THE DARK-BANDED JERBOA. 



^.^^^^ 

 22. — Dark-banded Jerboa. 



season, a quantity of grain, dried shoots, and herbs are 

 found within them ; on tlie contrary, Pallas affirms that 

 they collect no stores of" provision for the winter. It 

 is possible that both these naturalists, who had ample 

 opportunities of investigating the habits of the Alactaga 

 in a state of nature, may be correct, and that in the 

 more northern districts of its range it may accumulate a 

 store of provision, for use in the spring, when it first rouses 

 from its torpidity. The Alactaga is more numerous and 

 fertile in the warmer than in the colder latitudes ; but it 

 is nowhere to be seen in such numbers as the Egyptian 

 Jerboa. From its large size and the superior flavour of 

 its flesh, it is more sought after, as food, than that animal, 

 and is chased, and also taken by stratagem, by the Arabs 

 and Tartars. Such is its swiftness that it appears to 

 skim the plain without touching the ground j even a 



