322 EODENTIA. 



male, and more especially in the inferior incisors ; while in the female the upper 

 incisors are almost white, and the lower front teeth are richly coloured. 



It has been stated that " the species of RMzomys live on and not under the 

 ground," but this account of their habits was given many years ago, and when no 

 authentic information existed regarding their mode of life or distribution. Now, 

 however, it is established that the members of this group are essentially burrowing 

 animals. Their bmTows are well known to the Kakhyens on the borders of Yunnan, 

 who are great experts in unearthing them, digging and smoking them out of thcK 

 subterranean dwellings for food. I have frequently been shown their burrows on 

 the hill sides, and they were generally narrow tunnels run into the ground on the 

 face of some little escarpment ; but I can say nothing as to the details of their 

 construction. These rats feed in the evening at sundoT\m, and the contents of their 

 stomachs reveal that their food is not confined to the tender shoots of the bamboo, 

 as is generally supposed, but that the young shoots of other vegetable productions, 

 as well as various grains, such as Indian-corn and rice, form considerable elements 

 in their nutrition, and I have known them to eat mice in captivity. 



The young are quiet and inoffensive, but the ferine adults, more especially the 

 males, are very fierce and at once show fight without thinking of retreating, emit- 

 ting a peculiar hissing grunt as they charge. The female also when in company 

 of the young becomes greatly excited when captured ; and I have seen one in these 

 circumstances, when her own young were placed beside her, rapidly kill them off, 

 one after the other, as they fondled her and searched for her teats to suck ; but, on 

 the other hand, in confinement I have known an adult female to be perfectly docile. 



Rhizomys sumatrensis, Eaffies. 



Mus sumatrensis, Raffles, Trans. Linn. Soc. Lond. 1822 vol. xiii., p. 258. 

 RMzomys sumatrensis, Raffles, Gray, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond. 1831, p. 95. 

 Nyctocleptes dekan, Teniminck, Bijdrag. Nat. Hist. vol. vii. Tab. i. figs. 1-5, et Monograph Mamm. 



135-41 vol. ii,, pp. 44 and 45; Gervais, Voyage de la Bonite, Zool. vol. i. 1841, p. 64, pi. x. 



et xi. figs. 1-3. 

 Spalaxjavanims, Cuvier, Animal Kingdom, 2nd ed. 1829 vol. i., p. 211 ; Schreber's Saugeth. vol. iii., 



p. 367, 1843. 

 UUzomys cmereus, McClelland, Cat. Jom-n. Nat. Hist. 1842 vol. ii., p. 457. 

 Rhizomys dekan, Temm., Schinz, Syn. Mamm., 1845 vol. ii., pp. 123-24 (in part). 

 Rhizow/ys sumatrensis, Raffles, Blyth, Cat. Mamm. As. Soc. Mus. Cal. 1863, p. 122. 



This species was originally described by Eaffies from a drawing made by 

 Major Earquhar of a specimen obtained in Malacca, and which was forwarded, with 

 the drawing, to Sir Stamford Eaffies. Dr. M'Clelland was under the impression 

 that the drawing of Mus sumatrensis was deposited with the Asiatic Society of 

 Bengal at Calcutta, and concluded, because he could not find it there, that it was 

 lost. He also doubted the correctness of the identification of Dr. Gray's animal 

 BUzomys sumatrensis with that of Sir S. Eaffies, and accordingly re-described the 

 Malayan bamboo-rat or " dekan'' under the name of M. cinereus. But Blyth, so 



