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DESCRIPTION OF PERI PAT US OVIPARUS. 



By Arthur Dendy, D.Sc, Professor of Biology in the 

 Canterbury College, University of New Zealand. 



In my presidential address to the Biological Section of the 

 Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, at the 

 meeting recently held in Brisbane, I pointed out certain facts 

 which had lately come to light with regard to the literature of 

 the Australian species of Peripatvs, and which might render 

 necessary certain alterations in the nomenclature. At the same 

 time I still refrained from attaching a specific name to the 

 oviparous Victorian species, pending further evidence. After my 

 address was w^ritten I had the opportunity of talking over the 

 matter with Mr. J. J. Fletcher in Sydney, and found that he had 

 independently arrived at conclusions very similar to those con- 

 tained in my manuscript. Mr. Fletcher suggested that we should 

 each contribute a paper on the subject to the next meeting of 

 this Society, and that in my contribution I should confine myself 

 to the egg-laying Victorian species, which we agreed should now 

 receive a name. In accordance with this suggestion I now submit 

 a description of the species in question, for which I propose the 

 name Peripatus oviparus. 



Very fortunatel}^ while I was in New South Wales, my friend 

 Mr. Thos. Steel, F.C.S., was successful in finding a large number 

 of the viviparous species with fifteen pairs of claw-bearing legs. 

 These I was able to examine both alive and by means of dissec- 

 tion, and I have thus satisfied myself that the oviparous Victorian 

 form is certainly worthy of a distinctive name. 



