Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon Part 66

"In one earth which I opened, and which did not seem to have been originally constructed by the animal, I found two pairs, one of which were adults, the other young ones about three-parts grown. The mouth of the earth was very large, and completely blocked up with small stones; the pa.s.sage gradually widening into a large cavity, from the roof of which some other pa.s.sages appeared to proceed, but there was only one communication with the surface, viz. the entrance. The old pair were seated on a bed of pebbles, near which, on a higher level, was another collection of stones probably intended for a drier retreat; the young ones were in one of the pa.s.sages, likewise furnished with a heap of small stones."

Dr. Jerdon adds he has often opened the burrows of this mouse, and can confirm the above account. He also states that the Yanadees of Nellore declare that one variety uses small sticks instead of stones to sit upon, and they give it a distinct appellation, but he could not detect any difference in the specimens they brought him.

NO. 375. LEGGADA SPINULOSA.

_The Dusky Spiny Mouse_ (_Jerdon's No. 195_).

HABITAT.--Punjab, and also Southern India.

DESCRIPTION.--"Nearly affined to _M. platythrix_ (Sykes), but of a dark dusky colour above, with fulvous tips to the softer fur; below and all the feet dull whitish; upper rodential tusks orange, the lower white; whiskers long and fine, the posterior and longer of them black for the basal half or more, the rest white."--_Blyth_, 'J. A.

S. B.' 1863.

SIZE.--Head and body, 3-3/4 inches; tail, 3 inches.

NO. 376. LEGGADA JERDONI.

_The Himalayan Spiny Mouse_ (_Jerdon's No. 196_).

HABITAT.--Himalayan range, up to 12,000 feet.

DESCRIPTION.--"Bright dark ferruginous above, pure white below; some fine long black tips intermingled among the spines of the back; limbs marked with blackish externally; the feet white."--_Blyth's_ 'Mem., J. A. S. B.' vol. x.x.xii.

SIZE.--Head and body, 4 inches; tail, 3-1/2 inches.

Dr. Jerdon first found this mouse at Darjeeling, but afterwards in the valley of the Sutlej in Kunawur, at an elevation of nearly 12,000 feet, living under large stones.

NO. 377. LEGGADA LEPIDA.

_The Small Spiny Mouse_ (_Jerdon's No. 197_).

NATIVE NAMES.--_Chitta-burkani_, _Chit-yelka_, _Chitta-ganda_, Telegu of Wuddurs; _Chitta-yelka_ of Yanadees.--_Jerdon_.

HABITAT.--Southern India.

DESCRIPTION.--Similar to _L. platythrix_, but smaller and more weakly spinous; above pale sandy brown, pure white below, the two colours clearly separated. "The spines are small, fine, transparent, and of a dusky tinge, tipped with fawn; head very long; muzzle pointed; ears large, ovate, naked; tail naked, limbs rather long, fine."--_Jerdon_.

SIZE.--Head and body, 2-1/2 to 3 inches; tail, 2-3/4 inches.

Jerdon says of this mouse that he has found it in gravelly soil in gardens and woods in most parts of Southern India making a small burrow, which generally has a little heap of stones placed at a short distance from the hole. It is preyed on now and then by the common Indian roller or jay, and it is very generally used as a bait to catch that bird with bird-lime.

_GENUS GOLUNDA_.

The following rats are separated by Gray as a distinct genus, which from the Canarese name of the type he has called _Golunda_, the characteristics of which are: "the grinders, when perfect, low, with a broad, flat crown; the cross ridges of the crown of the upper grinders divided into three distinct slightly raised tubercles; upper incisors grooved; rest like _Mus_."

NO. 378. GOLUNDA ELLIOTI.

_The Bush Rat or Coffee Rat_ (_Jerdon's No. 199_).

NATIVE NAMES.--_Gulandi_, Canarese; _Gulat-yelka_ of Wuddurs; _Sora-panji-gadur_, Telegu of Yanadees; _Cofee-wattee-meeyo_, Singhalese (this name seems to me a corruption of "coffee rat").

DESCRIPTION.--Fur thick and stiff, fulvous brown, mixed with black, some olive brown mixed with fulvous, tawny grey beneath; hairs of upper parts flattened, ashy grey, tipped yellow, with some thinner and longer ones, also tipped yellow, with sub-terminal black band; under fur soft and of a light lead colour; face and cheeks rough; ears moderate, sub-ovate, hairy; tail round, tapering, scaly and hairy, dark brown above, yellowish below; cutting teeth yellow.

SIZE.--Head and body, 4-1/2 inches; tail, 4 inches.

Dr. Kellaart says these are the rats most destructive to coffee-trees, whole plantations being sometimes deprived of buds and blossoms by them.

