480 ADDITIONAL NOTES ON PERIPATUS LEUCKARTI, 



dark line, especially in specimens with a maximum of I'ed, is 

 conspicuous to the naked eye whereas the light line is microscopic; 

 moreover as far as my experience goes it is more conspicuous after 

 the animal has been placed in spirit, and I have seen living 

 specimens in which in parts of the body it seemed to be wanting 

 or obscured by pigment ; but even in spirit specimens it is possible 

 to find cases in which it is absent on some of the ridges. 



As regards pattern the differences between the Victorian speci- 

 mens examined by Mr, Dendy and the specimens examined by 

 me are more marked than in the case of the colour. Mr. Dendy 

 says {I.e. p. 61): "There is a thin median light line down the 

 dorsal surface. The characteristic pattern on the remainder of 

 the dorsal surface is a series of segraentally-arranged diamond- 

 shaped patches, in which the red colour is predominant. In some 

 cases viz., the darkest specimens these patches are represented 

 only by a row of small, light coloured, yellow or red spots on each 

 side of the middle line. Each of these spots is situate in the 

 position of the apex of each triangular half of one of the character- 

 istic diamond-shaped patches found in other specimens." I have 

 seen only one Victorian specimen, my original one from Gipps- 

 land, which since it had been dead for at least a week (fortunately 

 in dry cold weather) before I received and put it into alcohol is 

 not in first-rate condition ; nevertheless in places it still shows 

 fairly well a series of dorsal segmentally-airanged diamond-shaped 

 patches just as Mr. Dendy describes. I have, however, never 

 seen a specimen from this colony with a similar pattern. Those 

 that come nearest to it are the ordinary specimens from Illawarz-a, 

 but in these the median longitudinal linear dark stripe is nodose, or 

 pi'esents a series of enlargements, one to each pair of legs, and on 

 each side of each of them is a small triangular or diamond-shaped 

 patch of red, while laterally just above and corresponding with 

 the intervals between the legs on each side of the body is a series 

 of diamond-shaped patches of red, which seem to be absent in 

 Victorian specimens. Hence it seems to me that while the state- 

 ment that "the characteristic pattern on the rest of the dorsal 



