502 NOTES ON NORTH AMERICAN SNAKES STEJNEGER. 



ruhellum. froiu Uvalde, Texas (R^pt. Batr. y. Am., I, 1SS3. Opbid., p. 

 130). He distiugiiislied it from L. duleis first by the number of scale 

 rows being fourteen and not fifteen, but Cope has already shown the 

 latter number to be erroneous (Proc. Phila. Ac, ISGl, p. 305). The next 

 point of difterence is the •' complete separation of nasals by the rostral," 

 but this is the C4jse in every one of the nine specimens of L. duJee ex- 

 amined by me, including the type. The next character relied upon is 

 the number of infralabials, these being five in ruhellum and four in did- 

 ciSj but here the original description of the latter is again at fault, for 

 in the type I count five infralabials. Finally ruhellum is stated to have 

 " only the anterior parietal (i. e., postocnlar) in contact with the poste- 

 rior labial," implying that in L. dulcis the posterior parietal (i. e., the par- 

 ietal jtroper) is also in contact with the posterior labial. So it is also 

 described in the original description, and, moreover, an examination of 

 the type shows that this is the condition of the left side of its face, 

 while on the right side the two shields ia question are separated by 

 another smaller shield, the normal condition, which is found in all the 

 other specimens. There can, accordingly, be no doubt that S. ruhellum 

 is only a synouym of X. dulcis. 



The occurrence of i. dulcis so far north is highly interesting, being 

 the northernmost locality on record, as Cook County adjoins the Indian 

 Territory. 



Lampropeltis multistrata Ken:n". 



A young specimen of this rare species was received through Dr. 

 Timothy E. Wilcox, C S. Army, from Glover P. Wilcox, who collected 

 it at Fort Zsiobrara. 2Sebra>>ka (U. S. Xat. Mus. Xo. 16103), thus con- 

 firming my suspicion that the habitat of the type specimen, as origi- 

 nally given by Kennicott, was correct, viz. Fort Lookout, ZSTebraska, 

 and that the later substitution of Fort Benton. Montana, rests on an 

 error (see Cones and Yarrow, Bull. U. S. Geol. and Geogr. Surv. Terr., 

 IT, 1878, p. 284). 



This specimen, although agreeing with the type in the more impor- 

 tant features, for instance, scale-rows twenty-three, and temporals two 

 and three, differs in many others. Thus the supralabials are seven and 

 not eight, as in the type, and the coloration is still more aberrant, for 

 while in the type the white dorsal interspaces hardly average more than 

 three scale-rows, in the Niobrara specimen they are nearly twice that 

 width; but as the red spots in the latter are rather narrower, the num- 

 ber of white spaces between head and vent is nearly alike, viz, twenty- 

 eight in the latter and thirty-one in the type. While in the type, 

 however, the black bordering to the red spots descends as far down 

 as to encroach upon the gastrosteges, in the Xiobrara specimen they 

 do not touch the gastrosteges at all; in the latter there is, moreover, 

 a very distinct black postocnlar black spot covering the lower postoc- 

 nlar and the lower temporal, a mark not found in the type. 



