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Show COUES ON GEOMYS AND THOMOMYS. 245 Not to pursue this subject to the extent of further allusion to laws fairly deducible from such premises, it is a logical inference from what has been said that there is but one "species" among all these specimens. This "species" is modified by some unknown means, evidently related in some way to the climate, soil, vegetable productions, or other peculiarities of certain geographical areas, yet not to the extent of severing the links which bind all its individuals together. This species, in the course of time, by the continued operation of the same influences, may or may not be resolved into three or more species in the current acceptation of the term; but at present such is not the case. It is my intention, in the following pages, to describe these variations in detail In so doing, I consider it advisable, for convenience' sake, to give them each a name; and, in so doing, I shall adopt a formula of nomenclature which I consider best suited to suggest the intergradation which I find to exist, without reference to Linnaeus or to the British Association. :,.-.•.• .•-.•••••• ';•-.•,= •/.. :-v. "../ -- v,'/ " •' ; : ,.:.- -•.,' •;._,. ;'>•••.-., ^ ..•<•.: ' ••..-.••'• • • It may tend to take the edge oif the imputation implied in the remark made above, that six or eight species admitted by naturalists of high repute must be reduced to one, to briefly review the written history of Thomomys. The literature of the subject is unusually brief, and it is somewhat surprising how much of it is pure compilation, which has no actual bearing upon the case. Eydoux and Grervais, and Maximilian, each described a species, and Waterhouse and Brandt have both handled the general aspects of the case; but, with these exceptions, almost no original work appears from foreign authorities. Fischer, Schinz (whose one new species was a self-confessed synonym), Wagner, Giebel, and doubtless other systematists, have treated of a number of species of Thomomys, but entirely at second hand. Such authorities may be passed over in respectful silence, having no weight whatever. The very slight knowledge from abroad will seem the less remarkable when we find how little has been done by the naturalists of this country. Rafinesque's animals appear to have been all Geomys. Gro.dman had nothing to say upon the subject. Bachman's descriptions of two species, in 1839, were upon Richardson's MSS. DeKay enumerated some species at second hand. Audubon and Bachman's accounts of several species add positively nothing to what was already extant upon the subject. When LeConte monographed the family in 1852, he knew but a single species, |
