43 
During the same year, but previous. to the communication by 
Mr. Bennett, Mr. Ogilby had described a Pteropus from Gambia 
under the name of P. macrocephalus. In the volume of Lardner’s 
‘Cabinet Cyclopzedia’ devoted to the natural history and classification 
of Quadrupeds, Mr. Swainson described a Pteropus, and gave a 
figure of the head, from Western Africa, for which the name of P. 
megacephalus was proposed. The volume bears date 1835. 
All these species are now found to be identical, Epomophorus 
whitei being the male, and the other two the female of the same 
species. As far as can be ascertained, Mr. Ogilby’s name has the 
priority, and should therefore be made use of ; but, before going fur- 
ther into the synonymy of the species, I will give the results of some 
examinations made with a view to the determination of the generic 
peculiarities of this and other closely affined species. 
The backward position of the wings, and the length of the face, 
have been already mentioned by the first describers, and the excessive 
development of the upper lips has been noticed by M. Temminck in 
another species called by him Pachysoma labiatum; but there are 
some other peculiarities (having reference to this last character) not 
hitherto sufficiently insisted on. 
The original specimens described by Mr. Bennett and Mr. Ogilby 
having passed into my hands, together with a number of other spe- 
cimens of this and two other species referable to the same group, I 
have been able to examine them with exactness, and more especially 
to compare their crania with those of other fruit-eating Bats. The 
result has been a thorough conviction not only of their generic di- 
stinction, but that the genus is more removed from the ordinary 
Pteropi than is Pachysoma, or even perhaps Macroglossus. 
For the better understanding of the affinities of the present genus, 
I deem it advisable first to institute an inquiry into the relation of the 
genera Pteropus and Pachysoma to each other, and afterwards to 
compare with them the various species of Epomophort. 
M. Geoffroy St.-Hilaire, in his ‘Legons sur les Mammifeéres,’ has 
separated from the genus Péeropus several species which depart from 
the more typical forms of that genus in being possessed of a tail, in 
having the muzzle shorter and thicker, and the lower jaw provided 
with only five molar teeth, that of Pteropus proper having six. 
In the ‘Annales des Sciences Naturelles’ for 1828*, M. Isid. 
Geoffroy, after adverting to the establishment of this genus by his 
father, observes, “‘ Le museau des Pachysomes est gros, et leur boite 
cérébrale est trés-volumineuse et sphéroidale; mais entre ces deux 
parties existe un rétrécissement trés-sensible, quoique beaucoup 
moins prononcé que chez les grandes Roussettes. Un grand espace 
existe ainsi entre les parois du crane et les arcades zygomatiques, 
qui sont d’ailleurs beaucoup plus écartées que chez les Roussettes ; 
et comme Pétendue de cet espace est en rapport avec le volume du 
mass¢ter et du crotaphyte, nous voyons s’accroitre de beaucoup 
chez les Pachysomes la force des muscles élévateurs de la machoire 
* This communication bears date Oct. 1828, whilst the published volume of the 
‘Lecons’ is dated 1829, 
