1871.] MR. P. L. SCLATER ON ANIMALS IN THE MENAGERIE. 745 



41. ClNOSTERNTJM LEUCOSTOMUM. 



Iii 18/0 we received four living specimens of a species of Cino- 

 sternum, which I had little hesitation in referring to C. leucostomum 

 of A. Dume'ril (Arch. d. Mus. vi. p. 239, pi. xvii.). Two of these 

 were brought from Greytown, Nicaragua, by an officer of one of the 

 Royal Mail Steam-ship Company's vessels, along with an example of 

 Clemmys ornata. The other two were purchased out of a ship, 

 with the information that they had come from the Laguna de Ter- 

 minos, on the coast of Yucatan. Along with the latter were obtained 

 likewise an example of Clemmys ornata and a specimen of a Der- 

 matemys abnormis'*. I mention these particulars in order to extend 

 our knowledge of the range of this species, of which M. Dumuril's 

 only certain localities are Guatemala (Morelet) and New Granada 

 (Lewy and Goudot). I may add that some of these Tortoises were 

 taken to the British Museum and identified with SwanJca metadata, 

 Gray f ; so that I think it probable that that name is a synonym of 

 Cinostcrnum leucostomum. 



42. PoDOCNEMIS TJNIFILIS, TlOSchel. 



On December 16th of last year we purchased for the Society's 

 collection two small living Tortoises of the genus Podocnemis, of 

 which I now exhibit the dried shells, and which I entered in the 

 register of accessions as Podocnemis expansa and P. unifilis X~ The 

 officer of the steam-ship ' Augustine,' from whom they were obtained, 

 informed me that the former was obtained on the Lower Amazon, 

 and the latter from Purus on the Upper Amazon. In my report on 

 the additions to the Menagerie for December 18/0 § I stated in re- 

 ference to P. uniflls that a similar specimen in the British Mu- 

 seum had been referred to the young of P. dumeriliana, but that 

 I thought this could be "hardly correct." Dr. Gray, in a recent 

 number of the • Annals' (ser. 4, vol. viii. p. C8), has endeavoured 

 to prove that this determination (i, e. that P. unifilis = P. dume- 

 riliana, jr.) is correct, and has even come to the conclusion that 

 the character of having only one beard on the lower mandible 

 (whence Prof. Troschel derived his name unifilis) so far from being 

 a peculiarity of this species is " common to all the species of the 

 family Peltocephalidse," i. e. to the genera Podocnemis and Peltoce- 

 p/iafus, which, in Dr. Gray's latest arrangement, constitute his family 

 Peltocephalidee. But I cannot agree to this view. In the first place 

 the Podocnemis received along with the specimen of P. unifilis, and 

 which I entered as P. expansa, has (as you may see by the dried 

 specimen now before you) a distinct double beard, which in the living 

 animal was very prominent, and first called my attention to its spe- 

 cific difference from P. unifilis. Secondly, Wagler (Syst. d. Amph. 



* Described and figured by Dr. Gray, P. Z. S. 1870. p. 716, pi. xliii., as Chlo- 

 remys abnormis. 

 t Suppl. Cat. Shield Rep. p. 68. 

 } See P. Z. 8. 1870, Appendix, p. U10. 

 § See anted., p. .'!(!. 



