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Show 1892.J SPECIES OF THE HYRACOIDEA. 67 in the face of the fact that Mr. Blanford thoroughly hunted all the country between, specially looking out for Hyraces, without finding any trace of P. shoana until he penetrated as far south as the Wadela plateau, while the yellow-backed form was exceedingly common throughout the country from Massowa southwards. The skulls of the two forms unfortunately give no help in the matter, as they differ only in size; and although P. shoana ordinarily is far larger than what I consider as P. abyssinica, yet dwarfed individuals seem occasionally to occur, in which the skull is scarcely larger than in the latter species. Still, as a fact, the sizes of the skull and teeth of Ehrenberg's type specimens agree closely with those found in the ordinary Abyssinian form to which I refer them. 6. PROCAVIA PALLIDA. (Plate III.) Procavia pallida, Thos. Ann. Mus. Genov. (2) x. p. 908 (1891). Size small, form stout and squat. Fur very short, close, and crisp. Colour pale sandy grey, the hairs chocolate-brown basally, with a broad cream-coloured subterminal ring and a black tip. Rump rather more rufescent. Dorsal spot small, oval, pale creamy yellow, the peripheral hairs with a broader and the central ones with a narrower brown basal part, but none of them with darker tips. Skull (Plate III.) short, broad, and stout, in general appearance a miniature of the large-toothed Abyssinian forms P. abyssinica and ruficeps ; coronal and interparietal sutures persistent. Molars very large in proportion to the size of the animal, and in consequence of this the diastema is shorter than in any other known species, being only 5*6 m m . between the alveoli, and 5 between the teeth above, while in the lower jaw it is practically non-existent, p2 almost touching the outer incisor basally and only distant from it about 1 m m . terminally. It therelore leaves no room for p1, occasionally present in other species. M_l 6*9 m m . broad in the type ; ^ with a high crown, but, as it is somewhat worn, I can only say that it is more than 5*4 m m . high, that being its present height. pi gone in the type ; no doubt small and early deciduous. Hab. N. Somali-land. Type in British Museum (85. 11. 16. 4). This peculiar little species bears, within the typical Procavia with open interparietal sutures and large teeth, very much the same relation to P. abyssinica that P. brucei somalica does in the " Heterohyrax " group to P. b. typica, the geographical relations of each pair by no means positive about the opinion advocated in the text, the name of the Massowa Hyrax would be P. abyssinica typica, of the Shoan one P. abyssinica shoana, and of the ordinary N . Abyssinian one with yellow dorsal spot P. alpini, Gray. In this connection I must again express m y sincere thanks to Dr. Matschie for the patience and kindness with which he has borne the brunt of question after question about this unfortunate type of Hemprich and Ehrenberg's, a specimen which, in spite of all, must still remain a stumbling-block for naturalists until it is supplemented by a proper series of fresh examples collected exactly at the same place. |
