i 



Mr. R. T. Pocock on Scolopendra valida, Lucas. 335 



and must be considered at present to be peculiar to Central 

 Africa. 



Leaving out of consideration the species common to tropical 

 Africa generally, we know : — 



1. From Lado and Lake Njanza three species, two of 

 which are also found in the East- African littoral. 



2. From Monbuttu and Semraio seven species, of which 

 not less than six are West- African ; therefore this portion of 

 the fauna of the upper waters of the Congo is probably con- 

 tinuous along the course of this river to the west coast. 



3. From Kilima-ndjaro eleven species, of which three 

 occur also on the west and four on the east coast. 



4. From Mpwapwa and Ugogo four species, of which one 

 is known also from the west and two from the east coast. 



5. From the shores of Lake Tanganyika eleven species, of 

 which one only has been found also on the west coast, whilst 

 eight occur in the eastern littoral. However, it should be 

 remembered that probably most of these species were collected 

 on or near the eastern shores of the lake. 



6. From Lake Nyassa six species, of which one only is 

 West- and three others East-African. 



XL. — Description of Scolopendra valida, Lucas^ with Notes 

 on allied Species. By R. I. PocoCK, Assistant, Natural- 

 History Museum. 



This species of Scolopendra appears to be but little known, 

 and its history up to the present time may be told in a very 

 few words. 



Between 1836 and 1844 it was first described by Lucas 

 from the Canary Islands. In 1844 one of the specimens from 

 which Lucas drew up his description was presented to the 

 British Museum by M. Barker Webb, and was recharac- 

 terized by Newport in the Trans. Linn. Soc. for the following 

 year. Since then no new account of the species has been 

 printed. In 1881 Dr. Kohlrausch, trusting to the descrip- 

 tions given by Newport and Lucas and to the figure pub- 

 lished by the latter author, was led to believe that the nearest 

 ally to this form must be Sc. morsitans of Linnseus. But 

 even a superficial examination of a specimen shows that it 

 may at once be distinguished from the above-mentioned 

 species by the possession of certain characters which exist 

 conjunctly only, I believe, in some few neotropical forms. 



23* 



