234 SPHAERODACTYLUS. 



regions; again the vermiculations may appear to be dark upon a light ground- 

 colour; there is considerable variation. Never, however, has any tendency to 

 cross-banding been observed, the striping is invariably longitudinal. 



Dimensions: — Total length 76 mm. 



Tip of snout to vent 35 nun. 



Vent to tip of tail 41 mm. 



Greatest width of head 6 mm. 



Tip of snout to ear 9 mm. 



Fore limb 10 mm. 



Hind limb 11 mm. 



Remarks: — A common, perhaps the commonest of the house-inhabiting 

 members of the genus. It becomes quite tame and fearless and its smooth 

 satin-like skin make it extremely attractive to observe. It is the only one of the 

 large members of the genus which does not have much enlarged, imbricating 

 scales. The flat depressed snout and forehead are quite characteristic, as is the 

 beautiful dove-gray colouration, either finely punctate or with short vermiculate 

 longitudinal markings. 



For years I have searched in vain for the young of this species. I have 

 never found the freshly emerged. Therefore, and not without reason, I felt that 

 possibly elegans might represent the young of cinereus; until finally in the woods 

 of the high Sierra Maestra at a tiny mountain hamlet called Pozo Prieto de los 

 Negros en Jiguanf, I found a half-grown individual. This, with two adults 

 found in the dark high forest near by, was coloured very differently from the 

 great store of adults I had found in houses in many places. They were darker 

 and the scattered white spots had distinct dark borders so that all three were 

 speckled with many fine ocelli. They may represent a local race. Anyw'ay the 

 type of colouring is one often assumed by forest -living forms, as witness Lepi- 

 dophyma. I once thought that nigropunclatus was the species which Gundlach 

 confused with the Jamaican argus but I am now convinced it was this eastern 

 forest-loving cinereus which he had. 



The name cinereus has commonly been ascribed to MacLeay, P. Z. S., 1834 

 p. 12. This, however, is not correct. Dr. Stejneger calls my attention to the 

 fact that Wagler recognized that Lac^pede's sputateur was a composite species 

 and he leaves the "Gecko sputateur d bandes" as S. sputator Sparrmann (now 

 S. copei) while Wagler names the plain coloiired specimen figured by Lacepede, 

 Quad. Ovip., 1788, 1, pi. 28, fig. 1, Sphaerodactylus cinereus. 



