SYSTEMATIC ACCOUNT OF THE SPECIES. 261 



Type-locality: — Sierra de San Juan de los Perros, Province of Camaguey, Cuba. 



Type:— M. C. Z. 12,304 and four Paratypes M. C. Z. 13,438-13,441. 



Distribution: — Hill regions of Central Cuba. 



Diagnosis: — Large, sexually dichromatic, with large tectiform dorsals, about 

 six in distance from tip of snout to centre of eye, and having a middorsal granular 

 zone; the greatly enlarged dorsals beginning on the scapular region, not forward 

 on the neck as in anthracinus. Neck and shoulder-region covered with small 

 granules. 



Description: — Adult M. C. Z. 12,304. Cuba: Camaguey; Sierra de San 

 Juan de los Perros. Thomas Barbour. 



Snout pointed and elongate, the distance from the tip to the eye being dis- 

 tinctly longer than that from the eye to the ear-opening; rostral moderate with 

 a long median cleft behind; nostril between rostral, first supralabial, a large 

 supranasal and two small postnasals ; supranasal separated from its fellow on the 

 opposite side by a single roughly hexagonal scale about two thirds the size of one 

 of the supranasals, the three bordering the rostral above; four large and two 

 small supralabials to below the centre of the eye; a spine on the supercihary 

 margin over the centre of the eye; head above and on sides with extremely 

 minute granular scales; scales of the snout distinctly enlarged and pavement- 

 Uke dorsals at first very small and granular on the nuchal and scapular regions 

 then passing into the very large, heavily keeled scales of the back of which about 

 six equal the distance from the tip of snout to centre of eye ; the change from the 

 cephalic granules to the large dorsal scales is very gradual; it is very abrupt in 

 anthracinus and somewhat less so in copei; a very narrow median zone of very 

 small scales, most conspicuous on the nape and shoulder-region; mental large, 

 larger than rostral ; two very large inf ralabials and two very small ones to below 

 the centre of the eye ; two small, slightly elongate chin-shields behind the mental, 

 followed by small flat chest and throat rounded, imbricate, smooth, rather large, 

 not however, as large as the dorsals; scales of limbs much smaller, imbricate, 

 smooth or feebly keeled ; scales of tail small, rounded, slightly elongate, imbricate, 

 smooth, a rather mconspicuously enlarged series on the lower median surface of 

 the tail. 



Colour (in fresh specimen) : — Uniform iron-gray above, pale below, in the 

 male ; and in the female the ground-colour is bluish or stone-gray crossed on the 

 nape, shoulders, and body by pairs of black bands ; between these pairs of bands 

 there are also cross-series of dark dots. In the young the pairs of bands are 

 broad and conspicuous but the intermediate series of dots are absent. 



