SOUTH AFRICAN SPECIES. 171 



specimens at my disposal, except in two points : (1) in the 

 absence of the aual papillae, and (2) in the fact that the streaks 

 on the dorsal side of the feet were entirely absent in the first 

 nine pairs of legs. The legs of the last pair resemble, in all 

 respects, the preceding, and the genital opening is behind 

 them. 



One of these specimens measured 26 mm. and the other 

 30 mm. in length. 



Inasmuch as I have not been able to find any marked charac- 

 ters associated with the character afforded by the number of 

 legs, and further, as I have had no opportunity of ascertaining 

 whether the latter character is transmitted in reproduction, I 

 am inclined not to establish two distinct species but to regard 

 the specimens with twenty-two legs to be a variety of the species 

 Peripatus Moseleyi, which is distinguished by the possession of 

 twenty-one pairs of legs, and a subterminal genital opening 

 behind the last legs. 



Peters (No. 25) in a short paper on the variation of the 

 number of legs in P. capensis, states that the following speci- 

 mens were brought to him from Cape Town by a friend of his : 

 three specimens with 22 pairs of legs, eight with 21, eight with 

 20, one with 19, one with 18, and two with 17 pairs. He adds 

 that they were all found in the same locality, which, however, 

 is not mentioned. He gives no description of the specimens, 

 beyond mentioning the number of legs, and it is not therefore 

 possible to say whether he is right or not in his view that they 

 all belong to the species Capensis. I may add that, though 

 I have examined more than a thousand specimens from the 

 Cape Peninsula, I have only seen one specimen with more than 

 eighteen pairs of legs, and not one with less than seventeen 

 pairs. 



