18(59.] DIFFERENT SPECIES OF OTTER. 193 



present species Barangia sumatrana, from the original locality of 

 Raffles's specimen, and thus making the latter individual the type of 

 the species. 1h.\s " Barangia sumatrana" heing, as Dr. Anderson 

 has pointed out, the first unused binomial name applied to the 

 species, it must stand as " L. sumatrana. Gray'". 



Lastly, for species D, the Httle clawless Otter, a different name to 

 the well-known "Z-. leptonyx" most unfortunately has the priority. 

 In the ' Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap ' for 

 1/80^ Baron F. v. Wurmb gave a description of an Otter found 

 near Batavia which he called the " Grijze Otter," and to this "Grev 

 Otter" lUiger in 1811 applied the name oi Lutra cinerea" ^ This 

 name has never been referred to except incidentally among the 

 synonyms oi Lutra leptongx, and even then it is usually without 

 any particulars as to date or place of publication. 



The reference of L. cinerea to L. leptonyx is unfortunately correct 

 without a shadow of doubt, since in his accounts of the "Grijze 

 Otter," Baron v. Wurmb mentions among other thin2;s that it has 

 " ronde nagels " and is only 1 foot 6 inches long, with a tail 1 foot 

 in length, two characters that connect it with L. leptonyx alone of 

 all Otters. Again, Horsfield in his original account of i. leptonyx^ 

 himself quotes v. Wurmb's " Grijze Otter " as a synonym, without 

 knowing that 14 years before a Latin name, L. cinerea, had been 

 applied to it, which name antedated then and must, I am afraid, 

 supersede now the better-known " L. leptonyx." That the "Grijze 

 Otter " is the same as L. leptonyx is also proved by the fact that no 

 other species of the genus is as yet known to inhabit Java, unless 

 the very different sharp-clawed L. barang should after all be found 

 to occur there. 



Of the names now looked upon as synonyms of one or other of 

 the above four species, the following require some explanation : — 



(1) Lutra aurobrunnea, Hodgs. J. A. S. B. viii. p. 320 (1839). 



(2) Barangia (?) nepalensis, Gray, P. Z. S. 1865, p. 124; Cat. 

 Cam. B. M. p. 101 (1869). 



The type of the first of these descriptions is a distorted and dyed 

 skin, and that of the second an incomjjlete skull. Both were pre- 

 sented to the Museum by Mr. B. H. Hodgson along with his 

 Nepalese collection, and, as suggested both by Anderson and Blanford, 

 perhaps belong to the same individual. 



TJie skin (Z. aurobrunnea, Hodgs.) is, I feel sure, that of an 

 example oi L. vulgaris, as is shown, m spite of its distorted muzzle, 

 by the sharply-defined limit of the hair growing below the nostrils, 

 where in hairy-nosed Otters (to which the species has been said to 

 be allied) there is no such exact limit. The feet, again, so far as it 



1 It may be noted here that Lutra palceindica, Falc. and Cautl., from the 

 Siwaliks of N. India, proves, on a direct comparison of the type, to be almost 

 indistinguishable from L. sumatrana. 



2 Vol. ii. p. 285 of the 3rd edition, published 1826. 



3 Abh. Ak. Berl. 1811, p. 99 (published 1815). 

 * Zool. Kesearches in Java, 1824. 



