i 



78 NELSON 



General notes. — Gray first called this species S. richardsoni in 

 1842, but finding this name preoccupied by S. richardsoni of Bach- 

 man, 1S38, he renamed it S. boothia: in 1843. Overlooking Gray's 

 ■change, Schinz renamed the species S. fuscovaricgatus in 1845. 

 Most recent authors have lumped this squirrel with numerous others 

 under the name hypopyrrhus. 



Mr. Oldfield Thomas, to whom a specimen from San Pedro Sula, 

 Honduras (No. 19549 $ ad., U. S. National Museum) was sent for 

 comparison with Gray's type, writes that they agree absolutely in color. 

 Gray gives no definite type locality for this species, but specimens from 

 San Pedro Sula are absolutely typical. Mr. Thomas writes that the 

 type is less than half grown and that in retiescribing this species in 1867 

 (Ann. and Mag, Nat. Hist., 3d. ser., xx, p. 424) Gray mentions, 

 not the type, but specimens received by the British Museum from 

 Honduras in 1845 which have gray instead of white bellies. S. 

 boothice grades into S. b. belti to the south, and it is very probable 

 that another subspecies exists in the mountains of interior Honduras. 

 I have been unable to learn for whom Gray named this species. 



Specimens examined. — Eight : from San Pedro Sula, Truxillo, and 

 Segovia River, Honduras; Guatemala (i specimen without definite 

 locality) . 



SCIURUS BOOTHIA BELTI subsp. nov. 

 Escondido River Squirrel. 



Type from Escondido River, 50 miles from Bluefields, Nicaragua. 

 No. 1^1^^ 9 ad., U. S. Nat. Museum, Biological Survey Collection. 

 Collected Nov. 22, 1892, by Chas. W. Richmond. 



Distributio7i. — Humid tropical forests of eastern coast region of 

 Nicaragua and north to Segovia River, Honduras. 



Characters. — Differs from S. boothice mainly in having the un- 

 derparts uniformly rusty rufous, and feet grizzled with rusty yellow- 

 ish. Pelage thin ; hair on back coarse, stiff and shiny ; under fur 

 short and thin; tail flat and slender. Teats: p- y a- f !• \- 



Color. — Upperparts including top of nose and base of tail all 

 around grizzled grayish brown, more or less heavily washed with 

 black ; ears bordered with black, posterior surface and basal patches 

 dull rusty; sides of head and chin varying from yellowish brown to 

 brownish gray; feet black, grizzled with rusty yellowish ; outside of 

 fore and hind legs like flanks but appreciably suffused with 'rusty yel- 

 low ; tail above black, thinly washed with white ; below, median area 

 varying from grizzled yellowish brown to rusty, with narrow black 



