1890.] ON THE CHINESE ALLIGATOR. 619 



The following papers were read : — 



1. Remarks on tlie Cliinese Alligator. 



By G. A. BoULENGER. 



[Eeceived October 7, 1890.] 

 (Plates LT. & LII.) 



Altliougli the first intimation of the existence of a Crocodilian in 

 the Yang-tze-kiang ap[)eared in these Proceediaigs in 1870', it was not 

 until nine years later that M. Fauvel, a French gentleman in the service 

 of the Chinese Customs, made us acquainted with the animal, which 

 surprisingly proved to helong to the American genus Alligator. In 

 his excellent paper" M. Fauvel not only gave a very satisfactory 

 description of the new Alligator, for which he proposed the name of 

 A. sinensis, but dwelt at great length with the former records of it 

 in Chinese literature. A stuffed specimen was forwarded by M. 

 Fauvel to the Paris Museum, where I had the pleasure of examining 

 it in 1880; two others, kept for some time alive by the German 

 Consul von MiJllendorff, were after their death transmitted to the 

 Eerlin Museum, as we are informed by Boettger ^ It was not until 

 last year that two specimens, obtained at Kiu Kiang by Mr. Styan, 

 were received in this country, one of which was retained for the 

 British Museum. 



The Society has now the advantage of exhibiting two living speci- 

 mens in its Menagerie'', presented by Mr. D. C. Janson of Shanghai, 

 on August 26th. Upon these and the stuffed specimen in the 

 British Museum, I propose to offer some remarks, accompanied by 

 a figure of the animal. 



The Chinese Alligator belongs to the genus Alligator in the re- 

 stricted sense ; its nearest ally is the North-American A. mississippi- 

 ensis, which differs from the Central and South-American forms 

 (^Caiman) chiefly in the presence of a bony septum dividing the 

 commonly single nasal aperture. However, the Chinese S()ecies 

 approaches the Caimans in the greater development of the bony 

 plate in tlie upper eyelid and in the presence of ossifications in the 

 ventral shields. These ossifications, however, are wide apart, neither 

 juxtaposed nor imbricate on an}^ portion of the ventral region. 



Among the characters hitherto given as diagnostic of A. sinensis, 

 two prove not to be constant : — 



1. The three pairs of nuchal scutes may be reduced to two, as 

 shown by the larger specimen in the Society's Menagerie; the other 

 specimen has an additional fifth scute on the right side, but it is small. 

 The three pairs are all present in the British-Museum specimen. 



1 Swinhoe, P. Z. S. 1870, p. 410. 



2 A. A. Fauvel, " Alligators in China," Journ. N. China Br. As. Soc. (2) 

 xiii. 1879, pp. l-3(), figs. 



^ O. Boettger, Ber. Offenb. Ver. Nat. 188S, p. 112. 



* I hear from my friend Dr. Boet.tger that two specimens Lave just been 

 received by the Zoological Gardens of Irankfort-on-the-Main. 



