marginal, whereas in B. petersi (see figure of the type of B. ocellata) the sixth
marginal is completely excluded from touching the inguinal, with which the seventh
marginal forms a very broad suture, with nearly the anterior half of the outer
margin of the inguinal having the eighth marginal forming the suture along
its latter half, the eighth marginal being all but excluded from touching the inguinal.
The under surface of the plastron of B. ocellata is somewhat more concave
than in B . petersi.
The two males which I have observed are full grown, but considerably smaller
than the female which was also adult, and the relative proportion between the
sexes is given in the following table. The male differs only from the female in its
smaller size and slightly less elevated and narrower shell:— j
Adult 5 - Adult $
Axillary breadth . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Inguinal „ . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Depth of shell ¿ ........................................' . . . . . .
Inches.
2-28 220
23 3
Inches.
.7-70
6-65
3 6 0
3-47
370
The head is much more pointed than in B. ocellata, the muzzle is relatively
longer, and the portion below the nostrils much more backwardly sloped than in B.
ocellata. The skin of the neck is covered with granules, much in the same way as
ini?, ocellata, and the limbs with small scales, as in Batagwrs generally, but B.
petersi has three rather large yellow scales, a little above the base of the first toe.
The coloration of the two species is markedly distinct; the shell of B. ocellata
is brown-olive, with a large dark-brown round spot in the centre of each of the
costáis, surrounded by a pale areola, with a dark external border; the centre of
each vertebral is also occupied by an elongated dark-brown spot with a pale-
areola around it, and each marginal also shows a tendency to form a brown spot
like the foregoing. B. petersi, on the upper surface, is blackish, with a pale
narrow greenish-yellow line along the margins of the vertebráis, and a light
yellow line along the margins of the costáis, with a bright yellow margin, as iñ
B. tb/urgi, along the outer edge of the marginals. Each costal is occupied by a
narrow pale greenish ring, the centre of which is the dark black of the upper
surface of the shell generally; a narrow greenish-yellow line passes outwards
through the middle of each marginal, and these marginal lines tend to join with
each other above, external to the yellow costal rings, and to form marginal rings, but
they are imperfect at the margin, due to the broad yellow border of the marginals.
There is also a distinct tendency, in yellow lines given off from the vertebral
aspect of the costal rings, to the formation of another series of costo-vertebral
rings, but these rings are generally broken and become imperfect as they touch the
vertebráis. A yellow line runs through the nuchal and vertebráis almost to the
last vertebral, and from the posterior end of each shield, at the ridge, a greenish line
runs forwards from each of its sides to form a triangular figure, the two lines not joining
each other at the anterior end of the shield, but these yellow lines correspond
to the well-defined rings of the costals and the imperfect rings of the marginals.
The plastron is rich orange-yellow, but the axillary and the sixth and seventh
marginals below are occupied by a dusky central area. The front, sides, and top of
head, and the anterior portion of the neck above, are rich olive-black, fading on the
posterior portion of the neck above to olive-brown, the rest of the neck being of
this colour. A narrow yellow line on the upper surface of the head runs from between
the eyes backwards. A yellow line stretches from the upper margin of the nostrils
backwards, along the upper margin of the orbit; a narrow line from behind the aye
over the upper margin of the ear, fades away on the side of the neck; a narrow
yellow line, from below the nostril along the side of the face, extends to the angle
of the mouth, and slightly backwards; the line of the opposite side begins as a
separate line by itself, but occasionally imperfect at its beginning. A yellow line
runs along the lower margin of the under jaw; the divergent yellow lines on the
throat commence posterior to the orifices of the mental glands. The eye is black.
The limbs above are covered with blackish scales, the inner and outer margin of each
limb having a pale narrow yellow line, and two yellow lines down the upper surface
of the limb; claws blackish.
The skull is very much narrower and much more pointed than in B. (M.)
ocellata, and this character comes out also in the lower jaw; and in this narrow
character it is very different from the head of the types of B. ocellata in Paris.
Like B. ocellata it has all the palatal and mandibular characters of B. thurgi.
The structure of the soft parts is much the same as in B. ocellata. In the large
dilatation which marks the beginning of the large intestine, after which the intestine
again contracts to a small size, I found a great multitude of an Ascaroid worm.
There are some osteological differences between the two species; the neck of
B . petersi being somewhat proportionately longer than the neck of B . ocellata,
the bodies of the cervical vertebrae of the former being the longer of the two. The
nuchal plate, in an adult female of B. ocellata, is nearly twice as broad anteriorly
as in B. petersi, and the outer anterior portion of the plastron is very much larger
in B. petersi than in B. ocellata, and the hyoplastral elements are considerably
longer in the mesial line than in B. ocellata, the post-inguinal area of the plastron
of B. petersi being considerably broader than that of B. ocellata.
Blyth was the first to discover this species in Bengal. In 1859 he obtained
two living specimens in the Calcutta bazaar, and being misled doubtless by the circumstance
that the types of B. ocellata were stated by Dumdril and Bibron to have
been obtained in Bengal, he re-named the Burmese species B. berdmorei. The evidence
I have adduced regarding the structure and disposition of the plates of the
species, and which can be tested with the drawing of the type, and which have been
verified by actual inspection of the types in Paris, establishes, as I have already said,
that the true JEJ. ocellata was the Burmese form, and therefore that Belanger’s
specimens were not from Bengal, where JEJ. ocellata is unknown.