19            Soft-haired Squirrel

                     SCIURUS MOLLIPILOSUS.--Aud. and Bach.
                      [Tamiascuris douglasii mollipilosus]

                             SOFT-HAIRED SQUIRREL.
                               [Douglas Squirrel]

                                   PLATE XIX.


     S. cauda corpore curtiore; dorso fusco; iliis partibusque colli lateralibus
rufis; abdomine cinereo.
                                CHARACTERS.

     Tail, shorter than the body; back, dark brown; sides of the neck, and
flanks, rufous; under surface, cinereous.


                                   SYNONYME.

     SCIURUS MOLLIPILOSUS, Aud. and Bach., Journal Acad. of Nat. Sciences,
       Philadelphia, Oct. 1841, p. 102.


                                  DESCRIPTION.

     A little larger than the chickaree, (S. Hudsonius;) head, rather large,
slightly arched; ears, round, broad, but not high, clothed on the outer and
inner surfaces with short, smooth hairs; whiskers, longer than the head.
     In form this species does not approach the TAMIAE, as S. Hudsonius does in
some degree:  it, on the contrary, very much resembles the Carolina
gray-squirrel, S. Carolinensis, which is only an inch longer.
     Legs, robust; toes, rather long; nails, compressed, arched; tail bushy, but
apparently not distichous, as far as can be judged from the dried specimen;
hairs of the tail about as long as those of the Carolina gray-squirrel.  The
hairs on the whole of the body are soft and very smooth.


                                    COLOUR.

     Teeth, light yellow; upper parts, including the nose, ears, and outer
surface of the tail, dark-brown; this colour is produced by the hairs being
plumbeous at the roots, tipped with light-brown and black.  On the sides of the
neck, the shoulder, and near the thighs, it is of a reddish-brown colour.  The
tail is brown, twice annulated with black; a few of the hairs are tipped with
gray.  On the under surface, the lips and chin are grayish-brown; inner surface
of the fore-legs, throat, and abdomen, cinereous, lightly tinged in some places
with rufous.


                                  DIMENSIONS.

                                                        Inches.   Lines.

     Length of head and body  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .   8         6
     Length of tail (vertebrae)  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .   5         6
     Length of tail to end of hair  .  .  .  .  .  .  .   7         0
     Height of ear.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .   0         5
     From heel to end of nail .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .   2         1


                                    HABITS.

     This species was procured in Upper California, near the Pacific ocean, and
we are obliged to confess ourselves entirely unacquainted with its habits.  From
its form, however, we have no doubt of its having more the manners of the
Carolina gray-squirrel than those of the chickaree.  We may suppose that it
lives on trees, and never burrows in the ground, as the chickaree sometimes
does.


                           GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION.

     Our specimens were obtained in the northern part of California, near the
Pacific ocean.


                                GENERAL REMARKS.

     This species differs so widely in all its details from S. Hudsonius, that
it is scarcely necessary to point out the distinctive marks by which it is
separated from the latter.  The space occupied by the lighter colours on the
under surface is much narrower than in S. Hudsonius, and there is not, as in
that species, any black line of separation between the colours of the back and
under surface.