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Show 1887.] FROM THE SOLOMON ISLANDS. 327 Surgeon Guppy and Mr. Woodford obtained it in considerable numbers. For a comparison of the Chiropterous fauna of the Solomons with that of the neighbouring islands, it fortunately happens that the Bats of the nearest group, viz. that of New Britain, New Ireland, and Duke of York, have been fully worked out by Dr. G. E. Dobson1, who based his papers on the specimens obtained in those islands bv the Rev. George Brown. These specimens are all in the Natural History Museum, so that I have had the advantage of being able to compare Mr. Woodford's Bats directly with those named by the chief living authority upon Chiroptera. The following parallel lists show the species as yet known from the two groups, those marked with an asterisk being peculiar to their respective groups. MEGACHIROPTERA. New-Ireland group. Solomon group. Pteropus melanopogon. *Pteropus grandis. capistratus. hypomelanus. * rayneri. Cynonycteris brachyotis. Cynonycteris brachyotis. Harpyia major. Harpyia major. Cephalotes peronii. Cephalotes peronii. Macroglossus minimus. ^Melonycteris melanops. * Nesonycteris woodfordi. MlCROCHIROPTERA. Phyllorhina tricuspidata. Phyllorhina diadema. cervina. _- cervina. calcarata. *Vesperugo angulatus2. Vesperugo abramus. Kerivoula hardwickii. Emballonura nigrescens. Emballonura nigrescens. The New-Ireland group has therefore two, and the Solomon group three peculiar species, while there are five species common to both groups, a number that is certain to be largely increased as the islands are more fully explored. The proportion of fruit-eating to insectivorous Bats is larger by a slight fraction in the Solomons than in the other group, a difference only to be expected from the more oceanic position of the former. This position has also resulted, so far as is yet known, in the nearly entire absence of terrestrial M a m malia in the Solomons, the only other mammals besides Bats known from there being the arboreal and widely-spread Cuscus orientalis, Pall., and a Rat from Florida Island, described by Mr. E. P. Ramsay3. On the other hand, Mr. Brown collected in the New-Ireland group, as recorded by Mr. Alston4, no less than six indigenous 1 P. Z. S. 1877, p. 114, and 1878, p. 314. 2 Peters, SB. nat. Freund. 1880, p. 122. Only known to me by the original description. 3 Proc. Linn. Soc. N. S. W . vii. p. 43, 1882. This Eat appears to be a member of the arboreal genus Uromys. * P. Z. S. 1877, p. 123. |