358 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1923 



handicap is the lack of collected material in the way of good series 

 of properly labeled specimens for purposes of comparison. I should 

 like to see an awakening of the interests of the members of the Royal 

 Asiatic Society (north China branch) in regard to this matter, for 

 this institution is obviously the one to lead the way, in this part of 

 China at least, in the study of the zoology of the country, and all 

 that is needed are adequate funds for the purchase of books and 

 papers and to send collectors out into the field to gather more ma- 

 terial. The society's museum already has a considerable amount of 

 valuable material, but much more is needed before it can be con- 

 sidered as a genuine working museum rather than a show place. 



MAMMALS 



The mammalia of China is a comparatively large and varied one. 

 It contains representatives of numerous families and genera, some 

 of them unique, and most of them extremely interesting. Probably 

 the great order Rodentia is most fully represented, though the Car- 

 nivora are extremely abundant, especially in some localities. The 

 Ungulata, or hoofed animals, on the other hand, are less plentiful, 

 a fact due doubtless to their value as food. The Chinese are not to 

 be classed among the world's best hunters^- but by reason of their 

 numbers, and the fact that they never lose an opportunity to turn 

 an honest penny, they soon destroy the big game in any district 

 where such occur and they are allowed to hunt it. At the present 

 time it is only in remote mountainous areas, more or less inaccessible 

 to the outside world, that any of the larger ungulates are to be found 

 in a wild state, and even these are being assidulously hunted by local 

 natives, who are gradually acquiring modern rifles, and so threaten- 

 ing them with extermination. To this category belong the Asiatic 

 wapiti, or red deer, several forms of which occur in the country, 

 the wild sheep, the takin, the serow, the sika deer, and the goral 

 The large deer are hunted for the sake of their horns when in velvet, 

 the Chinese believing in this commodity as an excellent tonic and 

 rejuvenator. Thus the spotted deer, or sika, have become extremely 

 rare, and are now only to be found in a few isolated areas. The 

 sika deer form an interesting genus that is confined to the south- 

 eastern part of the Asiatic land mass and adjacent islands. There 

 are two distinct subgroups within the genus, one containing the large 

 animals of north China and Manchuria, and the other small animals, 

 typified by the little Japanese deer. In the extreme southwest of 

 China we find an Indian form of deer, the sambhur, while in the 

 Yangtse Valley occurs the remarkable little river deer (Hydropotes 

 inermis) , which has no horns, but well developed tusks in the male. 

 Muntjacs, musk, mouse deer, and roe deer complete the list of cervine 

 ungulates that occur in China, the roe being confined to the north, 



