MR. E. T. BENNETT ON THE CHINCHILLIDZ. 45 
animal, unaccompanied by description, in Mr. Griffith’s Translation of the ‘ Animal 
Kingdom’, of the existence of which I was not then aware. 
In August, 1830, Mr. Gray published, in the second Number of his ‘ Spicilegia 
Zoologica’, the generic and specific characters of Chinchilla lanigera, together with a 
description and figure, the latter drawn by Col. Hamilton Smith from a specimen 
brought to England in 1827, and lithographed in 1828. In this notice the skull and 
teeth are particularly described; and an interesting account is given, obtained from 
Mr. Hennah, the gentleman by whom the specimen figured was brought home, of its 
domesticated habits. 
A fourth original figure of the Chinchilla was giver. by M. F. Cuvier in the ‘ Histoire 
Naturelle des Mammiféres’, under the date of November, 1830, after a drawing made 
by a lady from the specimens in the possession of the Society. One of these having 
subsequently died, Mr. Yarrell examined both its viscera and skeleton, and laid an ac- 
count of the results of his investigation before the Committee of Science and Corre- 
spondence at its first Meeting in February, 1831; an abstract of which was imme- 
diately published in the ‘ Proceedings’ of that Committee’. From the ‘ Bulletin des 
Sciences Naturelles’? for March, 1831, it appears that M. Van der Hoeven published, 
about the same time, in the ‘ Bijdragen tot de Natuurkundige Wetenschappen’s, (a 
Journal to which I regret that I have no present means of referring,) another figure of 
the Chinchilla, and that he also, without being aware of what had been written on the 
subject by English zoologists, regarded it as a distinct genus from Lagostomus, under 
the name of Eriomys. 
In the ‘ Annales des Sciences Naturelles’ for August, 18324, Dr. Rousseau trans- 
lated into French my account of the Chinchilla, from the ‘ Gardens and Menagerie of 
the Zoological Society’, attributing its date to 1831, which some of the later published 
copies of the volume bear upon the title-page, instead of 1829, when the number con- 
taining the Chinchilla was published. There are, however, in this version numerous 
inaccuracies, attributable probably to an imperfect acquaintance with the English lan- 
guage. The paper by Dr. Rousseau himself, to which the translation is appended, 
contains a good and detailed description of the animal and of its skeleton, which he 
follows Mr. Gray, Mr. Yarrell, M. Van der Hoeven, and myself, in considering as a 
genus necessarily distinct from, although closely allied to, the Lagostomus of Brookes, 
and for which he also adopts the name of Chinchilla. A plate giving a front view of the 
head, the skull in various positions, and the details of the teeth, accompanies this paper. 
And lastly, M. Goldfuss, in his ‘ Naturhistorische Atlas’®, has given a sixth original 
representation of the animal under the name of Lagostomus laniger, Wagl., referring as 
a synonym to the Eriomys Chinchilla, Mus. Frankf. 
Having thus brought down the history of these three remarkable animals to the 
present time, I shall next describe at length the conformation, both external and in- 
1 Part I. p. 31. 2 Tom. xxiv. p. 352, 3 Deel vi. No. 1. 
4 Tom. xxvi. p. 349. 5 Th. iii. p. 263. t. 290. f. 1. 
