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SPERMOPHILUS TOWNSENDII.-Bach. 
American Souslik. 
PLATE CXLVII. Fig. 1. — Male. — Natural Size. 
S. Magnitudine Sciuri Hudsonii, capite parvo, corpore gracilior, auribus 
caudaque brevibus, colore supra rufo-fusco griseo sparsim vario, infra palli- 
diore. 
CHARACTERS. 
Size of Sciurus Iiudsonius ( red squirrel ) ; head , small ; body, rather slender ; 
ears and tail, short ; colour, upper surface speckled with white and brown; 
beneath, yellowish- gray. 
SYNONYMES. 
Arctomys (Spermophilus) Guitatus ? — American Souslik. Rich., F. B. A., p. 162. 
Spermophilus Townsendii — Townsend’s Marmot. Aud. and Bach., Jour. Acad. Nat. 
Sci. Phil., vol. viii., part 1, p. 61. 
DESCRIPTION. 
This animal has a convex and obtuse nose, with the frontal bone 
depressed ; the body is rather long and slender ; head, short ; ears, slightly 
visible above the fur ; cheek pouches, small ; nails, slender, compressed, 
and slightly arched ; the thumb protected by an acute and prominent 
nail ; the second toe of the fore-foot, as in all the species of the genus, 
is longest, and not the third, as in the squirrels. The first toe is a little 
shorter than the second, and the third intermediate in length between 
the first and second. The tail appears (in the dried specimen) much flat- 
tened ; it is clothed with hairs which are longest on the sides. 
The fur is throughout remarkably soft, smooth, and lustrous. 
COLOUR. 
There is a line of white around the eye. The fur on the whole upper 
surface is, for one fourth of its length from the roots, dark bluish, or nearly 
black, then (a broad line of) silver gray, then (a narrow line of) dark 
brown edged with yellowish- white, giving it a brownish-gray appearance, 
speckled with white all over the back ; these spots are longest near the 
