AND LOWER EGYPT. I73 



northern countries which I have just named, there 

 are gerboises, called alak-daaga, which differ from 

 the alagtaga of Gmelin, as they have five toes on 

 the hinder foot. M. Pallas adds, that, common in 

 the north, they are nevertheless scattered over 

 Syria, and even as far as to India, countries in 

 which lives equally the jerbo, that is, the gerboise 

 with three toes, with a spur or rudiment of the 

 fourth toe, the alagtaga of Gmelin. The British 

 Pliny, Mr. Pennant, asserts that they are met with 

 likewise in Barbary, and I can see no good reason 

 why M. Pallas should call this last fact in question, 

 on the remark that they prefer colder countries than 

 the gerboa likes, who is the inhabitant of warm cli- 

 vutes; as if several districts of Syria were not as 

 hot as Barbary, at least as the parts into which 

 the observers have penetrated. 



Here then we have two races closely allied, in 

 other respects, that of the alak-daaga and of the 

 jerbo, which exist together to the south, though the 

 latter be more numerous there than the former. 

 Is it not probable that both the one and the other 

 may be found in like manner to the north, where 

 the jerbo will, in his turn, be much scarcer ? This 

 conjecture becomes more probable, or rather it 

 ceases to be one, when we read in your letter, Sir, 

 that the intelligent naturalist, M. Pallas, has fre- 

 quently seen the jerbo in Asia % between the Tana'is and 



the 



