| OCR Text |
Show 18G9.] DR. J. E. G R A Y O N A N E W F R E S H W A T E R TORTOISE 499 the male, the horns may be those of an individual monstrosity, and not of the normal form ; but this I consider to be very doubtful. If they are not quite of the normal form, it is clear they are not a monstrosity of the regularly forked horns of Furcifer. 3. Description of Mauremys laniaria, a New Freshwater Tortoise. By Dr. J. E. G R A Y , F.R.S. &c. (Plate XXXVII.) Mr. Bartlett has kindly obtained for me from a dealer a small young living freshwater Tortoise which had passed through several hands, and was therefore without any reliable history or habitat. MAUREMYS LANIARIA, sp. nov. (Plate XXXVII., young.) The head short, broad ; nose very short, broad, rounded; the eyes very large and prominent, on the side of the head ; front of face high; beak thick, convex; lips convex on the edge; central notch simple; lower beak short, convex externally; crown dark olive; neck minutely granular, blackish olive above, with some very narrow reddish lines underneath; sides and underside reddish, with many more or less wide black and green lines, those on the back of the throat widest. Legs dark olive; fore legs olive, with large, irregular, prominent tubercles in front, and with a broad irregular streak on the lower half of the front side ; the front toes or fingers short, thick, united by a narrow fleshy web to the claws, each finger with a series of larger triangular scales on the upper surface; claws short, acute. Hind feet large, square, the toes thick, united by a narrow fleshy web to the claws, and with one or two scales on the upper part of the base. Tail short, thick, granular, with some whorls of distant minute spines near the base (tip injured); the hinder part of a dark olive, with reddish streaks and minute spines. Thorax depressed, rounded above, the side margin slightly revolute, dark olive-green above ; the shields blackish horn-coloured, smooth or slightly annulated, and irregularly convex; the third, fourth, and fifth vertebrae slightly keeled; the marginal shields blackish olive, very obscurely and irregularly varied with reddish brown above and blackish beneath. The sternum flat, truncated in front, and notched behind, raised on the sides, black, more or less varied with white on the margin of the front and hinder lobes, and on the sides of the central plates. This animal is strictly carnivorous, and eats most ravenously in confinement. This Terrapin agrees in the dull dark plain colour with a species described by me in the ' Proceedings' of the Society for I860, under the name of Emys fuliginosus (p. 232, Rept. t. xxx.), which differs PROC. ZOOL. Soc-1869, No. XXXIII. |
