Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon

Family Muridæ

Character.—“Lower incisors compressed; no premolars; molars rooted or rootless, tuberculate or with angular enamel folds; frontals contracted; infra-orbital opening in typical forms high, perpendicular, wide above and narrowed below, with the lower root of the maxillary zygomatic process more or less flattened into a perpendicular plate; very rarely the opening is either large and oval, or small and sub-triangular. Malar short and slender, generally reduced to a splint between the maxillary and squamosal processes; external characters very variable; pollex rudimentary, but often with a small nail; tail generally sub-naked and scaly, rarely densely haired.”—Alston, ‘P. Z. S.’ 1876.

This family is divided into about ten sub-families, of which the Indian ones are as follows: Platacanthyominæ; Gerbillinæ; Phlæomyinæ; Murinæ; Arvicolinæ; Cricetinæ.

The other four are Sminthinæ, Hydromyinæ, Dendromyinæ, and Siphneinæ, none of which are found within our limits.