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BULLETIN 17 7, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



specimens cataloged under the same number before they were lent to 

 Cope, who apparently separated them and described them three years 

 apart as types of separate species and with different data. 



Table 51. — Variations according to locality in Ameiva chrysolaema chrysolaema 



and A. c. affinis. 



Then Boulenger, who had no specimens of either vittipunctata or chrys- 

 olaema, and hence no way of guessing the great variability of the form, 

 placed vittipunctata in that part of his key based on the presence of a 

 small central group of enlarged gulars and three supraoculars, with 

 chrysolaema apparently easily separable into that section having all 

 the gular scales minutely granular and possessing four supraoculars. 

 Later Meerwarth applied Cope's name vittipunctata to the type of 

 Fischer's affinis. 



In 1915, Barbour and Noble suspected that there were two closely 

 related forms (i. e., chrysolaema and their so-called vittipunctata) on 

 Hispaniola, separable by the greater or lesser development of the bra- 

 chials, but unfortunately they also applied Cope's name vittipunctata 

 to the one with the small brachials, which should properly be called 

 affinis. Therefore, the published records of specimens of vittipunctata 

 seen by Barbour and Noble should go into the synonymy of affinis, 

 while Boulenger's, and probably Sclimidt's, belong under chrysolaema. 



The proper difFerentiation of this form and Ameiva chrysolaema 

 affinis required considerable search for even a single stable character. 

 The characters formerly used to distinguish them are exceedingly 

 variable or entirely untrustworthy. The best distinction, which can 



