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Show 8 MR. E. W. WHITE ON CHLAMYDOPHORUS TRUNCATUS. [Jan. 6, quent subjects of variation. The veins also are not regular. These differences are as numerous and as marked as those in man. Our observations point to important affinities, and, we have reason to believe, may direct attention to conclusions by no means as yet generally received. So we are in hopes that we have not overestimated the importance of our subject. Investigation of varietal modification of domesticated animals should teach us the general laws and methods of modification, and thus bear fruit in advancement of the science of anthropology, in promoting the scientific management of our animal servants, and in rendering our knowledge more exact with regard to those forms which inhabited the earth in bygone ages. 2. Notes on Chlamydophorus truncatus. B y E. W . W H I T E , F.Z.S. Lond., and F.Z.S. Reip. Arg. [Received Dec. 9,1879.] During my recent travels through the western provinces of the Argentine Republic, this beautiful little plantigrade aberrant member of the Armadillo family enticed me, in the month of August 1879, to undertake a ride of forty leagues from Mendoza and a diligent search for six days in company with a large number of men, in order to obtain a better knowledge of its habits. The range oi Chlamydophorus truncatus extends in latitude from the valley of Sonda, province of San Juan, 31° S. lat., down to San Rafael, seventy leagues S. of Mendoza, 34° S. lat., and in longitude from San Luis to the Andes. In the same neighbourhood are found three species of true Dasypodidae. I was fortunate enough to secure one living specimen of the Chlamydophorus, which, in spite of the utmost attention, survived capture only three days; in fact, no instance has occurred of a longer survival than eight days in captivity. The usual drawings of this animal in zoological works are erroneous in more than one particular ; for instance :- (a) The tail is represented as flexible and terminating in a somewhat flattened though, on the whole, solid pointed paddle-whereas it is almost perfectly inflexible, the paddle at the extremity being completely flattened and rounded at the vertex. ($) The fringe attached to the inferior edge of the scute is depicted as continuous, and drooping from the outer margin of one eye completely round to the outer margin of the other: the fact is, whilst the silky fringe from the lateral surface of the scute is drooping and inclined towards the tail, that issuing from the ultimate enlarged ring o** the dorsal carapace, uniting with that from the exterior ring of the truncated extremity, forms a double somewhat bristly fringe standing out pretty well at right angles to that truncated extremity. |
