136 BULLETIN 90, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



Bdeogalc puisa Peters. Type, 1150, $ , Querimba; Peters coll., skin mounted, 

 faded. Skull with top of braincase sawed off and lost. Very old, teeth worn away 

 to alveoli and last upper molars gone; points of canines much worn. Color: Body 

 above annulated buffy and umber-brown; tail black, hair brown at base; legs seal- 

 brown. Skull: Condyloiucisive length, 93; zygomatic breadth, 54; interorbital 

 breadth, 21; postorbital breadth, 15.5; length of mandible. 66; upper tooth row with 

 canine, 31; width of m ', 8. 



Genus CROSSARCHUS Geoffrey and Cuvier. 



1825. Crossarchns Gkopfroy and Cuvier, Hist. Nat. Mamm., vol. 5, livr. 47, 



text "le Mangue, " p. 3. Februaiy. (C. obscarus.) 

 1865. Ariela Gray, Proc. Zool. Soc London. 1864. pp. 509, 565. Keliruary. 



(C. fascia tus.) 



Tho banded mungooso is n'preseiiteil in unr Kast African collec- 

 tions ])y one form only. A much darker, richer colored race, 

 more like the South African forms, is found in T Uganda; and other 

 species occur m Abyssmia, Somali, and Sudan. Mr. Poco(;k has 

 recently recognized the genus Ariela as distinct from Crossarclnift.^ 



CROSSARCHUS FASCIATUS COLONLS Heller. 



Plate 37, figs. I, 2; plate 38, figs. 1, 2. 



1892. Ciossarchus mungo True, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus.. vol. 15, p. 453. (Spe<:i- 

 men from Taveta; not of Gmelin.) 



1910. Crossarchus fasciatus macrurus Roosevelt, African Game Trails, Amer. 



ed., p. 473; London ed., p. 485. (Not of Thomas.) 



1911. (Jrossarchus fasciatus colonus Heller, Smithsonian Misc. Coll., vol. 56. 



No. 17, p. 16. Fe'^ruary 28. (Southern Guaso Nyiro River, British 

 East Africa; type in LT. S. Nat. Mus.) 



Specimens. — Twelve, from localities as follows: 



British East Afhica: Kabalolot Hill, Sotik. 4 (Heller); Loita 

 Plams, 2 (Heller); Southern (xuaso .Vyiro KivcM-, ') (Heller, Meams, 

 Loring); Taveta, 1 (Abbott). 



The specimen from Taveta is in all essiuiiial details likt^ the speci- 

 mens from the Southern Guaso Nyiro and Sotik. There is consid- 

 erable variation among the skins from the type region, some showing 

 much more reddish-brown in the lower back than othei's. 



These mungooses are often met with on the gi-assy plains of the Sotik country, 

 where they li^^e in colonies in burrows on the open veldt. They do not stop long in 

 any locality, but move about in small packs of ten to twentj^ individuals, which take 

 up a temporary abode in any nest of ]>urrow3 which they find convenient. From our 

 observations it was apparent that tliey do not remain more than a day or two in any 

 one set of burrows.^ 



Doctor Mearns records the color of the iris of .m adult female as 

 ■' yellowish-brown. " 

 For measurements see page 137. 



« Pocock, Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 1916, p. 349. June, 1916. 



2 Heller, Smithsonian Misc. Coll., vol. 56, No. 17, p. 16. February 28, 1911. 



