KONE iO Nene ke EAT N § PE. Cave San Os 
ACE ALEAVGO N= EeROM SOU TH FN. DirAr 
By J. R. HenpEerson, M.B., F.L.S., and GEORGE 
Matruar, M.A. 
The collection of freshwater prawns on which the following 
observations are based is one formed during a number of years, 
and comprising specimens collected at various localities in the 
Madras Presidency, from Ganjam to Tranquebar on the east 
coast, and from Mangalore to Travancore on the west coast. In 
most of the species reported on, a large series of individuals has 
been obtained at all stages of growth. Altogether nine species are 
described, and of these two are regarded as new to science, while 
in the present state of our knowledge of the genus, and as a matter 
of convenience, we have considered it advisable to assign a name 
to a third form which may prove to be only a variety of a previ- 
ouslv known species. 
Species of Palaemon are found abundantly throughout South- 
ern India, wherever there are more or less permanent tanks 
(ponds and lakes) or rivers. We have obtained P. carcinus from 
the back-water at Cochin, but with this exception have not met 
with any of the other species in salt water. Freshwater prawns 
form an article of food among the poorer classes, but in this respect 
are inferior to marine prawns (Penacus). 
Comparatively little attention has been paid to the Indian 
species of Palaemon. Forms from Central and Northern India 
have been described by Milne-Edwards, Henderson, and de Man, 
while for Southern India there is the original description of the 
genus by Fabricius (Supplem. Ent. Syst.) and a recent paper by 
the late Dr. Giuseppe Nobili (Boll. Mus. Zool. Torino). Fabricius 
in 1798 described three species from South India, P. tranquebaricus, 
P. brevimanus, and P. coromandelianus, but the diagnoses are so brief 
that the forms are unrecognisable; all three probably occur among 
the species which we are about to describe. Nobili records seven 
species from Pondicherry, but this number can be reduced to five, 
all of which are present in our collection. The only one to which 
he assigns a new name, P. alcocki, is, we are convinced, a young 
example of probably P. rudis, Heller. He also briefly describes a 
single small specimen which he refers to P. multidens, Couticére, 
from Madagascar. It is impossible to identify this last from 
Nobili’s description, but in any case a reference to Coutiére’s paper 
shows that his species was undoubtedly based on immature speci 
mens, and in our opinion the name should be suppressed. 
