320 THE HOLARCTIC REGION. [CHAP. 



teeth are stained red ; the especial characteristic of the genus being 

 the thickly-fringed feet and tail. The water-shrew is a typical 

 Holarctic mammal, ranging as far east as the Altai mountains and 

 unknown in the Mediterranean sub-region. In the second division 

 of the same family, or that in which the teeth are white, there is a 

 peculiar shrew from the Kirghiz steppes nearly allied to the 



FIG. 66. RUSSIAN DESMAN (Myogale moschata}. 



widely-spread musk-shrews (Croridura), but constituting a genus 

 (Diplomesodon) by itself. To the same sub-family belongs the 

 Tibetan water-shrew (Nectogale], which is likewise the solitary 

 representative of its genus, and is closely allied to Chimarrogale, 

 which has, as elsewhere stated, one Oriental and one Japanese 

 species. Both these types are accordingly closely connected with 

 the Oriental region, although nothing is known of their past 

 history. Far more characteristic of the eastern half of the region 



