Vol. XXIV, pp. 221-224. October 31, 1911 



PROCEEDINGS 



of Tin: 



BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



uj L 



THREE NEW SHREWS OF THE GENUS CRYPTOTIS. 



BY GERRIT S. MILLER, Jr. 

 [By permission of the Secretarj oi the Smithsonian Institution.] 



Among the Mexican and Central American shrews in the 

 United States National Museum are three specimens of Cryptotis 

 which differ so widely from members of the described species 

 that each must be regarded as the representative of a new form. 



Cryptotis gracilis sp. nov. 



Type.— Adult (skin and skull) No. Hfff> U. S. National Museum. 

 Collected at head of Lari River, near base of Pico Blanco, Talamanca, 

 Costa Rica, by Win. M. Gabb. Altitude about 6,000 feet. 



Diagnosis. — Size and general appearance as in the Cryptotis mexicana 

 group (including the Costa Rican C. orophila) ; skull narrow and elon- 

 gated, this peculiarity more pronounced than in the small G. tropicalis 

 and C. soricina. 



Color. — Entire animal a dark smoke-gray, the upperparts heavily 

 washed with blackish brown, the general effect darker and less plumbeous 

 than in a skin of C. orophila taken in February; under-color slate-gray. 



Skull. — The skull about equals that of Cryptotis mexicana or C. orophila 

 in length, but the width throughout is noticeably less, this peculiarity 

 equally appreciable in braincase, interorbital region, rostrum, and palate. 

 Braincase nearly circular in outline when viewed from above, the lateral 

 angles barely indicated; viewed from behind, it is conspicuously narrower 

 in proportion to its depth than in C. mexicana and C. orophila and 

 appreciably more so than in C. soricina and C. tropicalis. While the 

 braincase retains essentially the same depth as in the other species of 

 similar size, the rostrum is lower, so that the general outline of skull in 

 lateral view is more strongly cuneate. Antorbital foramen smaller than 

 in C. mexicana or C. orophila, but in same position, its posterior border 

 over space between in 1 and m 2 . Mandible decidedly more slender than in 

 mexicana and orophila, but not peculiar in form. 



Teeth. — Upper incisors and unicuspids similar in general to those of 



42— Peoc. Biol. Soc. Wash., Vol. XXIV, 1911. (221) 



