~ 
1889.] DR. A. GUNTHER ON A BORNEAN PORCUPINE. 75 
But without being acquainted with the cranial, dental, or other 
characters, it would seem to me premature to offer an opinion as to 
its generie relations, or even to give to it a distinct generic term, 
much as the shape of the horns differs from that of all other known 
Antelopes. It therefore seems to me to be sufficient to distinguish 
it for the present as a species of Antilope in the Cuvierian sense, viz. 
as Antilope triangularis. 
5. Note on a Bornean Porcupine, Trichys lipura. 
By Dr. A. Ginruer, F.R.S., F.Z.S. 
[Received February 18, 1889.] 
In the ‘ Proceedings’ of this Society for 1876, p. 739, I described 
a small species of Porcupine from the west coast of Borneo under 
the name of Trichys lipura. 
The genus established for this Porcupine was characterized by 
the absence or rudimentary condition of a tail and by the form of 
its skull. The former character proves to be spurious, perhaps due 
to mutilation, and has to be abandoned ; whilst the latter suffices by 
itself to generically separate this Porcupine from Atherura, 
Since the publication of that paper the British Museum has received 
two other specimens: one, a female, obtained by Mr. C. Hose at 
Baram, Sarawak’, again, does not show the trace of a tail ; whilst the 
other, of which the skin as well as the skeleton are preserved, and 
which was found by Mr. A. Everett near the Batang Kubar River in 
Sarawak, possesses a long and slender tail. 
Thus, of two specimens examined by Gervais (Voy. Bonite, 
Mamm. p. 60), and of three specimens which have come under my 
notice, three were tailless, and only two provided with this appendage. 
This fact, combined with Mr. Low’s statement that the natives had 
assured him that this Porcupine was tailless, seems clearly to prove 
that the loss or absence of the tail is of very frequent occurrence ; 
and to judge from the condition of the integuments, I am inclined 
to believe that the tail is lost shortly after birth, if, indeed, its absence 
is not congenital’. 
However, the discovery that Zrichys lipura is normally provided 
with a tail has induced me to reexamine the literature in order to 
ascertain whether tailed specimens of this Porcupine had been noticed 
by previous authors. And there is no doubt that Waterhouse (see 
Nat. Hist. Mammal. vol. ii. p. 470) had examined four specimens 
of it, or, at least, of a closely allied species*, in the Leyden Museum. 
1 Mr. Hose says that the native name is ‘‘ Avkis.” 
2’ I, therefore, see no reason why the specific term “ ipwra” should not have 
the same claim to being retained as those of Paradisea apoda, Cypselus apus, &e, 
8 He says that the specimens in the Leyden Museum are from Siam. 
