The first class includes the isabelline bear, badger, pole-cat, ermine, roe and fallow deer, wild ass, Syrian squirrel, pouched marmoset, gerbill and leopard.
The various species of rapacious animals are disappearing, together with the colonies of marmots; the insectivores are also becoming scarce in consequence of the destruction of insects; while vermin, such as the suslik, or pouched marmot (Spermophilus), and the destructive insects which are a scourge to agriculture, become a real plague.
In hares and pacas the inside of the cheeks is hairy; and in some species, pouched rats and hamsters, there are large internal cheek-pouches lined with hair, which open near the angles of the mouth and extend backwards behind the ears.
In the New World pouched rats (Geomyidae) the pouches open externally on the cheeks.
The American pouched rats, or pocket-gophers, constitute the third section, Geomyoidea, with the single family Geomyidae.
