682 



NOTE ON THE GENUS LEGGADA, 



BY 



Oldfield Thomas. 



In Part III of the " Scientific Results of the Mammal Survey,"* 

 Mr. Wroughton and Miss Ryley have, at my instigation, accepted 

 the species platyilirix as the type of Lef/r/ada, on the ground of 

 tautonymy, that species having according to Elliot the native name 

 of " Leggyade. " From this acceptance it followed that the 

 platythrix group, with frontal ridges, would bear the name Leggada, 

 and that hoodioga and its allies, including all the African species 

 referred to Leggada, would fall into Mus. 



Bub it has been suggested to me by Mr. Miller that I have in 

 this case overstrained the admirable principle of tautonymy, and 

 on re-investigating the question I am prepared to agree with him. 

 The genus was undoubtedly primarily founded on L. hooduga, 

 though ]^latyt]irix was mentioned, and the selection of the former 

 species as the type was confii-med in my paper on Indian Rats and 

 Mice in 1881.| Apart from tautonymy therefore, 'platythrix could 

 not be selected by Wroughton and Ryley in 1913 as "first 

 revisers," that position having being taken by me in 1881, even if 

 any selection of a genotype was needed after Gray first founded 

 the genus. 



As a result, hooduga being now considered a member of true 

 Mus, the name Leggada will have to be sunk as a synonym of 

 that genus, while the group of which platythrix is the type will 

 need a new^ name. 



This I would suggest should be Leggadilla, technically different 

 from Jjeggada, but like enough to it to recall a name familiar to 

 most Indian naturalists. No confusion between the two can 

 arise, as Leggada itself now disappears from our lists as being 

 synonymous with Mus. 



The genotype of Leggadilla would be L. platythrix (^Mus 

 platythrix, Benn.) and there w^ould belong to it the six species 

 enumerated under Ijvggada in Wroughton and Ryley's paper. 



* Journ. Bomb. Nat. Hist. Soc, XXII, p. 16, 1913. 

 t P. Z. S. 1881, p. 652. 



