SCIURID^— SCIURUS COLLIJEI. 



739 



pure white; no lateral line. Tail long anil very hroml, vcrtcbrrc alone 

 nearly equal in length to the length of head and body; above, deep black, 

 broadly edged with whitish or mixed white, black, and i)ale fulvous; bencatli 

 with or without a broad central area of brigiit tawny, bordered by a broiid 

 Bubterminal band of deep black, and broadly edged with wliite. Sometimes 

 the central bright tawny zone can be faintly seen through tlie iiairs of 

 the dorsal surface, as in the Arizona specimens; again it is merely pale ful- 

 vous, striped with narrow lines of dusky, the central fulvous area being visi- 

 ble cnly from the lower surface. 



This species is thoroughly distinct from S. carolinensis, which it some- 

 what resembles in color, as it also apparently is from every other North 

 American species o{ Sciurus, It was described by Richardson, in 1839, from 

 a specimen from San Bias, on the west coast of Mexico, in latitude 21° 34', 

 where Mr. Collie found it common. My Mazatlan specimens are from near 

 ihe same locality (about one hundred miles farther north), and agree with 

 Richardson's original description. Dr. Gray's S. collim, "var. 2", with brigiit 

 rufous sides and limbs and white belly, I refer with little hesitation to S. 

 booth'iM, while his "var. 1'', from the west coast of South Atnerica, with "the 

 under surface yellow", he considers the same as Ogilby's S.variegatoidcs and 

 his 8. griseocaudatus, both of which I refer to the S. hi/pojii/rrhus of Wagler. 

 The "Macroxus collicei^' of Gray seems to be only in small part referable to 

 the S. collim of Richardson. 



I refer to this species also the S. arizonensis of Coues, described origin- 

 ally from a single specimen obtained at Fort Whipple, Ariz. .Two other 

 specimens from Arizona, collected later by Mr. F. Bischoff, agree essentially 

 with Dr. Coues's specimen, except that they are somewhat larger. One of 

 tliem, however, has the brownish dorsal area less strongly developed tbau in 

 tlip others, and has "the lower surface considerably varied vvitii irregular 

 patches and ttreaksof pale yellowish-rufous, thus showing a tendency to the 

 acquisition of a rufous belly, so common a feature among the Squirrels of 

 Mexico and Central and South America. Dr. Coues's specimen, though killed 

 in December, was evidently not full-grown, being, as described by him, of 

 about the size of S. carolinensis. The other specimens, one of them a female 

 that had recently nourished young, are much larger, and indicate a species 

 fully as large as 8. abcrti, if not even larger. 



The coloration of S. collim, at first sight, seems to bear a close resem- 





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