BATRACniA SALIENTIA. 49 



1. Uperodon marmoratum. 



Engystoma marmoratum, Cuv. Regne Anim. ; Guerin, Iconogr. Rent. 



pi. 27. f. 3. 

 Systoma leschenaultii, Tsclmdi, Batr. p. 86. 

 Uperodon marmoratum, Dum. ^ Bihr. p. 749. 



Olive mottled with brown ; metatarsus with two large flat, oval 

 tubercles ; a membranaceous prominence behind each inner nostril. 



a-c. Adult and half-grown. Madras. Presented by J". C. Jerdon, 

 Esq. 



d. Adult female: skeleton. Madras. Presented by J. C. Jerdon, Esq. 



e. Adult. India. 



/. Adult : not good state. India, From Mr. Parrey's Collection. 



The skeleton of this species is highly interesting from the total 

 absence of a clavlcula, which peculiarity was not observed in any of 

 the Batrachia anoura, and of which the two following genera partake. 

 We know too little of the mode of life of these animals to bring it in 

 connexion with a physiological peculiarity. Together with the cla- 

 vicle, the manubrium sterni is absent. Both scapula and coracoid 

 are very strong, and the latter has a much dilated inner end, for 

 forming a long suture with that of the other side ; the xiphoid is 

 formed by two thin dilated bony plates with a suture between, and 

 together representing a circular, rather concave plate. The supra- 

 scapula is not entii'ely ossified, having in the middle a cartilaginous 

 Luterspace separating the two bony branches from one another, as 

 we find to be more or less the case in many other frogs and toads. 

 The humenis as well as the femur are provided with a sharp ridge 

 along the upper half of the inner side, the ridge of the humenis being 

 broader, about as broad as the diameter of the bone itself ; the fii'st 

 cuneiform bone is very enlarged, much more than in Pelohates fuscus. 

 The configuration of the skull is very aberrant ; all the bones of the 

 cranium being perfectly ossified, large and broad, those of the max- 

 illary and mandibular arch weak and slender. The upper surface of 

 the skull is smooth; the parietal bones are swollen and convex 

 behind, without sharp crest ; they are ti'uncated in front, the angle 

 formed by the sutura coronata and sagittalis being a right one, wliilst 

 in other frogs the front part of the parietal bones is pointed, and 

 therefore that angle is an acute one. The frontals are large, irre- 

 gularly five-sided. Nine vertebrce : the atlas has no diapophyses, 

 but these are present in the rest ; they are of great length in the 

 second, third and fourth vertebrae, directed foi-ward in the second, 

 backward in the fourth, longest and horizontal in the third ; they 

 are short in the fifth to the eighth vertebrse. The diapophyses of the 

 sacral vertebra have about the same size and form as in Bufo calami fa, 

 each representing an isosceles tiiangle. The coccygeal style and the 

 iHac bones are slender, cylindrical, the former with a low sharp ridge, 

 the latter with a prominent tubercle on the hinder end, and both 

 branches forming a much acuter angle than in Bufo calamita. 



