EHIZOMYS. 325 



, Inchea 



Posterior angle of eye to ear 2-29 



Length of eye 0*39 



Breadth between eyes ^ 2*38 



„ „ external margin of nostrils 0'50 



» „ ears 2-10 



„ of tail at base . 0'77 



*Rhizomys pruinosus, Blyth. Plates XIII & XVI. 



Ehizomi/s pruinosus, Bljth, Journ. As. Soc. Beng. 1851 vol. xx., p. 519, et Cat. Mamm. As. Soc. 

 Beng. 1863, p. 122. 



Blyth first obtained this species from Cliarapunji, where it is extremely 

 common, and I found it equally abundant on the Kakhyen hills to the east of 

 Bhamo, where it is associated with B. castaneus, Blyth, which is only a brightly 

 coloured eastern race of H. badms, Hodg., of Nepal. It ranges to the eastward as 

 far as Cambodja, and is represented in the British Museum by two specimens which 

 were obtained there by Mouhot. It does not appear to exist in the high, treeless 

 region about Teng-yue-chow in the province of Yunnan, where the rounded hills are 

 covered only with short grass and bracken. 



In the India Museum, London, there is a specimen of a Rhizomys, which was 

 obtamed by the Schlagintweits on their mission to Tibet. It is now much faded 

 in its colours, but it has all the external characters of B. pruinosus, Blyth. I have 

 exammed the list of Mammalia collected by these travellers, but although this 

 bamboo-rat is mentioned, the locality from whence it is obtained is not stated. It 

 measures 8*60 in length from muzzle to the root of the tail, the tail being 2*50 long. 



The base of the fur is pale slaty, its terminal half being brown ; but scattered 

 very plentifully amongst it are longer hairs which have their ends terminating in 

 broad white bands, so that the animal presents a grizzled appearance on the upper 

 surface. On the under parts, the fur is nearly the same as superiorly, but the white- 

 tipped hairs are shorter and much less numerous. The whiskers are dark-brown. 

 On the head generally, but more especially on the sides of the face, the bases of the 

 hairs, in the majority of specimens, pale into an almost whity-grey, and where the 

 fur on the sides of the head is abraded, as it frequently is, this light under tint 

 becomes visible. In some old females, the sides of the face, the muzzle and the 

 chin, are very pale owing to the tips of the hair being of a Kght-brown tint, and 

 in such examples the whole coat of fur is of a paler hue than in the generality of 

 specimens, and as the white-tipped hairs are not so numerous, they have less of 

 the mottled appearance and are of an almost uniform light greyish-brown with the 

 under surfaces even paler. I have observed this only in old females, but whether it 

 is sexual, I am not in a position to say. The ears, nose, feet, and tail have a dusky 

 flesh tint, and the tail is about one-thii-d the length of the body. The foot-pads are 

 covered with flattened tubercles. In the young the teeth are but little coloured, 

 except at the bases of the lower incisors, the tips of which are nearly white. 



The female appears to produce from three to four at a birth. 



