Hind feet with three digits; tail cylindrical and tufted; incisors grooved; premolars absent, or, if found, then in the upper jaw and rudimentary; skull with very broad occipital region; greatly developed auditory bullæ; the cervical vertebræ are more or less anchylosed, and the metatarsals are united. They are not found in the plains of India, though one species inhabits Yarkand, and two more are found in Eastern Persia.
| DIPUS. |
[NO. 400. DIPUS LAGOPUS.]
The Yarkand Jerboa.
HABITAT.—Koshtak, south of Yarkand; Yarkand; and Yangihissar.—Blanford.
DESCRIPTION.—"Colour above light sandy brown, slightly washed with dusky, below pure white; a white band across the outside of the thigh; tail pale brown above, whitish below, with a tuft of longer hair, altogether about 2½ inches long; at the end the terminal portion pure white, the proximal portion black or dark-brown on the upper part and sides, but brown or white beneath the tail. The fur is very soft and rather long, 0·6 to 0·8 inch in the middle of the back; on the upper parts it is ashy grey at the base and for the greater parts of its length, pale sandy brown near the end; the extreme tip dusky brown; on the lower parts it is white throughout; ears about half the length of the head, oval, naked inside, thinly clothed with short brown hair outside; face sandy; the hairs grey at the base; sides of head whitish; whiskers as usual very long, exceeding three inches; the uppermost brown; the longest white, except at the base; the lower entirely white; the long hairs beneath the hind feet all white, as are the feet throughout."—Blanford, 'Sc. Res. of Sec. Yarkand Mission,' pp. 58,59.
"Hind feet with five digits, of which the first and fifth do not reach the ground; tail cylindrical, tufted; skull with the occipital region less broad, and the auditory bullæ smaller; infra-orbital opening with no separate canal for the nerve; incisors plain. One very small premolar present above only."—Alston.
NATIVE NAME.—Khanee, Afghan.