1877.] J. Wood- Mason — On a Neivt from Snckim. 53 



ding quadriennial term 1877—1880, according to the above rules, except that 

 in obedience to the testator's wishes it can only be conferred on an Italian. 

 And so on, every four years there will be a Bressa Prize for com- 

 petition among scientific men of any part of the world, and every four years 

 a Bressa Prize, which can be competed for by Italians only. 

 Turin, December 7th, 1876. 



The President oftlie R. Academy 

 Fedeeigo Sclopis. 

 Tlie Secretary oftlie Class The Secretary of the Class 



of Physical and Mathematical of Moral, Historical and Fhilological 

 Sciences. Sciences. 



ASCANIO SOBEEEO. GaSPEEE GoEEESIO. 



Mr. Wood-Mason exhibited a specimen of a Newt, which he had de- 

 tected in a small collection of insects and other objects recently made by 

 Colonel G. B. Mainwaring in the Darjiling hills and said : — " The specimen 

 is in the highest degree interesting not only as being the first example of 

 Tailed Amphibian that has ever been found in India, but also as being an 

 individual of the remarkable species described by Dr. J. Anderson (P. Z. S. 

 1871, p. 423) from specimens obtained by him around the little Chinese 

 town of Nantin and in various other parts of the same region. Tylototriton 

 verrucosus, as the animal has been called by Dr. Anderson, lives, in 

 Western China, in flooded rice-fields, but in Sikkim, according to Colonel 

 Mainwaring, in damp situations amongst decaying leaves and sticks. There 

 is, however, nothing remarkable in this difference of habit, for the common 

 eft of Europe is not unfrequently to be found on dry land at some 

 distance from water under logs of wood, there being no necessity for the 

 Urodelous Amphibia, after they have passed through that stage of their 

 existence during which they are provided with external gills for aquatic 

 respiration, to keep to the water. The entire order of Tailed Amphibia 

 is confined to the temperate parts of the northern hemisphere, but two 

 species have already been described from countries the fauna of which is 

 largely leavened by Indo-Malayan forms, Cynops chinensis having been 

 recorded from near Ningpo and Plethodan persimilis from Siam. This 

 occurrence of a newt within the limits of the Oriental region is far from 

 being without a parallel in other groups of animals also ; livedo gale {vide 

 W. T. Blanford, P. A. S. B., 1876, p. ), Anurosorex, probably also 

 Crossopus, and a host of animals, vertebrate and invertebrate, extending 

 still further southwards, being only to be looked upon as stragglers from 

 the Palsearctic region, or as outposts of it, to use the happy phrase of Dr. 

 Giinther. The only other form of newt at all resembhng T. verrucosus, 

 in which horny matter accumulated at the points where the ends of the ribs 

 project against the external integument forms on each side of the middle 

 line of the body along the upper side of the flanks a conspicuous row of great 



