18G MURIN-^, 



The Desert Jerboa-rat. 



Descr. — Mucli smaller than the last, with the tail also comparatively 

 shorter, and the ear smaller. Above pale-rufous or sandy, with fine 

 diisky lines, the hairs being blackish at the base, the rest fawn-coloured, 

 with a minute dusky tip ; a few longer piles on the rump and thighs ; 

 sides slightly paler, with fewer dusky lines ; all the lower parts whitish, 

 tinged more or less with fawn-colour on the belly, the line of demarca- 

 tion of the two colours not sti'ongly marked ; limbs pale-fawn ; tail 

 yellowish-rufoiis or fawn-colour throughout, with a line of dusky-brown 

 hairs on the upper surface of the terminal half, gradually increasing 

 in length to the tip ; orbits pale ; whiskers mostly white, a few of 

 the upper ones dark. 



Length, head and body 5 inches ; tail 4| ; ears f ; palm | ; hind-foot 1. 



I have not at present access to Gray's description of G. erythrourus, of 

 which there is no specimen in the Museum of the Asiatic Society, so 

 merely conjecture it to be the same from the specific name applyiug to the 

 Indian one, and its habitat being not far removed. At any rate it differs 

 conspicuously from the common jerboa-rat of India, and if not the same 

 as Gray's species, may be designated as Gerhillus Hurriance. When I 

 first observed this rat, I thought that it must be a casual variety of the 

 common kind, especially after Blyth's emphatic statement that he had 

 seen Gerhillus indtcus from every part of India without any decided vari- 

 ation ; but I have seen it since in vast niimbers over a large extent of 

 country, all pretty constant to the description and measurements above 

 given. Its habitat is the sandy tract of country west of the Jumna, Hur- 

 riana, and adjacent districts. Whether it extends much further south, or 

 through the Punjab, I cannot now say, but should imagine that it will 

 be found throughout Kajpootana, part of Sindh, and the Punjab, thence 

 extending into Afghanistan, It is exceedingly numerous in the sandy 

 downs and sand-hUls of Hurriana, both in jungles and in bare plains, espe- 

 cially in the former, and a colony may be seen at the foot of every large 

 shrub almost, I found that it had been feeding on the kernel of the nut 

 of the common Salvadora oleifoUa, gnawing through the hard nut, and 

 extracting the whole of the kernel. Unlike the last species, this rat, 

 daring the cold weather, at all events, is very generally seen outside its 

 holes at all hours, scuttling in on the near approach of any one, but soon 

 cautiously popping its head out of its hole and again issuing forth. In the 



