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March 13th, 1838. 

 William Yarrell, Esq., in the Chair. 



Mr. Ogilby read a letter from Mr. V. der Hoeven, in which the 

 writer expresses his belief that the large Salamander preserved in a 

 living state at Leyden ought to be regarded as a species of Harlan's 

 genus Menopoma ; its specific characters consisting in the absence 

 of the branchial apertures, which are present in the species upon 

 which Harlan founded his genus. M. V. der Hoeven thinks it pro- 

 bable that the branchial apertures were present in the Leyden Sala- 

 mander in the young state, and he proposes to adopt the generic 

 term Cryptobranchus in preference to that of Menopoma, and to give 

 it the specific name of Japonicus. He further states that his obser- 

 vations upon this singular reptile will shortly be published in a 

 Dutch Journal. 



Mr. Owen observed, with reference to the opinion of M. V. der 

 Hoeven respecting the relations of the Gigantic Salamander of 

 Japan to the Menopome of the Alleghany Mountains, that the persist- 

 ence of branchial apertures was a structure so likely to influence 

 not only the habits of an amphibious reptile, but also the struc- 

 tural modifications of the osseous and vascular parts of the re- 

 spiratory organs, as to render it highly improbable that the Me- 

 nopome should be related generically to a species having no trace 

 of those apertures. He thought, therefore, that the question of 

 the Menopome and gigantic Japanese Salamander being diflferent 

 species of the same genus, could be entertained only on the sup- 

 position, that the branchial apertures were a transitional structure 

 in the former reptile as they are in the latter. That this was the 

 case he considered as highly improbable ; for, besides the ossified 

 state of the hyoid apparatus, there was evidence in the Hunterian 

 Collection that both the male and female generative organs in the 

 Menopome have arrived at maturity without any change having taken 

 place in the condition of the branchial apparatus usually considered 

 as characteristic of the Menopome. He therefore considered it to be 

 undoubtedly generically distinct from the gigantic Salamander of 

 Japan, the true affinities of which could only be determined satis- 

 factorily after a complete anatomical investigation, especially of its 

 sanguiferous, respiratory, and osseous systems. 



Mr. Ogilby exhibited a drawing, made by Major Mitchell, of a 

 Marsupial animal found by that officer on the banks of the river 

 Murray, during his late journey in the interior of New South Wales. 

 Mr. Ogilby stated his original belief that the animal in question be- 

 longed to the Perameles, under which impression he had proposed 

 to name it Per. ecaudatus, from its entire want of tail, a cha- 



No. LXIII, — Proceedings of the Zoological Society. 



