494 Mr. Bennett on the C/tinchilHilcc. 



learned zoologist's " Darstellung neuer oder wenig bekannter Sauge- 

 thiere;" a work unknown to me at the period when my paper was 

 published. The figure there given so closely resembles the true Chinchilla 

 lanigera in all its prominent features, that T should not have hesitated to 

 refer it to that animal, had it not been accompanied by separate repre- 

 sentations of the feet, which offer only four toes on the anterior and 

 three on the posterior cxtreniities: and had not the almost proverbial 

 accuracy of the distinguished authour rendered it difficult to doubt the 

 correctness of his observations in the text, referring with scrupulous 

 particularity to this very point. As a synonym, however. Dr. Meyen 

 quotes the Callomys laniner of M.M. Isid. Geoffroy St. Hilaire and 

 D'Orbigny fils; and in this case there can be little doubt that those 

 excellent zoologists overlooked the small and almost rudimental inner toe 

 both of the fore and hind feet; the identity of this animal with the 

 Chinchilla lanigera of Dr. Rousseau being unquestioned by the Parisian 

 zoologists, who have ample opportunities of comparing them, and M. 

 Geoffroy himself having subsequently admitted the generic distinction 

 of the Chinchilla (his Callomys laniger) from his genus Callomys 

 (the true Lagostomus.) 



The Chinchilla of Mr. Gray, which forms the fourth genus enumerated 

 by Dr. Meyen as belonging to this family, is beyond all question the 

 only Chinchilla yet noticed by English zoologists, and consequently 

 identical with that figured in Mr. Griffith's edition of Cuvier's " Animal 

 Kingdom," as well as with the Chinchilla of my paper; and I see no 

 reason for doubting that the Eriomys of M. Vander Hoeven, the fifth 

 genus enumerated in Dr. Meyen's list, is founded on the same species : 

 there is nothing in the character that is not strictly applicable to it. 



His sixth genus, Galex, is established on a skull found at the entrance 

 of a burrow belonging in all probability to a yet undescribed species of 

 the family of ChinchillidcB ; as the characters of the animal inhabiting 

 the burrov/, which was seen only at a distance, appear closely to re- 

 semble those of a true Chinchilla. The skull and teeth, however, 

 according to the figures given by our authour, belong to a very different 

 family, that of the Caviida> ; with none of the known genera of which 



