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Show 64 DR. J. E. GRAY ON PTERONURA SANDBACHII. [Jan. 23, The Liverpool specimen has remained unique up to this time, and Pteronura was the only well-established genus of Mammalia wanting in the British-Museum Collection. In the latter end of 1867 the British Museum received from Dr. Krauss the skins of a large female Otter and its cub, under the name of Lutra brasiliensis, which had been obtained in Surinam by Mr. Kappler. As I had lately published a monograph of Mustelidee, including the species oiLutrince, in the * Proceedings of the Zoological Society' for 1865, these specimens were entered in the register, and put away for future examination. But the skin which Mr. Bartlett exhibited at the last Meeting having excited new interest as regards the specimens of Otters, the skins in store were examined, and it was soon seen that the Otter from Surinam was not the true Lutra brasiliensis, and was very nearly allied to, if not the same species as, the skin that Mr. Bartlett had exhibited. The specimen chiefly differs from Mr. Bartlett's skin in the tail being thick and strong, and convex on the upper and lower surface, nearly as in other Otters; so that the flatness of the upper and under surface of the prepared skin was doubtless produced by the preparation or dressing of it; and it was this excessive flatness that gave the tail such an artificial appearance. I believe that the tail of a Common Otter (L. vulgaris) might artificially be made to resemble the tail of that prepared skin. That there was considerable cause for scepticism I think is proved by the experiment that Mr. Bartlett himself made to see if the cordlike margins on the side of the tail were not artificially made, and would disappear in soaking and stretching. As soon as 1 discovered the Surinam Otter I thought it ought to be compared with the one from Demerara. I therefore wrote to the Secretary of the Royal Institution of Liverpool to request that they would allow the specimen, which I originally described, to be sent to the Museum for m e to examine it, and show it to the Zoological Society. He, most kindly and liberally, immediately granted my request, and, on a second application, allowed me to extract the skull of the specimen, in order that there might be no doubt on the subject of the specific identity, as there is a slight difference in the colouring of the throat, and also a very great difference in the size of the specimens. A careful examination and comparison of the specimen has satisfied me that the Demerara and Surinam Otters are of the same species. The specimen in Liverpool, from Demerara, is a very young animal, with its milk series of teeth. The tail of the Demerara specimen has the same marginal ribs as the Surinam one; but in the preparation it has been too much depressed on the sides, and the sides also are artificially extended, giving it a fin like appearance, which induced me to give it the name of Pteronura. Craspedura, or margined-tailed, would have been a much more appropriate one. The bones have been almost entirely extracted from the skin of the feet, and they have been evidently flattened by the stuffer. The size and flatness of the feet in this specimen, which gave the animal so much |