128 EXTINCT AND VANISHING MAMMALS 



collected over 50 years ago. These supply additional facts 

 concerning the structure and indicate that the animal was 

 closely allied to the "Quemi" of Santo Domingo, with essen- 

 tially the same enamel pattern of the molars but with a rela- 

 tively longer rostrum. A full account of these has been pub- 

 lished by Schreuder (1933) with figures. The complete skull 

 is estimated to have been about 400 mm. (16 inches) in length, 

 and hence the animal must have been a giant in comparison 

 with the "Quemi". How long ago this species lived, how it 

 reached the two neighboring small islands on which its remains 

 are found, and why it should have perished there are questions 

 still impossible to answer. That it lived well after glacial 

 times is probable, but whether it was a contemporary of the 

 aboriginal Indians there is uncertain. 



If Miller is correct in identifying his Quemisia grams with 

 the "Quemi" of Oviedo, the name should stand as Quemisia 

 quemi (J. B. Fischer), since this name was given in 1830 by 

 Fischer [Synopsis Mamm., Addenda, p. 389 ( = 589)], who 

 quotes Oviedo and Latinizes his description. He includes as 

 synonymous, however, the account of the "Spanish Racoon" 

 from Browne's "Civil and Natural History of Jamaica," an 

 unidentified animal that was probably the larger Cuban hutia, 

 Capromys pilorides. 



Family DASYPROCTIDAE : Agoutis 

 ST. VINCENT AGOUTI 



DASYPROCTA ALBIDA Gray 



Dasyprocta albida Gray, Ann. Nat. Hist., ser. 1, vol. 10, p. 264, 1842 ("St. Vincent's," 

 West Indies). 



In former times agoutis were doubtless present in most of 

 the Lesser Antilles, and they still occur or did so until modern 

 times on at least the following (named in order from south to 

 north): Tobago, Grenada, St. Vincent, Barbados, St. Lucia, 

 Dominica, Guadeloupe, Montserrat, and St. Kitts. This 

 carries them all the way, practically, from Trinidad and South 

 America, north throughout the chain to the northeast corner 

 of the Antilles, a point where the distribution of some other 

 Lesser Antillean animals stops, and beyond which to the 

 westward the distribution of certain Greater Antillean species 



