83 



ENGYSTOMA .—Fitzinger. 



Genus Engystoma. — Characters. Body oval, covered with a smooth skin; 

 head very small; mouth minute; jaws and palate without teeth; no post-tympanal 

 gland; tympanum concealed; anterior extremities with four fingers; posterior 

 short, with five toes, not palmated. 



ENGYSTOMA CAROLINENSE. 



Plate XL 



Characters. Body short, thick, nearly oval, covered with a delicate skin; 

 chestnut above, and thickly mottled with blackish specks beneath; head and mouth 

 larger than usual. 



Description. The general form of this animal approaches the oval; the skin 

 is smooth; the head remarkably small and short, though large for the genus; its 

 extent is marked by a delicate fold of the integuments behind the orbits; its 

 shape is triangular, the snout being very pointed; the upper jaw is dark brown, 

 the lower dark gray; the mouth is inferior and minute. The eyes are very small, 

 and but slightly prominent; the pupil is black, the iris very dark gray. The back 

 is round, somewhat flattened in the living animal, and smooth; dark brown along 

 the vertebral line, and chestnut on either side of it; the sides of the head and neck 

 below the orbits, and the flanks, are grayish; the throat and abdomen lighter, all 

 thickly sprinkled with blackish specks. The anterior extremities are chestnut- 



