450 Carcinological Fauna of India. 



dactylus ; the fingers, though they only meet at tip, are not widely 

 separated. 



In the adult female the chelipeds are about 1| times the length of 

 the carapace : the arm projects but little, the hand is not much enlarged, 

 aud the fingers almost meet throughout their length. 



In many young females the inner edge of the wrist is serrated and 

 there are also a few denticles along the upper border of the palm. 



The second pair of legs, which are the longest, are hardly twice the 

 length of the carapace. 



Colours in life : carapace violet with some dirty yellow markings : 

 chelipeds and legs yellowish with a livid reddish tinge. 



In the Indian Museum are specimens from the Nicobars and from 

 numerous islands of the Andaman group. The largest one has a carapace 

 82 millim. long and 110 broad. 



Family PALICID^, RatLbun. 

 Paligds, Philippi. 



Cymopolia, Roux, Ci'ust. Medifc. pi. xxi. 1828 : Milne Edwards, Hist. Nat. Crust. 

 II. 158: Miers. Challenger Brachyura, p. 333 {nom prsocc). 



Palicus, Mary J. Rathbnn, Proc. Biol. Soc, Washington, XI, 1897, pp. 93, 165 

 [" Philippi, Zweiter Jahresber. d. Vereins f. Naturk. in Cassel, 11, 1838."]. 



Carapace depressed, broader than long, covered with granules and 

 with symmetrical tubercles or rugosities that have a tendency to fall 

 into transverse series. 



Front about a third the greatest breadth of the carapace, little or 

 not at all deflexed, usually lobed or toothed. Lateral borders of the 

 carapace hardly curved, serrated anteriorly. 



Orbits deep, the upper border is cut into several teeth by deep 

 clefts, and there are usually two clefts in the lower border. 



The antenaules fold nearly transversely beneath the front : the 

 iuterantennular septum is a narrow plate. The antennsB commonly 

 have the basal joint, which stands in the orbital hiatus, enlarged : the 

 flagellum is well developed. 



Epistome sunken, not defined. Buccal cavern square. The exter- 

 nal maxillipeds do not close the buccal cavern anteriorly : their merus 

 is very small and is much narrower than the ischium : the ischium has 

 its antero-internal angle and the mei'us its autero-external angle much 

 produced : the palp articulates near the middle of the concave summit 

 of the obliquely-placed merus. 



Chelipeds short and usually slender in the female : in the adult 

 male one of them may be enlarged — rarely both. 

 792 



