Nelson Seven New Rabbits. 109 



Description of type in winter pelage. Top of head dingy grizzled buffy; 

 back buffy with a slight tinge of dull reddish brown, heavily mottled and 

 grizzled with black ; sides of body paler and grayer ; thighs and rump up to 

 median line iron gray; a heavy black band divides the gray of rump along 

 median line and covers top of tail ; under side of tail dingy gray ; sides of 

 head and neck dull buffy, palest on cheeks and darker with a slight tinge 

 of vinaceous on sides of neck ; under side of neck deep dull buffy ; chin 

 and under side of body white; top of hind feet dingy white becoming 

 grayish on toes; top of fore legs dingy buffy thinly grizzled with blackish; 

 ears finely grizzled yellowish gray on front half of convex surface, and 

 fringed with slightly yellowish white hairs on anterior edge; posterior 

 half of convex surface white, with a distinct black spot covering 35 mm. of 

 the tip and extending a dusky edge around border of anterior part of tip; 

 nape grizzled grayish without a trace of black patch characteristic of 

 L. merriami. 



Skull characters. Skull lighter and rather smaller than that of L. mer 

 riami, and practically indistinguishable from that of L. lexianus from 

 Chihuahua and the Texas boundary. 



Measurement* of type (taken in flesh}. Total length, 575; tail vertebrae, 

 78 ; hind foot, 126; ear from notch (from dried skin), 138. 



Measurements of type skull. Occipito-nasal length, 96.5; basal length, 74; 

 length of nasals, 43; greatest interorbital breadth, 26.5 ; parietal breadth, 

 31 ; depth of rostrum at front base of premolars, 25 ; width of rostrum 

 above same point, 20 ; greatest diameter of bullse, 14. 



Specimens examined. Nine. 



General notes. This species is apparently most closely related to L. mer 

 riami asellus, from which its even larger ears and entire absence of black 

 patch on nape at once distinguish it. The nape is much like that of 

 L. texianus, and the skull is a little smaller and lighter than that of merriami 

 and scarcely distinguishable from that of texianus. The color of back and 

 general appearance of this animal is that of a dark-colored L. merriami with 

 extraordinarily large ears and no black nape patch. Its habitat is at the 

 southern border of that of L. m. asellus and widely separated from that of 

 L. texianus. 



Lepus merriami altamirae subsp. nov. 



ALTA MIRA JACK RABBIT. 



Type No. 93,691, adult male, U. S. National Museum, Biological Survey 

 Collection. From Alta Mira, Tamaulipas, Mexico. Collected May 16, 1898, 

 by E. W. Nelson and E. A. Goldman. Original number 12,365. 



Geographic distribution. Coastal plains in southern part of Tamaulipas, 

 extreme northern Vera Cruz, and eastern San Luis Potosi. 



Zonal distribution. Arid tropical. 



Subspecific characters. Similar to typical merriami in color, but under side 

 of neck deeper and clearer buffy, and black nape patch distinctly separated 

 into two parallel black stripes by a well-defined median band of yellowish 



