97 



General Hardwicke [P.], 

 E. I. Company [P.]. 



Zool. Soc. Coll. 

 Zool. Soc. CoU. 

 Rev. G. Brown [0.]. 

 M. Lidth de Jeude. 



10. MELONYCTERIS. 



Melonycteris* Dobson, P. Z. S. 1877, p. 119. 



Miizzle long, narrow, cylindrical ; nostrils projecting slightly ; 

 upper lip with a vertical groove bounded laterally by naked raised 

 edges, as in Pteropus and Gynoplerus ; index finger with a distinct 

 claw ; metacarpal bone of middle finger as long as the index finger ; 

 wing-membrane from the sides of the body and from the dorsal sur- 

 face of the base of the middle toe ; taU none. 



Dentition. Inc. 2^15, c. j^, pm. g^, m. g^. 



First upper and lower premolars very small, close to the base of 

 the canines ; molars close together, very narrow, scarcely elevated 

 above the gum. 



Tongue very long and narrow, as in Macroylossus. 



This genus is most closely related to Macroglossus, with which it 

 agrees in the general form of the skull and in the mode of attach- 

 ment of the wing-membrane to the sides of the body, but is dis- 

 tinguished by the very different position and size of the first pre- 

 molars, by the origin of the wing-membrane from the middle toe 

 instead of from the base of the fourth, and by the form of the ex- 

 tremity of the muzzle. 



1. Melonycteris melanops. 



Melonycteris' melanops, Dobson, P. Z. S. June 1877, p. 119, figs. 4-7 



and pi. xvii. 

 Pteropus (Cheiropteruges) alboscapulatus, Pierson Ramsay, Proc. 



Linn. Soc. New South Wales, July 1877, p. 17. 



Slightly smaller than Eonycteris spelcea, Dobson, which it resembles 

 closely in the external form of the muzzle ; nostrils as in Cynonyc- 

 teris amplexicaudata, but scarcely so prominent, separated by a deep 

 groove which passes down to the upper lip, where it becomes narrower 

 and is margined as in Cynopterus by raised naked edges ; tongue 

 very long, much attenuated in terminal fourth, armed with long re- 

 curved brush-like papiUse ; ears about as long as the muzzle, oval, 

 rounded oS above, the" outer and inner margins of the ear-conch 

 equally convex, so that the ear attains its greatest width in the 



middle. 



Interfemoral membrane very short behind ; no trace of a taU in 



* jifiXov, tree-fruit; vvKrepis, a bat. 



