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Show 1874.] DR. J. E. GRAY ON MULETIA SEPTEMCINCTA. 245 The animal is peculiar in having only six free regular dorsal rings, and a seventh ring that is partly separated from the hinder dorsal disk on the lower part of the sides. The tail is short, conical, thick, and depressed at the base, rather more than half the length of the dorsal disk, and composed of thirteen or fourteen rings, each consisting of two series of tessera. The ears are small and covered with very minute scales. The skeleton agrees very much in the form of the greater number of bones with that of the Tatou noir (Tatusia peba), figured by Cuvier (Oss. Foss. v. partii. t. x.), and differs chiefly from it in the breadth of the ribs, in the shortness of the tail, which is not two thirds of the length of the body, the shortness of the thirteen vertebrae of which it is composed, and in the great width of the lateral processes of the first six caudal vertebrae, the first of which is as broad as the sacrum; they gradually diminish in breadth as they proceed towards the end. The tail of the Tatou noir (Tatusia peba) consists of twenty-two or twenty-three vertebrae, and has much smaller lateral processes, and is much longer than the body and head. The skull is 2 inches 8 lines long, and 1 inch 2 lines wide at the zygomatic arch. The lachrymal bone is triangular, the lower side forming the front part of the keel of the zygomatic process. The nasal hones are slender, attenuated behind. The upper jaw has six teeth on each side, the front one slightly directed forwards; the lower jaw has seven teeth on each side, the two front ones more slender and directed forwards. Cuvier, in his 'Ossemens Fossiles' (v. p. 118) refers to this species the Armadillo noticed by Belon (Observations, p. 467) and Aldrovandi (Quadrup. Digit, p. 489); but I much doubt their knowing a species that appears to be confined to the pampas of South America, and believe that the resemblance depends on the rudeness of old figures and descriptions. Schreber, in his ' Saugethiere,' 1775, describes a species which he considers to be the Dasypus septemcinctus of Linnaeus (Syst. Nat. p. 54), and he refers to a plate, t. lxxiL, which is marked by mistake D.sexcinctus, Linn., quite different from the species which he figures under the same name in t. lxxi. B. The figure moderately well represents this species ; but the body has been elongated in stuffing, and the tail is too slender at the base; but this occurs also in the specimen in the Museum. D'Azara (Hist. Nat. Quadrup. 1801, ii. p. 186), under the name of Tatou moulet, says it is called Tatou m'bouriqua, on account of its having straight and parallel ears like a mule, but observes the ears are not so large as in the other species. M . Desmarest, who inserted it in the scientific catalogues, gave it the Latin name of Dasypus hybridus, I suppose as a translation of Azara's name; but w h y it should be called a mule or hybrid I cannot conceive, as no species can be more distinct in external appearance and anatomical characters. It cannot be a mule or hybrid between any two known species, as D'Azara justly observes. |