SYSTEMATIC ACCOUNT OF THE SPECIES. 249 



Unfortunately this description does not allow us even to surmise what may 

 be the affinities of buergeri but if one may hazard a guess it is far from improbable 

 that the difference from molei which are assumed may be due to the difference in 

 the methods of observing by Boettger and Werner; for I strongly suspect that 

 both had the same species. 



18. Sphaerodactylus argus Gosse. 

 Plate 4, fig. 4; Plate 17, fig. 5-8. 



Sphaerodactylus argus Gosse, Ann. mag. nat. hist., 1850, ser. 2, 6, p. 347. 



Type-locality: — Jamaica. "Common in houses, in corners, and crevices." 



Types: — British Museum. A series of specimens. P. H. Gosse. 



Distribution: — Found very abundantly throughout the lowland regions of 

 Jamaica. It occurs at Mandeville but was not found in the highlands of eastern 

 Jamaica by the writer in 1909. It is very abundant in houses as well as in 

 suitable situations about cultivated and wild areas. 



Diagnosis: — Medium size, with small, keeled, slightly imbricate scales, 

 about ten or eleven equalling distance from tip of snout to centre of eye; about 

 fourteen small scales between the orbits ; a colouration of many distinct minute 

 ocellated spots. 



Description: — M. C. Z. 13,593. Jamaica: Constant Springs near Kingston, 

 1909. One of a large series (M.C.Z. 7,345). Thomas Barbour. 



Snout rounded, short; eye slightly nearer tip of snout than ear; rostral 

 small with median groove, and a crescentic groove on each half of the rostral as 

 well; nostril between rostral, a large supranasal and three small scales which 

 almost always occlude it from the first supralabial; suture of fourth and fifth 

 supralabial below the centre of the eye; superciliary spine present; head above 

 and on sides covered with small homogeneous granules, distinctly enlarged on 

 snout; dorsals small, keeled, slightly imbricating; about eleven equal the dis- 

 tance from tip of snout to centre of eye ; mental larger than rostral; followed by 

 a few enlarged postmentals; gular scales small fiat, roundish; ventrals over- 

 lapping, larger than dorsals, perfectly smooth; limbs partly covered with small 

 granules and partly with small, round, imbricate, smooth scales; scales of tail 

 rounded, smooth, strongly imbricate, not formmg whorls; large plates present 

 on lower surface. 



Colour: — Reddish or brownish with fine light spots on back and sides; on 



