TUI.PE3- LEUCOPUa. 151 



ones always go mad after a longer or shorter interval, and certainly I 

 have known one or two instances of this. 



Vulpes corsac, Pallas, of Central Asia, appears to be nearly allied to 

 this fox, but the ears are represented to be still larger. Some from Africa 

 have yet larger ears, such as the Pennec of North Africa, V. zerda, and 

 the Caama of the Cape of Good Hope ; these have been placed in a dis- 

 tinct genus, Megaloiis, Illiger. 



The next species, though so similar in general appearance to the last, 

 that it is often confounded with it by sportsmen, is placed by Blyth in 

 restricted Vulpes. 



139. Vulpes leucopus. 



Blyth, Cat. 135. 



The Desebt Fox. 



Light fulvous on the face, middle of back and upper part of tail cheeks, 

 sides of neck and body, inner side and most of the fore part of limbs, 

 white shoulder and haunch, and outside of the limbs nearly to the middle- 

 joint, mixed black and white ; tail darker at the base above, largely tipped 

 with white ; lower parts nigrescent ; ears black posteriorly ; fur soft and 

 fine as in V. montanus, altogether dissimilar from that of V. hengalensis. 

 The skull with the muzzle distinctly narrower, and the lower jaw weaker. 



One I killed at Hissar had the upper parts fulvous, the hair black tipped ; 

 sides paler; whole lower parts from the chin including the inside of the 

 arm and thigh, blackish ; feet white on the inner side and anteriorly, with a 

 blackish border on the anterior limbs; legs fulvous externally; all feet 

 white ; tail always with a white tip. 



Length, head and body, 20 inches ; tail to tip 14 ; weight 5i fcs. 



Mountstuart Elphinstone (quoted by Blyth), writing of the foxes of the 

 Hurriana desert, says, " their backs are of the same color as the common 

 fox ; but in one part of the desert their legs and belly up to a certain height 

 are black ; and in another white. The line between these colors and the 

 brown is so distinctly marked that the one kind seems as if it 'had been 

 wading up to the belly in ink, and the other in whitewash." It has been 

 suggested that the female is always white-limbed, and the dog with black 

 limbs; but the variation of color is apparently due to the degree of 

 abrasion of the hairs of the limbs, which are mixed black and white. Some 

 are very light colored above ; others are sandy red. 



The desert fox inhabits the North-west of India, from Cutch on the 



