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Show 6 ON EUROPEAN SQUIRRELS. [Jan. 17, winter coat in perfectly typical specimens only differing from th of summer in its much greater thickness. I have seen specimens from a number of German localities, in the more northern of which the winter coat contains a more or less amount of white or grey hairs on the flanks, thus intergrading with the next subspecies. SCIURUS VULGARIS VARIUS Kerr, op. cit. p. 256 (nee Pallas, Zoogr. Ross.-As. 1831, i. p. 183). Hab. Northern Scandinavia, Lapland, Northern and Central European Russia, Poland, East Prussia, parts of Hungary, and Western Siberia. Colour-in summer red, but lighter than S. rufus; in winter the body is more or less completely shining grey, nearly white, with the tail and ear-tufts red. In some specimens there is also a trace of the red colour on the dorsal line, head, and legs. SCIURUS VULGARIS TYPICUS. Hab. South Norway and Sweden. Colour-in summer the body resembles in its brownish-red tints that of S. leucurus, but the tail is red, and does not bleach when the hairs are old and worn ; in winter, the body-coat is composed of soft greyish-brown hairs, the summer tints remaining visible to a variable extent on the dorsal line and less. SCIURUS VULGARIS CALOTUS Gray, Ann. Mag. N. H. xx p 272 (1867). Hab. Eastern Siberia, the exact limits uncertain ; but specimens in the British Museum labelled as from Wilni (Siberia), Seoul (Corea), Southern Manchuria, Saehalin Island, Pekin, and Nepal all appear to belong to a single form. Colour-in winter darker than S. varius. I have seen no summer skins which are not melanisms, but a winter skin which I purchased at Hakodate, Yezo Island, shows a trace of rufous colour on the central dorsal line. This subspecies might possibly provo to be identical with that from the River Obi, to which the name of S. vulgaris argenteus had been given by Kerr (op. cit.). In conclusion Mr. Barrett-Hamilton said that he ventured to suggest that when a further knowledge of the local variations of European mammals should have been gained, it might be found that the European Continent might be divided, for the purposes of study of the geographical distribution of mammals, into some such areas as those represented by the different subspecies of Squirrels to which he had now drawn attention. The following papers were read :- |