Musk- Rat of Santa Lucia {Antilles). 205" 



to (lie incna;;erie *. 'Vwo ye;wA later Gosse remarlcs tli.-it the 

 Mus piiorides o{' Di'sinarostj " found in the Caribbean Islands, 

 lias not the dentition ot" the 01d-^V^o^ld rats, but resembles, in 

 the struetiirc of its molars, the South-American rats grouped 

 by l\Ir. Waterhousc under the ;i:cnoric name of Ifesperomt/s " f . 



From the published description and figures it is impossible 

 to make more than a guess as to which group of Ilesporo- 

 myina' the musk-rats may belong; Wiiige was therefore right 

 in saying that their closer relationship is still unknown. 



'I'he examination of a specimen from Santa Lucia in the 

 British Museum (no. 53. 12. 16. 4), ])resumably the one 

 mentioned in the P. Z. 8. for 1849, shows that we have to do 

 with the genus Oryzomys. The same may be said of the 

 ]\Iartiiiique musk-rat ; one of the type specimens from Mar- 

 tinique, presented by Plee to the Paris Museum, has found 

 its way to the Leyden Museum, and its skull was kindly lent 

 to me by Dr. Jentink. 



Tiie detailed description, with figures, of these two skulls, 

 together with the lower dentition of a third (extinct) species 

 found by Prof. Gregory in a small ossiferous breccia of 

 Barbuda, will be given in another place. 



The fullowing is the synonymy of the musk-rat from 

 Martinique : — 



Oryzomys piloris (Zimmerm.). 



Rat )ini^(jud (^I'iluri), C. de Rochefort, Hist. Nat. et Morale des Ilea 



Antilles de rAui(5rique, p. 124 (1G58). 

 Musk Cavi/, Teimaut, tSyn. of Quadr. p. 247. no. 183 (1771); 3id ed.ii. 



p. 97 (1793). 

 Cavia, S/Jtcies vfjscura, Ei-xleben, Syst. Regni Auim., Mammalia, p. 357 



(1777). 

 Castor I'ilons, Zinmiermann, Zool. geogr. p. .509 (1777). 

 Mus pi/oridex, Di'suiurest, Diet. !Sc. Nat. t. xliv. p. 463 (1820) ; Wagner, 



Seliivbt-r' s Jr^aiigthieie, tsuppl. iii. p. 444 (Ib4i5). 

 Mus Besmarestii, Fischer, bjn. Mauunaliiini, p. 316 (1820). 

 Le Pilori, F. Cuvier (E. Ueo&roy <5c F. Cuvier), Hist. Nat. des Mammif. 



iv. pi. cclviii. (1830). 

 Ifespcromys {Meyalumys) pilorides, p. p., Troucssart, Le Naturaliste, 



no. 45, p. 5 (1881); Auu. So. Nat., Zool. xix. Art. no. 5, p. 13 (1885). 

 Jlolovhilus {^Meyalomys) pilurulee, p. p., Trouessart, Catul. Mamui. p. 520 



(1897). 



Uah. Martinique. 



* " Mtis (Ilesperomys) pilorulcs,'' I'roc. Zool. 8oc. London, 1849, 

 ]). 105. 



t P. IL Gosse, 'A Naturalist's Sojourn in .Jamaica,' pp. 449, 450 

 (1851). 



Ann. (k Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 7. Vol. vii. 15 



