368 PROF. W. J. DAKIN ON THE 



Bi-idgetown, by a Mr. Lea and named by Fletcher (Proc. Linn. 

 Soc. N.8.W. 1895 (2) x.). Twelve yeai\s later, Peripatus was 

 found in another locality much farther north, in the hills at 

 Armadale, only about 18 miles from Perth. Specimens of these 

 collected by Mr. H. M. Giles were sent to Professor Baldwin 

 Spencer. He found them to belong to a new species, and in a 

 short paper, published (12) in 1909, named it /-". gilesii after the 

 collector. Specimens of the supposed third species had been 

 collected four years before this, i.e., in 1905, by a CTerman 

 Expedition (The Hamburg Exped. of Michaelsen and Hartmeyer). 

 They were also collected near Perth and in the hills. These 

 specimens were sent to Bouvier, who wrote a detailed description 

 of the anatomy and discussed the relationships of the species to 

 other known Australian forms. Bouvier's paper (3) appeared in 

 1909, the same year in which Spencer's description of P. gilesii 

 was published. The supposed occurrence of two species in the 

 same district and the fact that both descriptions appeared in 

 the same year aroused the curiosity of the present author, find 

 the result of his investigatioriS (see Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 

 June 1914) confirmed his suspicioi:is. Peripatoides looodioardi 

 and Periiyatoldes gilesii turned out to be one and the same sjjecies, 

 and since Spencer's description was published some months before 

 Bouvier's paper, the name P. gilesii took precedence over 

 P. ivoodwardi. The fullest account of the species is, however, 

 to be found in the paper of Bouvier (3) under the name of 

 P. ivoodwardi. Now, since the previous publication of the writer 

 (Dakin, Pi-oc. Zool. Soc. 191 4), an exploration to the S. W. resulted 

 in the collection of over 100 specimens of the Peripatus first 

 made known from West Australia, i. e., Peripatoides occidentalis. 

 The conseqiience was that the entire question was reopened. 

 About 100 specimens of P. gilesii were collected for the j)urpose 

 of a detailed examination and comparison of both species, the 

 northern and southern. The conclusion of this research was 

 rather surpi'ising. In all the peculiarities that mai-ked the 

 northei'u species (P. gilesii) the southern species agieed. The 

 difl:erence between the two forms was so slight that we could not 

 regard them as more than varieties. 



Thus we have reduced the number of species of Peripiatoides in 

 "West Australia from three to one. The southern type must 

 retain the name Peripatoides occidentalis — the northei'u foi'm 

 should be known as Peripatoides occideidalis viw. gilesii. Further 

 than this, however, a detailed investigation of the specimens has 

 shown that Bouvier's description of tlie anatomy contains sevei'al 

 inaccuracies, some of which are decidedly important from the 

 point of view of comparisons. These inacctu-acies are without 

 doubt excusable, for the number of specimens at the disposal of 

 Bouvier was small and the preservation could not have been all 

 that was to be desired. 



