SCIURIDAZ—TAMIAS ASIATICUS AND VARIETIES. 801 
that on the east of those mountains (7. guadrivittatus) as to suggest a doubt 
of their distinctness, and at least a suspicion of a hybrid race.” 
SYNONYMY AND NOMENCLATURE.—As already shown (see anted, under 
Tamias striatus), the Old World form of Tamias was formerly confounded 
with the species of Eastern North America under the name Tamas striatus, 
which is still by many writers retained for the Old World type, though orig- 
inally based exclusively upon the Striped Ground Squirrel of Eastern North 
America. The use of the name striatus, in this restricted sense, by Linnzus, 
in the tenth edition of the Systema Naturee, renders it unequivocally pertinent 
to the latter species, and to that alone. The name striatus was first applied to 
the Siberian animal by Pallas twenty years after the publication of this edition 
of Linnzeus’s work, Pallas supposing it identical with the striatus of Linneeus. 
The first name distinctively applied to the Europeo-Asiatic form was asiati- 
cus, given by Gmelin, in a varietal sense, in 1788, who properly discrimi- 
nated the two forms, and correctly assigned their habitats and their synonymy. 
Professor Baird, apparently overlooking this fact, supposed, as late as 1857, 
that the Old World Tamias was without a name, and bestowed upon it that 
of pallast. The only objection to asiaticus is its unfortunate geographical 
significance, since the Old World forms prove to be specifically the same as 
several of the forms of Tamias of Western North America, subsequently 
named quadrivittatus, townsendi, dorsalis, etc. Rigid adherence to the rule of 
priority renders it necessary to adopt asiaticus as the specific designation also 
of the American forms of this group, which will stand as above, namely, 
Tamias asiaticus vars. quadrivittatus, townsendi, ete. 
The Sciurus uthensis Pallas, known only from Pallas’s description, is 
commonly believed to have been based on a melanistic example of the com- 
mon form. ‘The species was originally described by Pallas, in 1831, from 
skins brought from the river Uth. The examples were wholly black, with 
five white dorsal stripes and a white streak on the throat and breast.* 
Middendorff, von Schrenck, and other explorers have since diligently searched 
the same general region without meeting with other examples, and incline to 
the opinion that it is merely a melanistic form of the common species. The 
* Pallas states, in his diagnosis, ‘‘S. auriculis imberbis, corpore atro strigis dorsalibus quinis albis”. 
It is further described as smaller than Sciwrus striatus, with smaller ears and relatively shorter tail, but 
with the dorsal stripes similar (“‘strig dorsi item similes”), and with a longitudinal band of white on 
the throat, extending from the lower lip to the breast. 
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