THE SKULL OT DENDEOLAGUS DOEIAITtTS — WAITE. 85 



Nnv..OlC95 



The skull ov'DENDROLAQUS DORIANUS, Ramsay. 



By Edgar R. Waite, F.L.S. 



(Zoologist to the Australian Museum.) 



[Plates'XVIII.; XIX.] 



When examining the Tree Kangaroos in the Museum Collections 

 for the purposes of my paper on Dendrolagus bennettianus, de Vis,* 

 I was somewhat puzzled by a mounted specimen. As however it 

 did not throw light upon the species under investigation, it was 

 placed aside for future study. 



Having once more taken it in hand, I found that it agreed with 

 D. dorianusj in all described particulars except the non-reversal 

 of the hair. A search among the duplicate collections revealed 

 two other skins, received along with the specimen mentioned ; 

 these presented ^the aspect of the hair peculiar to D. dorianus. 

 Another look at the mounted specimen showed '^that the hair had 

 been bruslied in the orthodox manner, namely from head to tail. 



These skins were purchased from a Sydney tirm of importers in 

 December, 1891, the locality given being the Astrolabe Range, 

 British New Guinea, whence also the types were obtained. One 

 of the skins is headless, but the other contained the skull, from 

 which, however, the occipital region had, as usual, been cut for 

 the purpose of cleaning the cavity. 



Dr. Ramsay stated J that in the three original specimens, in 

 the Macleay Museum, " The teeth and all the bones of the skull 

 are in a very bad state, being corroded by the liquid in which the 

 skin was preserved." Baron N. de Miklouho-Maclay § supple- 

 mented the original description by a moi'e detailed account of the 

 direction of the hair, and by a notice of the teeth as far as could 

 be ascertained from'a stuffed specimen. 



These further particulars enabled Mr. Oldfield Thomas || to 

 draw up a sufficiently comprehensive synopsis of the cranial 



*|Proe. Linn. Soc. N.S.W. (:i);ix., p.f571. 



t .. ), (1) viii., p. 17. 



J ,, „ ,, footnote. 



§ „ „ (1) ix.. p. 1154. 



II B.M. Cat. Marsnpi&lia, 1888, pp. 94 & 98. 



