1882. ] MR. W. A. FORBES ON THE GREAT ANTEATER. 299 
opportunity of verifying, this median septum is developed along 
the proximal (uterine) part of the vagina, instead of the distal 
(external) as in Myrmecophaga’. 
As Pouchet, though describing the two apertures, does not men- 
tion any median septum, it is possible that this vaginal septum may 
disappear, as there seems to be good reason for supposing that it 
does in Elephas indicus, in the gravid state. The penis in Myrmeco- 
phaga is so small that during coitus it is, I expect, entirely con- 
tained in the urino-genital tube, and does not enter the vagina, as 
is also the case in Elephas; the disappearance of the vaginal sep- 
tum can therefore hardly be due, in this species at least, to the non- 
virgin condition of any particular female. 
4. As regards other points, I may mention that the external and 
internal iliac arteries come off separately, as in many other mammals’, 
there being no common iliac arteries. 
As in Manis tridentata as described by Rapp’, the chevron bones 
in the tail contain a curious caudal rete miradile, composed of both 
venous and arterial elements, which completely surrounds, as in a 
sheath, a central artery of large size, which is the direct coutinuation 
onwards of the abdominal aorta, and gives off here no branches at all 
to the rete. The arterial elements of this reée are derived from 
several small trunks on each side, which arise from the caudal artery 
beyond the origin of the internal iliacs, and then break up into a 
number of more or less parallel, rarely anastomosing, branches, 
mixed up with which are similar venous trunks. A similar rete 
occurs in Zamandua, and also, as I am informed by Prof. Flower, in 
the Spider Monkeys of the genus A¢eles. 
The paired eyelids are very small, and hardly exist as special 
organs; there areno eyelashes. The third eyelid, on the other hand, 
is very large and well-developed. It contains a large cartilage of 
concayo-convex shape; on the internal surface of this eyelid, just 
below the inferior border of the contained cartilage, opens the 
minute aperture of the Harderian gland, which is very large, almost 
completely surrounding the orbit, and concealing the much more 
minute lachrymal gland. As described and figured by Pouchet, it 
consists of three chief lobes. 
As already suggested by Chatin, I have little doubt that it is the 
Harderian gland that has been described by Cuvier (Anat. Comp. 
2me éd. iv. part 1, pp. 430, 431) and Owen (J. ¢. pl. xl. fig. 3 6) 
in Cycloturus as a salivary gland opening into the mouth. 
Clavicles are frequently supposed to be absent in the Great Ant- 
1 A similar condition of things to that here described in the genus Myrmeco- 
phaga occurs sometimes, it may be observed, as a malformation, known as 
“vagina duplex et uterus simplex,” in the human female, the vagina being more 
or less completely divided into two chambers by a median septum, and open- 
ing externally by wo quite separate orifices. Cf a paper by Dr. T. Matthews 
Duncan, Journ. Anat. Phys. i. pp. 269-274, and Dr. Morrison Watson’s paper, 
“'The Homology of the Sexual Organs illustrated by Comparative Anatomy and 
Pathology,” /. ¢. xiv. pp. 60-62, 
2 Cf P.Z.S. 1881, p. 188, 
Se bkespaoes 
