CROCODILIANS, I^IZARDS, AND SNAKES. 771 



prefrontals, and tlie frontal is occupied by the three small plates already 

 mentioned. This azygos is thus surrounded on the sides and poste- 

 riorly by three small plates (this number is sometimes greater). Rostral 

 broad and high, much recurved. Eyes moderate, situated posterior to 

 the center of imaginary line connecting the last labial and rostral, 

 which would pass nearly through its center. Loreal subtriangular, 

 acute above, scarcely reaching to the exterior angle of the postfrontal, 

 a small plate sometimes intervening. Nasal plates rather short and 

 high ; nostril occupying most of the posterior one, its infero-anterior 

 wall constituted by the first labial, its lower by a small inferior nasal 

 plate. Labials eight above; in one specimen of the six examined, there 

 are seven; they increase very rapidly from the diminutive first; fifth 

 and sixth largest; all much higher than broad. Lower labials nine. 

 Curve of upper jaw very convex and short. Temporals four on both 

 sides in five specimens; three on both sides in one. 



Scales back of the head short, curved, obsoletely carinated. Dorsal 

 rows of scales twenty-five, outer rows smooth, sometimes only three, 

 the carination slight, increasing to the medial row. Scales shorter and 

 broader than in the other type, becoming narrower on the back; those 

 behind rather narrower than before. Body contracted at the anus, 

 then expanding or swelling on the tail, which is thick throughout, taper- 

 ing to the tip. Scales on the tail longer and broader than those of the 

 upper part of the body in front; carination not very distinct, inferior 

 three rows truncated behind, especially the highest. 



A dorsal series of transverse black blotches, thirty-five from head to 

 tip of tail, the twenty- seventh opposite the anus. These are sometimes 

 oblique, but generally transverse, and with the anterior and posterior 

 margins parallel. They are about nine scales wide and three to four 

 long, with light-brownish yellow intervals one or one and a half scales 

 wide. On each si;^e and opposite the intervals is a distinct series of 

 subquadrate or circular black spots on the sixth to ninth rows, not 

 touching those on the back, and between them a dusky shade opposite 

 the dorsal spots. Below these again are usually two smaller blotches 

 to each spot. Intervals between the spots mottled yellowish-brown. 

 Beneath yellowish, with obsolete small brown blotches. On the tail 

 there are nine half-rings rather wider than the light intervals and 

 somewhat contracted above. 



A narrow black line crosses the forehead on the posterior half of 

 the prefrontals, and just margining the frontal; this passes through 

 the center of the eye and is continued to the posterior labial. A medial 

 patch of black, expanding behind, starts from the commissure of the 

 parietals, from which plates others, one on each side, pass across the 

 angle of the jaws, the three confluent with the dark color in the parie- 

 tals. In H. platyrhinus this medial patch is isolated and not in contact 

 with the occipital one. 



Some specimens from Abbeville, South Carolina, vary in having the 



