EUPETAURUS CINEREUS. 14.'^ 



NOTE XX. 



OBSERVATIONS RELATING 

 EUPETAURUS CINEREUS, OLDFIELD THOMAS. 



Dr. P. A. JENTINK. 



March 1890. 



(Plate 7, figs. 1 and 2). 



Mr. Oldfield Thomas has described iu the Journal of the 

 Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1888, p. 256 , a very interesting 

 and aberrant Pteromys-ioxva under the name Eupetaurus 

 cinereus. He remarked that in the Leyden Museum were 

 not improbably a melanoid and a normal example of this 

 species. This supposition he based upon quotations by 

 Anderson in his well known »Yunnan Expedition". 



As the species under consideration seems to be a very 

 rare one , at least in zoological collections , it has its in- 

 terest to know if the two named specimens in the Leyden 

 Museum really belong to E. cinereus and — if so — how far 

 the characteristics given by Thomas are constant. 



One of our specimens , the individual presented to our 

 Museum by Lord Walden and collected in Kashmir, certainly 

 does not belong to E. cinereus, as its ears , skull and dentition 

 prove , but probably is a melanoid form of Ptéromys alhi- 

 venter as suggested by Anderson. 



The other specimen, however, said to be from Tibet, 

 really is an Eupetaurus cinereus, although not an adult 

 one like the specimen the skull of which has been figured 

 and discussed by Oldfield Thomas , 1. c. pi. XXIII. Just in 

 the not so advanced age of our specimen lies the scientific 



Notes from the Leyden JMuseuxri, Vol. JXII. 



