" THE " COMMON STRIPED PALM SQUIRREL. 409 



" La Palmiste qui a servi de sujet pour cette description n' etait pas 



adulte II y avait cinq doigts aux pieds de derriere et seule- 



ment quatre a ceux de devant La couleur du poil de la 



queue etait melee de gris et de brun noiratre qui semblait former des 

 anneaux forts etroits, chaque poil avait du noir pres dela racine, du gris 

 audessus du noir et enfin du noir a la pointe. 



Jai observe un autre palmiste qui etait empaille et qui m'a paru de 



meme espece que le precedent Les poils de la queue 



formaient un panache, chaque poil etait de couleur rousseatre a son 

 origine, il avait ensuite du noir, du rousseatre, du noir et enfin 

 1'estremite etait blanche." 



I have seen no specimen in which the hairs of the tail were tipped 

 with black. But whatever the immature specimen may have been the 

 other was almost certainly the same form as the one described by Brisson 

 and possibly the same specimen. Moreover Buffon's plate shows, as 

 clearly as is possible in an uncolour picture, the rufous band of short 

 appressed hairs on the undersurface of the midrib of the tail. ( Vide 

 plate which is carefully copied from Buffon's picture, omitting only 

 th;i background, and for which my acknowledgments are due to Miss 

 Edwards.) 



Neither Brisson nor Buffon gives an exact locality for the specimen 

 on which he bases his description. But it would probably be the 

 E. coast of Madras ; at any rate in the absence of any more exactly 

 indicated locality I think we may accept the three striped form of 

 Madras as the typical form of Funambulus palmarum, L. and I 

 propose to make a new species for the five striped form under the name 

 of Funambulus pennant//. 



FUNAMBULUS PALMARUM, L. 



Sciurus penicillatus, Leach, Zool : Misc : Vol. 1., p. 6, 1814. 



Funambulus indicus, Lesson, 111 : de Zool : PI. XLIIJ, 1832. 

 The individual hairs on the upper surface of the body, including the 

 fac3, vertex (which however is often strongly tinged, with red). 

 Shoulders and flanks are particoloured, or broadly ringed, with black 

 and dirty white or pale buff, the general result is a very finely speckled 

 appearance varying from red-brown to grey-brown according as the 

 pide portions of the hairs approach more or less to buff. On the back 

 there is a ' saddle -mark ' area always darker than the general body 

 colour and usually much redder or browner. This variation in colour 



