SCIUEID^E— SCIUKUS CAROLINENSIS VAR. YUCATANENSIS. 705 



The form above characterized as var. carolinensis is typically represented 

 by Florida specimens. Specimens from Louisiana, however, are hardly dis- 

 tinguishable from Florida ones. A specimen from Salt Creek, Kansas (No. 

 30G1, May 29, 1857), is not appreciably different. Specimens from the 

 Carolinas, and as far north even on the coast as Washington, and as far north 

 in the Mississippi Valley as Saint Louis, are nearer the southern form than 

 they are to the northern. 



Var. YUCATANENSIS, H. V. 



Yucatan Gray Squirrel. 



Varietal chars. — Size small ; tail with hairs shorter than head and body. 

 Intermediate in size between 8. carolinensis (var. carolinensis) and S. hudsonius. 

 Head and body 10.00; tail-vertebra? 8.00; tail to end of hairs y.75. Ears narrow 

 and pointed, in winter somewhat tufted. Pelage coarse and harsh. Above, 

 gray, with the middle of the back brownish ; beneath, white ; hairs of the tail 

 ringed with white and black. 



The four specimens of this variety before me are all from Merida, 

 Yucatan, and were collected by Dr. A. Schott in March, 18G5. They present 

 a remarkable degree of uniformity in coloration. Three are adult, the other 

 about half-grown. Their general aspect is widely different from that of any 

 form of S. carolinensis from the United States, but differs less from the New 

 Leon specimens, referred doubtfully by Baird, in 1857, to S. carolinensis. 

 The pelage is very coarse, harsh, and stiff; the sides are clear ashy-gray, 

 unvaried with any shade of fulvous or rufous. The middle of the dorsal 

 region is black and light yellowish-brown, the hairs being black at base and 

 tip, with a broad subterminal bar of wood-brown. The tail is centrally white 

 below, with a well-defined line of black on either side of the median line, 

 traversing the middle of the basal white band; on either side of the central 

 white area is a broad bar of black, succeeded by a broad terminal bar of 

 white Each hair is thus white, with an inner narrow bar of black and a 

 broader outer one of the same color, with no shade of fulvous or rufous. 

 The ears are much narrower and higher than in any United States form of 

 carolinensis, and, with the coarse pelage, ashy-gray tints of the sides, and 

 blackish hue of the back, varied with pale yellowish-brown, together with 

 the small size, convey the impression of an animal specifically distinct from 

 any other species of Sciurus, and I am far from sure that it should not be so 

 45 m 



