ON A SMALL COLLECTION OF SCORPIONS. 297 



to the group of flat scorpions in which the tail is small and strongly 

 compressed, and the hand very flat, with a strongly defined external 

 surface. 



The genus Scorpio may be considered as typical of the family. The 

 species are par excellence the *big black scorpions' of travellers. The 

 genus is confined to the Old World,* being widely distributed in 

 tropical and sub-tropical Africa, India, and Ceylon and Java. The 

 only genus in the Oriental Region with which it is likely to 

 be confounded — and the likelihood it must be confessed is not 

 slight — is Palamnoeus of Thorell. Palamncms is in appearance very 

 like Scorpio, being of large size and of a piceous or olivaceous tint ; 

 it may be recognised, however, by the fact that the movable dactylus 

 of the chelicerse is bifid at the extremity, the superior terminal fang 

 being of large size ; the inner border of the hand, moreover, is much 

 thicker. In Scorpio this fang is small and the hand is internally 

 more compressed. 



This genus Palamnoeus largely takes the place of Scorpio in the 

 Indo-Malayan area. One species only has been recorded from India 

 and that without definite locality. This is Palamnceus spinifer 

 (Hempr. and Ehrb.) with which P. petersii of Thorell seems to be 

 synonymous. The British Museum, however, has several examples 

 of this species from Bengal, and from this locality it spreads in a 

 southerly direction to Singapore. But in Burma there is found a 

 second species, about which there has been much discussion. This 

 has been named thorellii, and judging from the numbers of it that 

 Mr. Oates brought to England, it is far more commonly met with 

 than spinifer. 



For a consideration of these two species reference may be made to 

 the Annals and Mag. of Natural Eistory, ser. 6, vol. ix., pp. 38-43 

 (1892). 



Family Buthidce. 



(1) Isometrm tJmrstoni, sp. n. ( ? var. nov.) 



9 . Colour very like that of I. rnaculatus, ochraceous, variegated with 



black ; cephalothorax with its lateral margins black, ocular tubercle, 



region of lateral eyes and ante-ocular portion black, a narrow median 



* C. Koch has described one species irom Mexico. 



