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Show 1882.] ON A NEW SPECIES OF RAT FROM CHINA. 587 9. Description of a new Species of Bat from China. By OLDFIELD THOMAS, F.Z.S., British Museum. [Received June 19, 1882.] (Plate XLIV.) The specimens upon which the following description is founded were sent to the Paris Museum by the Abbe Armand David; and I have been asked by Prof. A. Milne-Edwards to describe them, as they represent a most interesting and remarkable new species. Four specimens were obtained ; and of these Prof. Milne-Edwards has been good enough to let the British Museum have one, the specimen b measured below ; and I have also myself examined and determined the others in the Paris Museum. I propose to call the species Mus EDWARDSI, sp. n. (Plate XLIV.) Fur rather short, fine and soft, though mixed with numerous slender spines. General colour above yellowish grey, the yellow more strongly marked on the sides. Hairs slate-coloured with pale yellow tips ; spines white with black tips ; chin, chest, and belly pure white, the line of separation well defined. Outer side of legs slaty grey. Fore feet white; hind feet with the upperside of the tarsus grey and the toes white. Tail about the length of the head and body (stuffed, in spirit-specimens probably markedly longer), sharply bicolor dark grey and white for half its length ; and then the dark upper colour gradually disappears, and the terminal three inches are wholly white. Ears large and rounded, uniformly grey. Hind foot-pads very large ; fifth hind toe, without claw, reaching to jusf beyond the base of the fourth. Skull with the elongated muzzle, open infraorbital foramen, and but slightly developed perpendicular plate found in M. jerdoni, Blyth, and in the other members of the group of Rats to which the present species belongs. Dimensions (from stuffed specimens) in English inches and tenths:- a. b. c. Head and body (approximately)1 ..12*6 11*8 11*2 Tail 12*0 11*05 10*9 Hind foot 203 2*03 1*96 Ear-conch, length 1*0 *93 *86 Skull, total length 2*41 2*30 2*18 Other dimensions of skull of b :-greatest breadth 1*0; length of 1 Pere David's labels give the measurements in the flesh of specimens a and c as follows:-a. Head and body 114, tail 122. c. Head and body 110, tail 118. The bodies have therefore been stretched in the stuffing, while the tails have contracted, a process which always renders measurements i'rom stufled specimens very deceptive. |