General color above, brownish buffy, varying in some specimens to
lighter buffy tints, grizzled with black; oblique hip stripes white;
tail with dark-brown or blackish stripes above and below, running into
blackish about halfway between base and tip, and with two lateral side
stripes of white to a point about halfway back; tail tipped with pure
white for about 40 millimeters (Pl. I). Underparts white, hairs white to
bases, with some plumbeous and buffy hairs about base of tail; fore legs
and fore feet white all around; hind legs like back, brown above, hairs
with gray bases, becoming blackish (fuscous-black or chætura-black)
about ankles, hairs on under side white to bases; hind feet white above,
dark-brown or blackish (near fuscous) below.
Color variations in a series of 12 specimens from the type locality and
points widely scattered through the range of _spectabilis_ consist in
minor modifications of the degree of coloration, length of white tip of
tail, and length of white lateral tail stripes. In general the color
pattern and characters are remarkably uniform. Young specimens, while
exhibiting the color pattern and general color of adults, are
conspicuously less brown, and more grayish.
There appears to be little variation in color with season. In the series
at hand, most specimens taken during the fall, winter, and spring are
very slightly browner than those of summer, suggesting that the fresh
pelage following the fall molt is a little brighter than is the pelage
after being worn all winter and into the following summer. But at most
the difference is slight.