ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 



IT is difficult, in type, to express my sincere appreciation for the 

 hearty assistance I have received, in the preparation of this work. 



To Director William T. Hornaday, of the New York Zoolog- 

 ical Park, I wish to express my thanks and esteem, for his en- 

 couragement and suggestions. The most pleasant period of 

 my life, has been the seven years past, spent in the Zoological 

 Park in charge of the collection of reptiles. Nowhere else but 

 in a reptile house like that erected by the New York Zoological 

 Society, could one find such opportunities to observe reptiles at 

 their best. A number of the photographs are of specimens that 

 have been exhibited at the Park. 



My thanks are also extended to Dr. Leonhard Stejneger, 

 Curator of Reptiles, at the United States National Museum for 

 assistance in the identification of specimens. 



To Director Arthur Erwin Brown, of the Philadelphia 

 Zoological Gardens, I am indebted for much helpful advice. 



For courtesies that have been valuable in the preparation of 

 this book, I wish to thank Dr. Samuel Carman and Mr. Thomas 

 Barbour, in relation to reptiles at the Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology, at Cambridge, Massachusetts. Through the coopera- 

 tion of these gentlemen, photographs of a number of very 

 rare species were procured. 



To the following gentlemen I also wish to extend my thanks: 



Mr. C. S. Brimley, Raleigh, North Carolina; Dr. John Van 

 Denburgh, San Francisco, Calif.; Mr. Herbert Lang, Am. Mus. 

 of Nat. Hist., New York; Mr. Morris Pearsall, New York; Mr. 

 Adam Dove, New York; Mr. Otto Eggling, New York; Mr. Wit- 

 mer Stone, Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, Pa. ; Prof. 

 E. L. Moseley, Sandusky, Ohio. 



In conclusion I wish to express my obligations to Keepers 

 Charles Snyder and John Toomey, of the Reptile House, in 

 the New York Zoo logical Park. 



New York RAYMOND L. DITMARS. 



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