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Show 1900.] ON THE EARTHWORMS OF THE GENUS AMYNTAS. 609 [I have identified the single specimen with Sundevall's Chloropeta icterina, a species about which very little is known. It differs from G. natalensis in its more slender bill and greener plumage, in which the head is like the back. It is much smaller than C. masaica, and has not the dusky-brown head of the latter. - R . B. S.] 56. TERPSIPHONE CRISTATA. Terpsiphone cristata (Gm.): Sharpe, Ibis, 1892, p. 304; Shelley B. Africa, i. p. 99 (1896). 3 No. 8. cf ad. Nairobi, July 12, 1899. Bill and eyelids cobalt-blue ; feet leaden blue. Somewhat common, and found frequenting the forest shambas near Nairobi. 4. A Revision of the Earthworms of the Genus Amyntas (Perichaita). By F R A N K E. B E D D A R D , M.A., F.R.S., &c. [Received May 9, 1900.] There can be no doubt that this " difficult and extensive genus urgently requires revision. There has been no comprehensive essay upon the whole series of species comprised in the genus (which I will attempt to define presently) save in my ' Monograph of the Oligochaeta.' Since the appearance of that work a very large number of new species have been described, or at least a large number of new nairfes given to members of this genus. In view of recent investigations, the 79 species described in my Monograph should probably be reduced to not more than 56. Some 50 new species may now be added. I have lately gone through my very large collection of Perichceta- or Amyntas as it should unfortunately be called !; and in doing so have noted a number of small facts of systematic, rather than of anatomical, interest which are new. As these concern a considerable number of species and refer to several hundreds of individuals, I was compelled to make for my own use a list of the species of the genus as I defined them. It has appeared to me that the best way of recording these new facts would be in the shape of a revision of the entire genus : this will doubtless be criticised ; but I believe that it will at least serve as a means of determining a supposed new form more easily than can be done at present with the scattered literature. 1 Micbaelsen ("Terricolen von verschiedenenGebieten der Erde," Jahrb Hamb wiss. Anst, xvi.) has pointed out that the name Perichceta, having been used for a genus of Diptera, must be dropped, and that the name Amyntas, formerly dropped on account of its being merely a synonym of Perichata, must be reinstated. Dr. Horst (Zool. Anz. 1900) traverses this conclusion and would retain Perichceta for the worm, since it is not a valid dipteran genus. It seems to m e impossible to avoid the conclusion that a name once used cannot be used again for another genus. |
