Vol. VIII, pp. 83-P6 July 18, 1893 



PROCEEDINGS 



BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



RP]1)I8("0VERY OF THE ^MEXICAN KANGAROO RAT, 

 DfrODOMYS PHILLIPSI ORAY 



BY C. HART MERRIAM, M. D. 



AViTH Field Notes by E. W. Nelson. 



The first kangaroo rat known to naturalists was descril)ed b}^ 

 J. E. Gray, in 1S41, under the name Dipodom ys ])Jtill'i])xi .-^ Both 

 species and genus were new. and were based on a single speci- 

 men presented to the British Museum by John Phillij)s on his 

 return h'om Real del ^lonte, in the state of Hidalgo, Mexico, 

 in the vicinity of which place it was supposed to have been 

 oljtained.f This specimen still remains unique, so far as authen- 

 tic published records go, notwithstanding'the fact that numer- 

 ous museums in this country and Europe contain specimens 

 ]aheled D. pJdllqjsi v^'hich have been examined and treated as 



*Bipodomys plnUipii Gray, Annals and Magazine Nat. Hist., vir, Aug., 

 1841, 522. In the original article the name M'as spelled philUpii by typo 

 grapical error; it was corrected to phillipsii a few months later by the 

 same author. (Am. Jour. Sci., xlii, 1842, 335.) 



t Real del Monte is in the mountains at the extreme north end of the 

 Valley of INIexico, about 50 miles nortlieast of the City of Mexico. 



12-Bi(ii,. Sdc. Wask., Voi,. VIIL ISO:?. (53) 



