The Maritime Rat-Mole.) Nearly the 

 size of a Rabbit; the superior incisors furrowed Avith a groove, 

 and the hair of a whitish grey. 



B. capensis; M. capensis, Gm.; Taupe du Oap., Buff. Supp. 

 VI, xxxvi. (The Rat-Mole of the Cape.) Hardly as large as 

 the Guinea-Pig ; brown, with a spot round the ear, another 

 round the eye, and a third on the vortex, together with the end 

 of the muzzle, white. The incisors are smooth. 



