1870.] DR. J. MURIE ON SAIGA TARTARICA. 501 
sacculate the glandular portion of the skin of the groin. I am not 
at present clear regarding its homology ; but the better to call atten- 
tion to the existence of this muscle, I propose temporarily to deno- 
minate it the cnvaginator sacculi. 
VY. Systematic PosITION OF THE SAIGA TARTARICA, 
When what is regarded among zoologists as an exceptional form, 
either in a family or genus, is put to the crucial test of anatomical 
detail, it is oftentimes hard to assign the creature a definite place, 
even when in possession of the more complete data. Such an animal 
is the Saiga | 
The difficulty in this as in similar cases springs mainly from two 
causes. One is the value to be attached to any single character or 
set of characters ; for upon this point the most conflicting views are 
entertained equally among the younger school of naturalists and 
among the older authorities. 
The other cause arises out of the circumstance that in most species 
such as that under consideration we have what the indefatigable 
embryologist Parker very deftly expresses in birds as “a generalized 
form,” moulded akin to no special group, but, as it were, a combined 
patchwork of varied structural organization. 
The characters assigned by Pallas (/. c. p. 14) in his analysis of 
the genus Antilope * are, “Ant. saiga (cornibus distantibus, lyratis, 
pallido diaphanis, naso cartilagineo ventricoso).” 
Setting aside older and subsequent authors, I may mention that 
Dr. Gray t, with the addition to the above definition of its cramen 
(suborbital gland), distinct and soft fur, generically subdivided 
Saiga tartarica among the “ Antelopes of the Fields” in his syn- 
opsis of the Bovidae. Mr. Turner}, in grouping the hollow- 
horned Ruminants from a study of their crania, unfortunately did not 
see a skull of Saiga. Provisionally, from the shape of the horns, 
that able anatomist placed it under Gazella, though animadverting 
upon Gray’s generic separation because of their pale colour. The 
reply of the latter (Cat. B. M. 1852, p. 51) sufficiently answers the 
objection. This translucency of the horns, moreover, has even 
greater significance than their lyrate, annulated character, and, toge- 
ther with their occasional multiple number, decidedly evinces affi- 
nities to the Ovine type. Doubtless in size, shape, and position they 
conform to the Gazelles. So far, therefore, as outward aspect is 
concerned, they belong to the Antelope section, but not necessarily 
so; for in the four-horned breeds of Sheep, and even in some of the 
two-horned varieties (e.g. the Wallachian Ram), these organs to a 
certain extent assume the said peculiarities. 
When the skeleton comes to be considered, the skull, as rightly 
interpreted by Turner in other Bovidae, affords distinctive marks of 
its family relationships. Whilst exhibiting structural formation pe- 
* See Ogilby’s critical remarks thereon, Trans. Zool. Soe. vol. iii. p. 38. 
+ Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. (1847), vol. xviii. p. 227. 
} P.Z.8. 1850, p. 168. 
