310 MAMMALIA OF INDIA. 
with fulvous tips, a few thin black hairs intermixed chiefly on the side 
and cheeks. 
The eyebrow is whitish ; whiskers long and black and a few grey ; the 
nearly half an inch beyond 
the lower; tail, which is 
longer than the body, is 
blackish above and below, 
pale laterally, and termi- 
nates with a black tufted 
tip; the ears are large and 
nearly naked ; the eye is par- 
ticularly large and lustrous, 
which, with its graceful 
bounds, have given it its 
Indian name of “ antelope- 
rat” ({irna-mus). 
Size.—Head and body, 
about 7 inches; tail, 84 
inches; fore-foot, 4%, inch; 
hind-foot, 2 inches. Weight, 
63 ounces. 
This graceful little creature frequents bare plains and sandy country 
in general, where it forms extensive burrows. Hardwicke writes of it : 
‘These animals are very numerous about cultivated lands, and particu- 
larly destructive to wheat and barley crops, of which they lay up consider- 
able hoards in spacious burrows. A tribe of low-caste Hindus, called 
Kunjers, go in quest of them at proper seasons to plunder their hoards, 
’ and often within the space of twenty yards square find as much corn 
in the ear as could be crammed in a bushel.” Sir Walter Elliot’s 
account of their burrows is most interesting. He says: ‘‘ The entrances, 
which are numerous, are small, from which the passage descends with a 
rapid slope for two or three feet, then runs along horizontally, and sends 
off branches in different directions. These galleries generally terminate 
in chambers from half a foot to a foot in width, containing a bed of dried 
grass. Sometimes one chamber communicates with another furnished in 
like manner, whilst others appear to be deserted, and the entrances closed 
with clay. The centre chamber in one burrow was very large, which 
the Wuddurs attributed to its being the common apartment, and said 
that the females occupied the smaller ones with their young. ‘They do 
not hoard their food, but issue from their burrows every evening, and 
run and hop about, sitting on their hind legs to look round, making 
astonishing leaps, and on the slightest alarm flying into their holes.” 
This account differs from that of Hardwicke as regards the hoarding of 
food, and from what I can learn is the more correct. 
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