168 Zoological Society :-— 
them, showing that the animal could not long have been hatched, yet 
observes, ‘* L’aspect de la carapace et sa solidité comparée a celle de 
la boite osseuse de jeunes Pentonyx du Cap semblent prouver que 
notre individu est adulte”’ (p. 164). The example figured must be 
that on which this observation is founded; for he remarks, ‘II est 
unique dans la collection.” 
It is probable that Hmys Adansonii of Schweigger, the Pentonyza, 
and more lately the Sternotherus Adansonii of Duméril and Bibron, 
described from a shell in the Paris Museum said to come from the 
Cape de Verd, is only a half-grown specimen of this species, which 
is the only Sternotherus I have seen from Western Africa. 
The specimen in the British Museum from Sierra Leone, which 
is described in the ‘ Catalogue of Shield Reptiles’ (p. 52) as Séer- 
notherus castaneus, appears to belong to this species. 
II. The head rather short and broad ; the upper jaw truncated ; the 
crown covered with an oblong shield (or three smaller shields), 
with a number of smaller shields over the tympanum, between 
the hinder outer edge of the crown-plate and the upper edge 
of the large temporal shields. Notoa. 
STERNOTHERUS SUBNIGER. 
S. castaneus, Dum. et Bibr. Erp. Gén. ii. p. 401, t. 20. f. 1. 
Head depressed; jaws pale; the upper surface of the fore legs 
with small scales, and a few rather larger ones on the inner sides. 
Hab. Madagascar. 
Head of S. subniger. 
The specimen in the British Museum, which was received from 
Paris under the above name, and as coming from Madagascar, agrees 
well with Duméril and Bibron’s description and figure; but they do 
not describe the small shields on the head, and especially say that the 
frontal plate is much developed, and that there are no occipital plates. 
Now, in our specimen the sutures of the occipital plates are well seen, 
and they are peculiar for being oblong and obliquely placed (so as to 
leave the sides of the occiput to be covered with small shields), instead 
of being large and trigonal (as they are in the two other species) and 
covering all the space on the head to the margin of the temporal 
shields. 
