NOTES AND QUERIES. 19 



MAMMALIA. 



The Deer of British Guiana. — Five species of deer appear to be 

 distributed in the colony. The common brown Savannah-deer, Cariacus 

 savannarum = C. mexicanus, is so well known that it needs no description, 

 the branching antlers, with the inner basal snag, sufficiently distinguishing 

 it. The large red Wood-deer, or Brocket, with the simple horns, Coassus 

 rufus, is also well known, being commonly obtained about the back of the 

 estates, more especially on the Essequibo coasts. The M Welbisiri," or 

 small Wood-deer, or Brocket, Coassus nemorlvagus, is common only in the 

 forest tracts of the inner part of the country. In spite of its being a very 

 common species in the interior, it was only quite recently that I was able 

 to secure a suitable specimen for accurate identification, and it seems likely 

 that the name " Welbisiri " is given to two distinct species. C. nemorivagus 

 is much smaller than the red Wood-deer, and is of a very pale brownish 

 grey or white colour, with a frontal streak before the eyes, the horns very 

 much finer and shorter. The " Welbisiri " was referred in Schomburgk's 

 "Reisen" to the species C. humilis, Benn, but it is widely separated 

 from this form. A species of Brocket, also known as "Welbisiri," is 

 frequently mentioned, by bushmen in the colony, as being much smaller 

 than the above, — scarcely larger, in fact, than the fawn of the red Wood- 

 deer, — while it possesses the lines of pale yellowish spots. This form is 

 said never to lose the spots of the young stage, but to retain them throughout 

 life. It would thus appear to be distinguishable from the other small grey 

 Brocket, Coassus simplicicornis, which has been recorded from the colony by 

 Schomburgk, though it is possible that those with the spots, which were 

 considered adult, were really only the young of this species. There is no 

 frontal streak in C. simplicicornis. A very different deer from any of the 

 preceding is only represented in the Museum Collection by a skull, the 

 characters of which mark it as referable to Blastocerus paludosus. There is 

 no inner basal snag in this form, and the antlers grow to some length ere 

 they divide into two, about equal, branches. In our specimen these antlers 

 are thick and very rough, but unfortunately, though it was obtained in the 

 colony, its exact locality is not known. — J. J. Quelch (Georgetown, British 

 Guiana). 



Old English Black Rat at Bristol. — It may be of interest to some 

 of your readers to kuow that a Black Rat was killed in Bristol, in July last, 

 in the offices of Messrs. Spillers and Bakers. Presumably it was Mus 

 rattus, as I know Bristol was one of its last strongholds, though now it is 

 rare there, as everywhere. I unfortunately could not obtain the body for 

 identification, but hope to obtain any others that may be trapped. I do 

 not know whether the occurrence is now sufficiently rare to be worth 



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