RHEITIIHÜ.SCIURUS. 171 



general colour of the animal is dark-nutbrown , very mi- 

 nutely punctulated ; the hind quarter , including the base 

 of the tail and the outside of the fore- and hiudlimbs 

 bright bay ; the feet blackish. There is a brownish band 

 from the axilla to the groin , with a yellowish white band 

 about it. The cheeks and inner sides of the limbs are 

 pale brownish , grizzled and with long white tips to the 

 hairs. Habitat. Sarawak. Borneo." Afterwards my friend 

 Trouessart in his Catalogue des Mammifères vivants et 

 fossiles 1880 p. 69 (12), united my microtis with Gray's 

 macrotis in the genus Rheithrosciurus. Thereupon I wrote 

 to Trouessart that I did not accept that genus, as there 

 were still more squirrels which show the same character, 

 but for the rest beloug to the most different groups and 

 I shortly explained why I had placed my squirrel in the 

 neighborhood of Gray's species. But I hardly can express 

 my astonishment as I saw in the Paris Museum and af- 

 terwards in the British Museum specimens of Rheithro- 

 sciurus mcuTotis! Indeed it is the most splendid squirrel 

 that I ever saw. The coloring of the body generally re- 

 sembles that of Sciurus prevostii] like in that species each 

 side is ornated with a broad white band. But the ears 

 are longer than in any other squirrel , viz : 30 mm. , they 

 are embellished with a very long tuft measuring 45 mm., 

 the whole ear with pencil also measures about 75 mm. 

 The tail is very bushy and resembles that organ in Chiro- 

 mys madagascariensis\ its length is about 280 mm. without 

 tuft, while it measures the tuft included 292 mm., also 

 much longer than the body (c. f. Gray's measures above 

 given), which measures the head included 235 mm. The 

 hairs of the tail are long 92 mm., so that, if the hairs 

 are spread out, the tail has a diameter of about 185 mm. 

 — The most striking characters however the skull and 

 teeth present. Dr. Günther very kindly allowed the skull 

 of one of the largest specimens to be extracted for exa- 

 mination. In examinino; that skull Mr. Oldfield Thomas 

 and 1 soon came to the conclusion that the specimen was 



Notes t'rora the Leyden M.u&ieum, Vol. 111. 



