192 MR. 0. THOMAS ON THE [Apr. 2, 
So far as is known at present there are four well-marked species 
of Otter occurring in the Oriental Region, and these may be briefly 
distinguished as follows :— 
A. Muzzle naked. Claws large. Internal lobe of p.* small. 
(“L. vulgaris.” *) 
B. Muzzle naked. Claws large. Internal lobe of P-* large. 
(“L. ellioti.’”’) 
C. Muzzle hairy. Claws large. Lobe of p-* small. (“* L. suma- 
trana.’’) 
D. Muzzle naked. Claws rudimentary. Size much smaller than 
in A, B, and C. (‘ Z. leptonyz.’’) 
The synonymy of A is happily quite clear, thanks to the labours 
of Messrs. Anderson and Blanford. It stands as Lutra vulgaris, 
from which I agree with Mr. Blanford in thinking that ZL. nair, 
F. Cuv., and Z. indica, Gray, are not separable. To its Indian 
synonyms should also now be definitely added L. chinensis, Gray, 
and, as stated below, L. aurobrunnea, Hodgs., and L. nepalensis, 
Gray. 
The history of B is much more difficult. Firstly, it is unques- 
tionably the true “Simung”’ of Raffles, as evidenced by Ratftles’s 
own specimen now in the Museum. ‘The “ Barang” of the same 
author is really species C ;_ but F. Cuvier, when describing a young 
specimen of B, still in the Paris Museum, mistook it for the Barang, 
and therefore called it ‘‘ Zutra barang,” a name which must stand 
as the first binomial applied to the species. This species B is 
therefore L. barang of the continental naturalists, Lesson, Fischer, 
and others, who followed Cuvier, but not the L. barang of English 
authors, although it should now become so. At the same time it 
is the L. simung of Lesson, Horsfield, Gray, and others. Later on, 
specimens of the same species received the names of L. monticola 
from Hodgson, L. elliot? from Anderson, a name under which Mr. 
Blanford has placed the species, and L. macrodus from Gray (see 
below). 
The range of Z. barang extends over the whole Indian Region from 
the Indus to Ceylon, and from Nepal to Sumatra. Its occurrence 
in Java has never been confirmed, and F. Cuvier was very possibly 
mistaken as to the exact locality of the type; indeed, Lesson in 
1827 speaks of the species as having been discovered by Diard and 
Duvaucel in Sumatra, as though an error in the locality had been 
discovered in the interval. 
Species C, the Hairy-nosed Otter of the Malayan part of the 
region, is the true “ Barang”’ of Raffles, that author’s type having 
come into the British Museum from the collection of the late Dr. 
Crisp, and is therefore the L. barang of Cantor, Gray, and others, who 
followed Raffles’s determination. In 1865 Dr. Gray elevated the 
Indian Hairy-nosed Otters to the rank of a genus, and called the 
1 The names in brackets are those used in Blanford’s work (Faun. Brit. 
Ind., Mamm. pp. 182-187, 1888), the most recent on the subject. 
