154 Zoological Society : — 



1. LiCHBNELLA BrENTII. 



Hab. W. Australia (F. Brent, Esq., 1850). 



The coralloid is so very like the calcareous Alga named Masto- 

 phora Lamourouxii by Decaisne, from the same locality, that I am in 

 doubt if it should be regarded as distinct from it. It differs from 

 the usual specimens of that Alga in the leaf-like expansions being 

 covered with cells on the upper surface, and longitudinally grooved on 

 the under surface, the grooves forming the ridge between the cells on 

 the upper side, while in the Alga both sides of the leafy expansions 

 are smooth like Pavonia. I must, however, at the same time own that 

 one or two of the expansion^ at the top of one or two of the branches 

 are smooth like the Alga. 



Can it be a specimen of Mastophora Lamourouxii in which the 

 form of the leaves is changed by a parasitical coral, which causes 

 the leaves to be radiately grooved longitudinally ? 



July 13, 1858.— Dr. Gray, F.R.S., V.P., in the Chair. 

 On the Vespertilio suillus of Temminck, the type of 



THE GENERA MuRINA (GrAY) AND OCYPETES (LeSSON). 



By Robert F. Tomes. 



Contemporaneously with the adoption of Kerivoula as a new 

 genus. Dr. Gray gave the name of Murina* to the species which 

 Temminck had long before described under the name of Vespertilio 

 suillus. During the same year, M. Lesson bestowed on it the generic 

 appellation of Ocypetes f. 



The departure in some of its external characters from the more 

 ordinary species of Vespertilio was noticed by the original describer ; 

 but as his genus Vespertilio was a very comprehensive one, no 

 generic separation was attempted. At a later date, but before the 

 appearance of the names proposed by Dr. Gray and M. Lesson, 

 Count Keyserling and Prof. Blasius, in the arrangement of the Ves- 

 pertilionidce appended to their paper on European Bats published 

 in the fifth volume of Wiegmann's Archiv, had placed this species 

 by itself, immediately following their second group of the genus 

 Vesper tiliOi as an aberrant form, but without any name. 



Dr. Gray and M. Lesson, as above noticed, have made it the type 

 of a new genus, for which each has advanced a name ; but the ap- 

 pearance of these names in one year, renders it difficult to ascertain 

 which claims the priority — supposing that a name is required, which 

 is by no means certain. As the name imposed by Dr. Gray has the 

 advantage over that given by M. Lesson, of having an accompanying 

 generic description, I should choose, if a name be required, to give 

 it the preference, believing that the practice of making new genera 

 by the mere alteration of a name, done in some instances in antici- 

 pation of the investigations of others, or on the mere chance of its 



* Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. vol. x. (1842), p. 258. 

 t Nouv. Tab. Reg. Anim. p. 30 (1842), 



