50 BULLETIN 58, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



of ribs. The Aglossa are onh' found in Africa and South America; 

 the other two suborders are represented within our area. 



Suborder COSTATA. 

 1879. Costati Lataste, Act. Soc. Linn. Bordeaux, XXXIII, 1879, p. 339. 



Sahentia having a tongue; eustachian tubes, when present, with 

 two pharyngeal openings; ribs present and a pair of transverse proc- 

 esses near the proximal end of the coccyx. Larvse with one spiracu- 

 luni in the middle of the thoracic region. 



The Costata, wliich embrace only one family, the ])iscoglossid3e, 

 have a veiy wide and disconnected distribution showing their great 

 antiquity and fully bearing out the verdict of Professor Howes, based 

 upon anatomical investigations, that they are "by far the least 

 modified of living anura." " 



The principal center of distribution at present is central and south- 

 ern Europe, where three genera together with five species are at 

 home, one of these species extending its range into northwestern 

 Africa and another into central Russia. At the other extreme of 

 the Palearctic region another species of one of the European genera 

 maintains its isolated existence, namely, the species to be treated of 

 in this work, while in the Yunnan region another one has recently 

 been discovered. Two more genera belong to this family, both 

 widely removed from the above, namely, Liopelma, the single species 

 of which is the only batrachian occurring in New Zealand to which 

 antipodal island group it is peculiar and where it seems to be very 

 rare, and Ascaphus, represented thus far by two specimens only, of 

 a single species, A. truei, which has recently been discovered in the 

 State of Washington, not far from the Pacific coast. The extreme 

 rarity of the last two species would seem to indicate that they are 

 nearing extinction.'' 



Family DISCOGLOSSID.E. 



Only this family is included in the suborder. 



Genus BOMBINA'' Oken. 



1816. Bombina Oken, Lehrb. Zool., II. \). 207 (type, Rana bombina). 

 1820. Bovibinator Merrem, Tent. Syst. Amph., p. 178 (same type). 

 1830. Bombitator Wagler, Nat. Syst. Amph.. p. 206 (emendation). 



aProc. Zool. Soc. London, 1888, pp. 178, 506. 



6 See Stejneger, A Resume of the Geographical Distribution of the Discoglossoid 

 Toads in the Light of Ancient Land Connections, in Bull. Amor. Geogr. Soc, 

 XXXVII, No. 2, Feb. 1905, pp. 91-93; and The Geographical Distrilnition of the Bell- 

 Toads, in Science (n. s.), XXII, Oct. 20, 1905, p. 502. 



cFrom the medieval Latin verb bombinair, to utter a bontbiis, a loud hollow .^ound, 

 euch as the stroke of a bell. 