There is an ill.u.s.tration of one in Sir Emerson Tennent's 'Natural History of Ceylon' in the act of cutting off the slender branches which would not bear its weight in order to feed on the buds and blossoms when fallen to the ground. "The twigs thus destroyed are detached by as clean a cut as if severed with a knife." Sir Walter Elliot writes of it: "The _gulandi_ lives entirely in the jungle, choosing its habitation in a thick bush, among the th.o.r.n.y branches of which, or on the ground, it constructs a nest of elastic stalks and fibres of dry gra.s.s thickly interwoven. The nest is of a round or oblong shape, from six to nine inches in diameter, within which is a chamber about three or four inches in diameter, in which it rolls itself up. Round and through the bush are sometimes observed small beaten pathways along which the little animal seems habitually to pa.s.s. Its motion is somewhat slow, and it does not appear to have the same power of leaping or springing by which the rats in general avoid danger. Its food seems to be vegetable, the only contents of the stomach being the roots of the haryalee gra.s.s. Its habits are solitary (except when the female is bringing up her young) and diurnal, feeding in the mornings and evenings." Dr. Jerdon says: "The Yanadees of Nellore catch this rat, surrounding the bush and seizing it as it issues forth, which its comparatively slow actions enable them to do easily. According to Sir Emerson Tennent the Malabar coolies are so fond of their flesh that they evince a preference for those districts in which the coffee-plantations are subject to their incursions, where they fry the rats in cocoanut-oil or convert them into curry." Both he and Dr. Kellaart mention the migratory habits of this animal on the occurrence of a scarcity of food. Kellaart says that in one day on such visits more than a thousand have been killed on one estate alone.

NO. 379. GOLUNDA MELTADA.

_The Soft-furred Bush Rat_ (_Jerdon's No. 200_).

NATIVE NAMES.--_Mettade_, of Wuddurs; _Metta-yelka_, Telegu of Yanadees; _Kera ilei_, Canarese.

HABITAT.--Southern India and Ceylon.

DESCRIPTION.--Fur very soft; above deep yellowish, olive brown or reddish-brown, with a mixture of fawn; under fur lead colour; chin and under parts whitish; head short; muzzle sharp; ears long and hairy; tail shorter than body, scaly, but scales covered with short black adpressed hairs; feet pale.

SIZE.--Head and body, 3-1/2 to 5-1/2 inches; tail, 2-1/4 to 4-1/4 inches.

The specific name of this rat is an absurd corruption, such as is not unfrequent in Dr. Gray's names, of the native _mettade_, which means soft. According to that accurate observer Sir Walter Elliot, "the _mettade_ lives entirely in cultivated fields in pairs or small societies of five or six;[25] making a very slight and rude hole in the root of a bush, or merely harbouring among the heap of stones thrown together in the fields, in the deserted burrow of the _kok_,[26] or contenting itself with the deep cracks and fissures formed in the black soil during the hot months. Great numbers perish annually when these collapse and fill up at the commencement of the rains. The monsoon of 1826 having been deficient in the usual fall of rain at the commencement of the season, the _mettades_ bred in such numbers as to become a perfect plague. They ate up the seed as soon as sown, and continued their ravages when the grain approached to maturity, climbing up the stalks of jowaree and cutting off the ear to devour the grain with greater facility. I saw many whole fields completely devastated, so much so as to prevent the farmers from paying their rents. The ryots employed the Wuddurs to destroy them, who killed them by thousands, receiving a measure of grain for so many dozens, without perceptibly diminis.h.i.+ng their numbers. Their flesh is eaten by the Tank-diggers. The female produces six to eight at a birth."--'_Madras Journ. Lit. Sc._' x. 1839.

[Footnote 25: In this case probably parents and young.]

[Footnote 26: _Nesokia providens_.]

Kellaart's _Golunda Newera_ is, I fancy, the same, although the measurement he gives is less. Head and body, 3-1/4 inches; tail, 2-1/2. The description tallies, although Kellaart goes upon difference in size and the omission of Gray to state that _G. meltada_ had the upper incisors grooved. He says that "this rat is found in pairs in the black soil of Newara Elia, and is a great destroyer of peas and potatoes." So its habits agree.

_GENUS HAPALOMYS_.

This was formed by Blyth on a specimen from Burmah of a murine animal "with a long and delicately fine pelage and exceedingly long tail, the terminal fourth of which is remarkably flattened and furnished with hair more developed than in perhaps any other truly murine form; limbs short, with the toes remarkably corrugated underneath; the b.a.l.l.s of the inguinal phalanges greatly developed, protruding beyond the minute claws of the fore-feet, and equally with the more developed claws of the hind-feet; head short; the ears small and inconspicuous; the skull approaches in form that of _Mus Indicus_,[27] but the rodential tusks are broader and flatter to the front. Molars as in the _Muridae_ generally, but much worn in the specimen under examination; they are considerably less directed outward than usual, and the bony palate has therefore the appearance of being narrow; the superorbital ridges project much outward in form of a thin bony plate, and there is a considerable process at the base of the zygoma anteriorly and posteriorly to the anti-orbital foramen; zygomata broad, and compressed about the middle."

[Footnote 27: _Nesokia Blythiana_.]

NO. 380. HAPALOMYS LONGICAUDATUS.

HABITAT.--Shway Gheen, in the valley of the Sitang river in Burmah, or its adjacent hills.

DESCRIPTION.--"Fur long and soft, measuring about five-eights of an inch on the upper parts, slaty for the basal two-thirds, then glistening brown with black tips, and a few long hairs of very fine texture interspersed; lower parts dull white; whiskers black, long and fine, and there is a tuft of fine blackish-hair anterior to the ears."--_Blyth_.

SIZE.--Head and body of a male, 5-3/4 inches; tail 7-1/4 inches. Of another specimen, female: 5-1/4 inches; tail, 7-1/2 inches; sole, 1-1/8 inch; ears posteriorly, 1-1/4 inch.

Specimens of adult male and female with a young one were forwarded to the Asiatic Society's Museum by Major Berdmore.