NEW SPECIES OF SCOTOPHILUS 85 



some of the more aberrant species of Vesperugo, and especially 

 from those placed by M.'" Dobson in his subgenus Scotozous, to 

 which perhaps it may be thought the new species should have 

 been referred. Scotozous was founded on the Indian V. (S.) dor- 

 meri, Dobs., a species with all the fades of a Vesperugo, with 

 two upper premolars, and with a long and pointed anterior 

 lower premolar, these characters being strictly those of Vesperugo, 

 from which in fact it only differs by having but one upper 

 incisor on each side, as in Scotophilus. On the other hand the 

 second species referred to the subgenus by M.'^ Dobson^ '' Nycticejus 

 schlieffeni „ Peters, ought, it appears to me, to be rather called 

 a Scotophilus. Before entering into this point however, some 

 reference to its specific history is unfortunately necessary, as 

 there has been considerable confusion in regard to it. 



Its first description was given by D.^" Peters in 1859 (^) unless 

 Vespertilio marginatus (^), Cretzschm. be the same species, but 

 the type of the latter form was distinctly stated by Blasius (^) 

 to be referable to Vesperugo kuhli, Natt., and if he was right the 

 species will stand under Peters's name. In 1878 (*) M.^' Dobson 

 referred the bat, with one Museum specimen, to his subgenus 

 Scotozous, of the genus Vesperugo, but at the same time (^), 

 misled by an erroneous locality, he placed a second specimen 

 of it under Scotophilus pallidus, a species described by him two 

 years previously in India (^). That this specimen was wrongly 

 named has since been proved by the receipt of genuine examples 

 of S. pallidus from India, but in the mean time a comparison 

 with it had caused the Marquis G. Doria and myself to refer C') 

 to S. pallidus a bat from Masso wa collected by Signor Gustavo 

 Frasca ; this extension of the range of the latter, commented upon 

 by us at the time, must now be cancelled, the bat being, like the 



(1) M. B. Ak. Beri., p. 224, 1859. 



(2) Atl. Riipp. Reise, p. 74, pi. XXIX, 1826. 

 (^) Saug. Deutschl., p. 65, 1857. 



(*) Cat. Chir. B. M,, p. 244, 1878. 



(^•) 1. c, p. 264. 



(6) Mon. As. Chir., p. 186, 1876. 



O Ann. Mus. Civ. Genova (2), IV, p. 206 , 1 



