HERPETOLOGY OF PORTO RICO. 599 



Class REPTILIA. 



Order SQUAMATA. 



This order eiiibnicos the lizards and tlie snakes, which in most cases 

 may be easily told apart by the former possessing legs. A small 

 number of lizards, however, are entirely limbless, externally resem- 

 l)ling snakes very closely. The only limbless lizards in Porto Rico are 

 the amphisbffinians, which are readily distinguished from the snakes by 

 having no imln'icate scales, the integument being divided by longi- 

 tudinal and transverse grooves into squarish segments which form 

 regular rings around the })ody. 



Suborder SAURIA. 



The lizards form the most numerous group of the reptiles in Porto 

 Rico there being no less than nineteen species out of a total of twenty - 

 eight land reptiles. 



KEY TO THE LIZARDS OF PORTO RICO, ACCORDING TO GENERA. 



o ^ Four limbs. 



/>! Head above covered with numerous scales or small plates. 

 c^ Eyelids rudimentary, not conniving; pupil vertical (fig 40). ( Geklonklx. ) 

 d'^ Toes dilated at base, terminal phalanges compressed, free, raised angularly 



to the basal dilatation (figs. 44, 45) - Hemidactylus, p. 599. 



d'^ Toes dilated into a circular plate at tip only (fig. 50) 



Sph^rodactylus, p. 602. 



c - Eyelids well developed, functional ; pupil round Anolis, p. 625. 



d^Toes with marked dilatations, but no " combs" (fig. 83). [Igumiids'.) 

 d. 2 Toes simple; two of the posterior ones with lateral "combs" (fig. 



;i^25) Cyclura, p. 670. 



/>2 Head above with large, regular shields (fig. 67). 

 c^ Occipital shield absent. 



(^ Ventral scales in quincunx. [Sc'mcids:.) Mabuya, p. 607. 



d"- Ventral scales in squarish series. ( Teiidse. ) Ameiva, p. 612. 



c' Occipital shield present (fig. 73). {Anguidie.) Celestus, p. 621. 



a- No limbs. {AmpUshienklse. ) Amphisb.ena, p. 675. 



Genus HEMIDACTYLUS" Oken. 



1817. Hemidactylus Oken, Isis, 1817, p. 1183 (based on Cuvier's H'emidactyles, 



type ' ' Gecko tuberculeux Daudin " ) . 

 1843. Tachybates Fitzinger, Syst. Rept., p. 105 (type H. mnhmua). 



HEMIDACTYLUS MABOUIA '' ( Moreau de Jonnes.) 



1818. Gecko maboula Moreau de Jonnes, Bull. 8oc. Philom. Paris, 1818, p. 138, 



(type locality, St. Vincent); Monogr. du Gecko mabouia, 1821, p. 1.— 

 Hemidactylus m. Dumeril and Bibron, Erpet. Gen., Ill, 1836, p. 362 

 (Martinique).— DuMERiL, Cat. Meth. Kept. Mus. Paris, I, 1851, p. 



<'f/Mi, half; dccKruXoi, digit. ^'A Caribbean name attributed to several lizards. 



