OCR Text |
Show 1871.] DR. J. E. GRAY ON THE BRADYPODIDA. 437 blainvillei or cuculliger; but it is most probably the former, as says that the throat is brown. Cuvier, in the 'Animal Kingdom,' edit. 1, vol. i. p. 217, says, "Sa couleur est grise, souvent tachetee sur le dos de brun et de blanc; plusieurs individus portent entre les epaules une tache d'un fauve vif que traverse une ligne longitudinale noire. On ignore s'ils forment espece." He adds, " O n connait un Ai dit le dos bride, parce qu'il a entre les epaules une tache noire entouree de fauve; ce n'est selon M. Temminck, qu'une variete resultant de ce que des longs poils de ses epaules sont uses." (Cuvier, Reg. Animal, ed. 2. p. 225.) Dr. John Wagler, in the ' Isis' for 1831, p. 604, wrote an essay on the genus Bradypus, of which he notices four species : - 1 . B. cuculliger, from Surinam, Cayenne, and Guiana ; 2. B. ai, from Brazil; 3. B. torquatus, Brazil; 4. B. infuscatus. He considers the female of B. cuculliger and B. infuscatus distinguished by an orange or yellow spot on the middle of the back between the shoulders; for he says particularly in the description of B. cuculliger, " Macula spince dorsi (in fcemina) pone humerum subrotunda, laete aurantiaca, medio longitudinaliter vitta aterrima dissecta" (p. 605), and that, in B. ai, "Macula spinee dorsi (in fcemina) pone humerum subrotunda, pilis adjacentibus plus minusve tecta, fuscescenti-flavida, vitta per medium nigrescente longitudinaliter signata; pili hujus macula, mollissimi sunt, quasi sericei;" and he describes a new species under the name of B. infuscatus with the following character:-" Intense fuliginoso-fuscus, seriebus macularum in dorso fuscescenti-albarum longitudinalibus quatuor ; fronte temporibusque flavido-albis ; vitta utrinque pone oculum oblique ad mentum de-ducta distinctissima fusco-atra inferius flavido-albo limbata; collo toto anteriore ac gastreeo noteei colore, immaculatis. Adult. " Pili appressiores quam in speciebus praecedentibus, multo breviores, ungues ac extremitates longiores, multo graciliores ; hi fusce-scenti- flavi; pedes supra albido maculati. " Longitudo 1' 11", caudae 1" 11'", antibrachii, exclusis unguibus 15", scelidum 8" 2'". " Habitat in Brasilia versus Peru." Dr. John Andreas Wagner, in the Supplement to Schreber's ' Saugthiere,' iv. 1844, p. 132, describes four species of Bradypus (including B. torquatus) ; but he evidently regards the orange mark on the back as the character of the male, and not of the female as Wagler had considered them. 1. B. pallidus, Wagner, he says, is B. tridactylus of Cuvier, and B. ai of Wagler; and at p. 143 he gives to it the following characters :-• " B. e rufescente pallide cano-lutescens; noteeo longitudinaliter albo-maculato; fronte alba; vitta utrinque post oculum oblique ducta fusca ; collo gastreeoque notaei colore, immaculatis; macula dorsali aurantio-fulva nulla." This cannot be the Bradypus ai of Wagler, which he thus describes : - " Cinereo-fuscescens sive rufescens, notseo tteniis duabus longitudinalibus albido-maculosis notato ; fronte alba ; vitta utrinque pone oculum oblique retrorsum ducta obscure fusca, |