On the Himalayan Bat known as Murina grisea. 309 



XXXV. — A Special Genus for the Himalayan Bat known as 

 Murina grisea. By Oldfield Thomas. 



(Published by permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.) 



The teeth of Murina grisea differ so markedly from those of 

 the other species of Murina that I think it should be separated 

 from them to form a special genus, which might be called 



HARPIOLA, gen. nov. 



External characters as in Murina, except that the wing- 

 membrane is attached to the base of the first toe, instead of 

 near its claw, as is ordinarily the case in Murina. 



Teeth remarkable for the almost complete suppression of the 

 usual specialization of the canine, the upper incisors, canine, 

 and premolars being all subequal in size and closely similar 

 in shape; the incisors therefore comparatively enormous, 

 nearly as large as the reduced canine, the second one pressed 

 close against the front of the latter. Canine scarcely higher 

 than the anterior premolar, which, in turn, is actually larger 

 in all dimensions (except in its outer antero-posterior diameter) 

 than the second, the converse being the case in all species of 

 Murina. Below, the incisors are, as usual, quite small, but 

 the canine is again reduced, less in height than the first 

 premolar — this, in turn, very slightly less than the posterior 

 premolar. Upper molars with the metacone so reduced as 

 to be scarcely higher than the paracone, which it ordinarily 

 far surpasses. 



In transverse area all the anterior teeth, incisors, canines, 

 and premolars are remarkably broad and bulky, while the 

 molars are unusually narrowed ; as a result, both the canine 

 and first premolar are eacli as broad as the molars, a propor- 

 tion unknown elsewhere in the family except in the genus 

 Harpiocephalus. 



Genotype. Harpiola grisea {Murina grisea, Peters). 



It is noticeable that the molars, usually so uniform in their 

 structure, should in this one subfamily, the Murininse, be so 

 variable — the three genera, Murina, Harpiola, and Harpio- 

 cephalus, being readily distinguishable from each other by 

 their molar structure only. 



The typical species of Harpiola, II. grisea, is unfortunately 

 as yet only known by the type-specimen in the British 

 Museum, and this, like others of the series collected by 



