Rodents from Van, Kurdistan. 309 
closely allied FE. intermedius, it may be distinguished by its 
smaller size, loose fur, and dull coloration. 
Allactaga Williams?, sp. n. 
Intermediate in size between the large A. alactaga, Oliv.*, 
and the much smaller A. euphratica, acontion, and tndica. 
General colour coarsely mixed yellowish buff and_ black. 
Face more finely grizzled buff; a spot above the eye poste- 
riorly and a large patch on the cheek below the eye white. 
The latter patch is succeeded behind by the clear yellowish 
buff of the sides of the neck and upper part of the shoulder. 
Flanks bordering the white belly also more or less buffy, 
interrupted behind by the usual white hip-stripe. Below 
the latter the outer sides of the thighs and legs to the ankles 
are bright rich salmon-buff (almost orange- -buff of Ride gway); 
upper ‘surface of hands and feet white. Ears of medium 
length, their hairs rich buff, but as these are only present in 
any number along the anterior third of the outer surface and 
along the extreme edge of the inner surface, the rest of the 
ear appears dull brown (which may or may not be flesh- 
coloured in life). ‘T'ail for the greater part of its length bright 
buffy, whiter below. Distally, as the hairs lengthen they 
become blackish, at least above, and form a black subter- 
minal band from one to two inches in length, succeeded by 
a pure white tip supported on the terminal half-inch of the 
tail-vertebree. 
Skull strong and stoutly built, forming a large edition of 
that of A. acontion, quite different from the long-muzzled 
skull of A. mongolica, Radde (incl. A. annulata, M.-Edw.). 
Upper premolar only about a quarter the size of m*, which 
in its turn is about one-third the size of m’. 
Dimensions of the type, an adult male, taken by the col- 
lector in the flesh :— 
Head and body 141 millim.; tail 203; hind foot 65; 
ear 46. 
Skull: basilar length 27-2 ; greatest breadth 23°8 ; nasals 
* Dipus alactaga, Oliv, Bull. Soc. Philom, ii. p. 121 (1800). The 
proper name of this species is somewhat doubtful. Biichner calls it 
A. saliens ; but this is based on Gmelin’s Cuniculus pumilio saliens, which 
was not eiv en binomially at all, and has therefore no status in nomen- 
clature. "By Blanford and myself it has been called A. decumana, Licht., 
but the name used above has a priority of 25 years over that given by 
Lichtenstein. The words major, media, minor, pygmea, and minuta, 
occurring passim in Pallas’s account of his Mus jaculus (Glires, p. 275 et 
seqq.), are, in a book written throughout in Latin, apparently used as 
descriptive words, and are clearly not given as names, for which they 
cannot therefore be used. 
