252 



CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES [Proc. 4th Ser. 



fortunately no mark or label is attached to the specimen by 

 which its identification could have been placed beyond ques- 

 tion, so that, as Dr. Traquair says at the end of a letter to Dr. 

 Baur, "we have no absolute certainty as to whether our Tes- 

 tudo ephippium is the specimen from the South Sea presented 

 by Captain Basil Hall or not." 



Recently,^ Dr. Giinther has compared the type of his T. 

 ephippium directly with three specimens of the Abingdon tor- 

 toise and four specimens from Duncan Island. He finds that 

 the agreement of the Duncan Island specimens with the type 

 of T. ephippium is perfect, while marked differences exist be- 

 tween that specimen and those from Abingdon Island. 



After careful study of his descriptions, measurements, and 

 plates, in connection with my large series of specimens from 

 Duncan Island, I see no reason to doubt the correctness of 

 Giinther's conclusion that the name Testudo ephippium may 

 properly be applied to the Duncan Island tortoise. 



7. Testudo microphyes Giinther. 1875 



Testudo microphyes was first described by Giinther, in 1875, 

 from a small adult individual which he then thought was a 

 male, but which he later concluded was a female. This speci- 

 men was without definite locality. Giinther at first"^ thought 

 it represented the Hood Island race, but later^ identified it 

 with specimens from Tagus Cove, Albemarle Island. The 

 merging of the anterior two marginals of each side into a 

 single plate is probably, as Giinther remarked, only an indi- 

 vidual variation. 



Some measurements of the type specimen in the British 

 Museum were made for me, as follows : 



Straight length 21.3 inches 100% 



Straight width 15.85 



Length over curve 26.45 



Width over curve 26.5 



Width at 2-3d marginals 12.4 



Middle height 10.1 



Front height 6.8 



Height to marginals 9 



Length of plastron 17.6 



BNovitates Zool., in. No. 4, 1896, pp. 329-334. 

 TTrans. Royal Soc. Lond., 1875, pp. 260, 275. 

 SGigantic Land Tortoises Brit. Mus., 1877, p. 78. 



74.4% 

 124% 

 124% 

 58.2% 

 47.4% 

 32% 

 4.2% 

 82.6% 



