354 MR. P,L.SCLATER ON A NEW INDIAN PORCUPINE. [Apr. 11, 
find how difficult it is to detect any very decided differences in their 
structure. The muzzle in the present specimen of H. malabarica 
(which is the only individual I have been able to examine) seems to 
be decidedly less clothed with hair than in H.leucura. This is one 
of the few points in which H. leucura differs externally from H. 
cristata, and in this respect the present specimen seems more like 
H. cristata. The whole of the short spines and hairs of the anterior 
portion of the body in H. malabarica are dark reddish orange at 
their bases, growing into purplish brown at their tips; and the same 
is the case with those of the flanks and legs. The elongated spines 
of the middle of the back are some of them black, annulated with 
white, just as in H. Jeucura ; others, more especially towards the sides, 
where these latter rather predominate, have the white replaced by a 
bright orange-red. The medial line of the rump is well defined, as 
in H. leucura; but the white spines are mixed with others wholly 
orange. This is likewise the case with the spines round the base of 
the strong spines which terminate the tail: some of these are wholly 
white, and some wholly orange. The strong spines which surround 
the tail, and extend beyond its extremity, are mostly wholly white, 
with some wholly orange intermixed. In the centre of these are 
about twelve of the singular hollow truncated quills mounted on pe- 
dicels, just as in H. lewcura and H. cristata*. About one-fourth 
part of these abnormal quills are orange ; the others are white. 
As the cranial characters of the species of Hystriz are generally 
very well marked, and indeed the only test by which the species can 
be certainly distinguished, I was in hopes of finding in the cranium 
of Hystrix malabarica some more certain evidence of its real distinct- 
ness from H. leucura. Ihave therefore carefully compared the skull 
of the new species with a fine series of six skulls of H. /eucura in the 
British Museumf, in doing which I have received the valuable as- 
sistance of my friend Dr. Peters, who happened to be present at the 
occasion. The skull of Hystriv malabarica, which is that of a very 
old animal with the molar teeth worn very low and the cranial sutures 
nearly obliterated, agrees in the shape of the nasal and intermaxillary 
bones with H. leucura. As in the latter species, so in H. malabarica 
the nasal bones have their sides nearly parallel with the hinder mar- 
gin, terminating nearly in a line with the anterior edge of the orbit, 
and the nasal processes of the intermaxillaries are broad and truncated. 
At first I was inclined to think there was some difference in the pat- 
terns of the molar teeth of the two species, those of H. malabarica 
being surrounded by a complete cingulum of enamel, and the internal 
areas being completely isolated, which is not the case in H. leucura. 
But this, I suspect, is only due to the age of the specimen. It would 
therefore be desirable to have further specimeus of the skull of H. 
* T am not aware whether any explanation has ever been given of the use of 
these curious quills. My impression is that they serve to act as a rattle, which is 
thus formed, as in the Rattle-Snakes (Crotalus), by a cutaneous development at 
the end of the tail. 
t 4. cristata and H. leucurus of the ‘ Catalogue of the Bones of Mammalia in 
the British Museum’ (1862), p.191. 
