822 



REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1898. 



with a median groove iu continuation of tlie interparietal suture; nos- 

 tril large, opening between the two large nasals and overhung by the 

 prominent lower edge of the supranasal; the loreal proper high and 

 narrow, surmounted by a small supraloreal which joins the supranasal, 

 the upper preorbitals, and the prefrontals, being a detached portion of 

 the latter; between the loreal proper and the supralabials two small 

 subloreals; three preoculars, upper largest and not in contact with the 

 frontal; two suboculars; four postoculars; three anterior temporals, 

 upper largest; six supralabials, the two posterior largest (on the left 

 side a narrow portion of the last is divided off anteriorly by a vertical 

 sutnre not shown in the figure), none in contact with orbit; nine infra- 

 labials, the first five largest; mental triangular, with two well-defined 

 concavities on the anterior border ; only one pair of large, broad geneial 

 shields, with a straight anterior border joined in its whole length by 

 the posterior border of the first infralabials, the lower border of the 

 second infralabial only meeting the lateral border of the geneial; a 

 small scale wedged in between the geneial and the fourth and fifth 

 infralabials probably represents the second pair of geneials. Scales 



Fig. 185. 



PHYLLORHTNCHDS BROWN! STEJNEGER. 



X2. 



nearly equal, in nineteen rows, those on the anterior third of the body 

 nearly smooth, but becoming gradually more distinctly keeled posteri- 

 orly; gasterosteges, one hundred and fifty-nine; anal entire; urosteges, 

 thirty-one pairs. Tail rather blunt. 



Dimensions. — Total length, 325 mm. ; length of tail from anus, 42 mm. ; 

 proportion of tail to total length = 1 : 7.75. 



Coloration [in alcohol). — White, with fifteen "seal brown" blotches 

 on the back from head to tip of tail, becoming palo posteriorly; the 

 first of these blotches, which begins three scale rows behind the parie- 

 tals is of a uniform dark color, rather long and nearly hourglass-shaped, 

 its anterior border being concave, and the antero-lateral corners pro- 

 duced to the angle of the mouth, and nearly meeting the posterior ends 

 of a broad line of dark color which runs from the upper posterior labials 

 on one side through the eye across the interorbital space down to the 

 hinder labials on the other side; the other blotches are more or less 

 square with rounded corners, the middle portion being lighter — the 

 dark color only "powdered" over the white ground — with dark borders. 

 The anterior and i)osterior borders wider than the lateral ones, the 



