No. 356 Mus Homourus
Habitat.—Lower Himalayan range.
Description.—Dark rufescent above, rufescent white below; hands and feet fleshy white; tail equal to length of head and body; “fur more gerbille-like in character than in M. musculus” (or urbanus), stated to be the common house mouse of the Himalayan hill stations from the Punjab to Darjeeling. Stated by Hodgson to have eight teats only in the female, other mice having ten. Possibly his description was founded on young specimens. I myself was of opinion for some time that I had got two species of hill mice, a larger and a smaller, the latter being so much darker in colour, but I kept them till the young ones attained full size in six months, at which time they were not distinguishable from the old ones. Hodgson may have overlooked the pectoral mammæ when he noted the number.
Size.—Head and body, 3½ inches; tail, 3½ inches.
← Back to Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon