1917.] C. BoDEN Kloss : On Burmese and Himahivan Rats. 9 



undersurface is sharply margined and extends down the inner and 

 posterior sides of the fore-limbs on to the hands : the front and 

 inner sides of the thighs are white also, but the white feet are 

 isolated by a/' cinnamon " band round the ankles, which colour 

 also extends slightly down the median line of the metapodials. 



Some measurements of the skull are: — greatest length about 

 38"0; palatilar length, 15 "4; length of palatal foramen, 6*4; 

 diastema, 9-4 ; upper tooth-row (alveolus), 6-o ; nasals, I3'9X 3*9; 

 palatal breadth between last molars, 4"8. 



6. Rattus jerdoni (Blj^th). 



Leggadajei'duiii, Blyth, Jourii. Asiat. Soc. Bengal, XXXII, p. 350 (1863). 

 Musjerdoni, ? Thomas {partim), P.Z.S., 1880, p. 537 ; Sclater (partim). 



P.Z.S., iSgo, p. 525 ; id., {1 partim). Cat. Mamm. hid. Mtts., II, p. 6q 



(1891). 

 Eptmysfiilvtscens, Wroughton, yoitni. Bombav Nat. Hist. Soc. XXIV, 



p. 427(1916). 



The type of Blyth's Mus jerdoni (specimen m of Sclater 's 

 catalogue) was collected at.Darjeeling by Jerdon, and is in a very 

 bad state of preservation. The skin has been mounted and is now 

 much torn and discoloured with the tail broken. The skull, which 

 appears to have been removed later, consists of little more than 

 the anterior portion; one zygomatic arch is complete, though 

 fractured, but the tips of the nasals are broken away. The 

 mandible is in fair condition. 



The skull is that of a very young animal as only the first two 

 molars are in sight. The combined lengths of these two molars, 

 upper and lower as far as they show, are 5"o and 4*8 mm. respec- 

 tively. 



The colour was described by Blyth as being ' " bright dark 

 ferruginous above, pure white below ; some fine long black tips 

 intermingled among the spines of the back; limbs marked with 

 blackish externally; the feet white. Length about 102; tail, 76 ; 

 hindfoot 22 mm." 



It was originally therefore much darker in colour than 

 fulvescens, '^ cinnamomeus," etc., but not greyish like m'ym'^n^ey. 

 The colour to-day is very near Ridgway's "cinnamon-brown" on 

 the back, becoming '' ochraceous-tawny " on the lower parts of the 

 sides (the base of the fur, as usual, grey) and one does not receive 

 the impression that the darkish tone is due to immaturity only. 

 The distribution of white on the underparts is as I have noted in 

 the case of Blyth's " cinnamomeus." 



On the rump the darker-tipped, pale spines are slender and 

 elastic but they are stiff and flattened on the sides and mid-body. 

 The outer sides of the ears are very thickly clad with comparatively 

 long hair of the same colour as the head. The tail appears to 

 have been bicoloured as stated by authors subsequent to Blyth ; it 

 is clad with very fine short hairs. 



Thomas in 1886 (and other writers have followed him) held 

 that jerdoni could always be separated from fulvescens on account 



