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906 



MONOGH \PIia OP NOBTU AMBBIOAN BODENTIA. 



lliunih. Lfiwix mill Clarke's nccoiiiit of their inotlo uf living in communities, 

 of tliu cliiirii(;t(;r of tlicir Itiirrows, tind of tlicir lial>its, is trulliful in all itH 

 details, as I can alKriii rniiii piTsonal obaorvation. On the other hand, there 

 is nothing in the account of tlie external clmractcrs of these animals that very 

 strongly recalls Spermnpliilus (ownsendi, while the fize and the relative leugth 

 of the tail at once show the ini|>o8siiiility of referring the "liurrowing 

 Sijuirrol" of Lewis and Clarke :« the Spermophiliu totptisemli of Auduimn ontl 

 liachman. 



In 1855, Professor Ihiird gave to this species the name gunnLwni, based 

 on a single specimen collected l>y Mr. Kreutzfeldt, in the Cooachito|tc Pass, 

 Rocky I^Iountaiiis. In 1H57, in redescribing the species in his Mammals of 

 North America, he very donbtl'ully referred the Burrowing Squirrel of Lewis 

 and Clarke, together with the systematic names based thereon by Onl and 

 Uafinesrpie, to his C. gunnisoni, but noted some discrepancies between Lewis 

 and Clarke's description and his specimens, of wliich he had at this time 

 three, — the original one from Cooachitopc Pass and one each from Pole 

 Creek and Medicine Bow Creek. As the two latter differ from the first, he 

 thought it possible that they represented two species, while the Arctomys 

 kwini of Audubon and Bachman he deemed might form a third, all different 

 from C. ludovicianus. Later, lie thought it quite possible that the Arctomys 

 lew'tsi miglit ]>rove to be the same as Lewis and Clarke's animal, explaining 

 how" some of the discrepancies between the accounts given by Lewis and 

 Clarke and by Audul)un and Bachman might be presumably explained. On 

 tlu; whole, ho was inclined to ctmsider " the Arc/omyx lewisi rather as a 

 Cynomys [than an Arctomys], and quite jiossiiily the some with the Burrowing 

 Sipiirrcl of Lewis and Clarke, called Arctomys columhianus by Ord, and 

 Aiiixonyx brtKhyurn by Rafincsque". 



The large numiier of specimens since received renders unquestionable 

 the reference of all these names to the Burrowing Scpiirrel of Lewis and 

 Clarke, for which the name columbianus of Ord becomes (he only tenable 

 s])eciiic designation. 



This species, as already sUited, was first n)et with on the Plains of the 

 Columbia by Lewis and Clarke, in 1806. As shown by the subjoined list 

 of specimens, it has been since met with on the Ogden River and about Fort 

 Bridger in Northern Utah, and as far eastward as the Medicine Bow and 

 Wind River Mountains. Further southward, it ranges throughout the Parks 



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