152 SIXTH UJil'ORT — 1836. 



witli others which are white with yellow tints. Sclurus CoUicei 

 from California, figured in the appendix to Beechey's Voyage, 

 differs from any species inhabiting the Atlantic states, but 

 nearly agrees with Hernandez's account of the Mexican " tlal- 

 mofotlf". Sc. Clarkii and Lcivisii, figured by Lieut. -Colonel 

 Hamilton Smith in Griffith's Cu\ier, were brought from the 

 Missouri by the travellers whose names they bear. The latter 

 is supposed by the editor of the work referred to, to be the sc. 

 uiainlatiis of Desmarest, whose native country was previously 

 unknown. The sciurus hudsonuis, named locally red-squirrel, 

 or chickaree, tbe most northern American species, bas a range 

 from the arctic extremity of the woods to Massachusetts. 

 Though destitute of cheek-pouches, it has been generally ranked 

 as a tamias, perhaps on account of the dark line which occa- 

 sionally divides the fur of the back from that of the belly ; and, 

 indeed, it resembles the tainias in forming burrows at the foot 

 of the pine-tree, on which it seeks its food : it is evidently the 

 ruhro lineatus of Warden, and probably the riiher of Rafinesque. 

 The tamias Lysteri ranges on the eastern side of the Rocky 

 Mountains from the 50th parallel down to the Carolinas ; it is 

 the tamias americanus described by Kuhl {Beitrage, 69)*. 

 Cuvier states, that the t. striatus inhabits both Asia and Ame- 

 rica ; but we have met with no American animal that resem- 

 bles Bufibn's figure 10, 28, which Cuvier quotes. T. qiiadri- 

 vittutus inhabits the fur-countries, and goes southwards along 

 the eastern declivity of the Rocky Mountains to the sources of 

 the Platte and Arkansa. T. buccatus is a Mexican animal, 

 which differs from the other admitted species of tamias in want- 

 ing longitudinal stripes and colours on the flanks. We cannot 

 help surmising, therefore, that it may be a spermophile, for the 

 two genera are very nearly allied, the only material diff"erence 

 in the dentition being, that the anterior molar of the upper 

 jaw, which falls early in the true squirrels, but remains till old 

 age in the tamias, is smaller in the latter than in the spermo- 

 philes. The typical species of each differ, indeed, a little in 

 the feet ; but /. (/nadrivittatus and sp. lateralis possess inter- 

 mediate characters, which imite the two groups very closely, so 

 that we may be prepared to find authors differing as to which 

 genus or subgenus certain species ought to be referred. Pte- 

 romys volucella inhabits Canada, the United States, and, ac- 

 cording to Lichtenstein, Mexico also. Pt. sahrinus and alpi- 

 nus, which are not yet fully established as distinct from each 

 other, and closely resemble the valans of Siberia, frequent the 



* Fischer, xijn. 



