538 MR. E. J. MiERS ON [Junc 6, 



5. On Crustaceans from the Mauritius. — Part II. 

 By Edward J. Miers, F.L.S., F.Z.S. 



[Received June 1, 1882.] 

 (Plate XXXVI.) 



Of the interesting Crustaceans of which I submit descriptions as 

 a sequel to my former paper on Crustaceans received by the British 

 Museum from M. V. de Robillard, the tirst to be mentioned, a Pali- 

 nui-us, was taken in a fishiug-net at a depth of 40 fathoms. With 

 it were sent, with other marine animals, a specimen of a species of 

 Dromia (apparently D. vulgaris^) completely covered with a sponge 

 of the genus Dysidea ; and also a specimen of Lysiosquilla maculata, 

 one of the commonest and best-known of the Oriental Squillidse, of 

 which, however, there were previously no specimens from the 

 Mauritius in the British-Museum collection, and which is marked as 

 "rare" hy M. Robillard. 



The Crawfish, of which a detailed description follows, and which 

 belongs to the restricted genus Palinurus of Gray", I regard as 

 specifically identical with a West-Indian form long since described 

 and roughly figured by Parra^ under the designation " Camaron 

 de lo alto," which M. H. Milne-Edwards^ has briefly described as 

 Palinurus longimanus from a West-Indian type in the collection of 

 the Paris Museum. M. Guerin-Meneville' also mentions this spe- 

 cies, but without adding any thing to our knowledge respecting it; 

 and yet more recently Dr. Edward v. Martens" has published a few 

 remarks upon a male example obtained at Cuba by Dr. J. Gundlach. 

 Thus the West-Indian habitat of P. longimanus is established beyond 

 question. 



The original description of Parra, although of considerable length, 

 is, as might be expected in so early a work, insufficient from a 

 scientific point of view ; but as far as it goes it is applicable in almost 

 every particular to the species from the Mauritius. Nevertheless, as 



1 I have already, Ann. & Mag. Kat. Hist. (ser. 5) v. p. 370 (1880), remarked 

 on the occurreuce of this species in the Oriental region. 



^ I may observe here that Dr. G. Pfeffer, in a memoir on the Palinuridce in 

 the collection of the Hamburg ^luseum (Verhandl. des naturn-issenschaftlichen 

 Vereius von Hamburg-Alt ona, v. p. 30, 1881), has proposed for the subgenus 

 PanuUrus of Gray (ined. ?) and Heller (18(35), which includes by far the greater 

 nmnber of known Crawfishes, and has been generally adopted, the new desig- 

 nation Scncx. This name cannot be adopted, having been long ago preoccupied in 

 the class Aves ; and I will add that, in my opinion, it would be productive of much 

 inconvenience were a generic name liable to altefation merely because (as in the 

 present instance) it is composed of the transposed letters of another name ; to cite 

 only one instance, it would then become necessary to name nearly ail the older 

 genera of Fish-lice ( CijmutJioida-). 



^ Descripciou de diferentes Piezas de Historia natural, &c., p. loi, pi. Iv. fig. 1 

 (1787). 



* Histoire naturelle des Crustaces, ii. p. 294 (1837). 



'' "Anim. Ai-ticules," in E. de la Sagra's Hist, de I'Ue de Cuba, p. xcih (1857). 



8 Archiv f. Naturgeschichte, xxxviii. p. 125 (1872). 



