684 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1902. 



The blind-snakes are small burrowing snakes, smooth and nearly 

 cylindrical, and covered with rounded imbricate scales of nearly uniform 

 size and shape both above and below; only a few shields covering the 

 anterior portion of the head are clearly differentiated from the rest. 

 The eye is concealed under a large shield and may be shining through 

 as a blackish spot or be entirely invisible. They have teeth only in 

 the upper jaw, and there is no enlarged preanal shield. 



At the first glance they resemble earthworms, and like these animals 

 they live underground in self-made burrows. 



Two species of blind-snakes occur in Porto Rico, one of which is 

 here described as new. They may be distinguished as follows: 



a 1 Rostral moderate, one-third to one-fourth the width of the head; brown above, 

 whitish below; twenty to twenty-two scale rows T. lumbricalis, p. 684 



a' 2 Rostral very narrow, one-fifth to one-sixth the width of the head; uniform brown 

 above and below with an abrupt whitish spot on the underside of the snout 



and another on the underside of the tail; eighteen to twenty scale rows 



T. rostellatus, p. 686 



TYPHLOPS LUMBRICALIS'* (Linnaeus). 



1758. Anguis lumbricalis Linnaeus, Syst. Nat., 10th ed., I, p. 228 (type locality, 

 America). — Typhlops I. Oppel, Ordn. Rept,, 1811, p. 55. — Dumeril and 

 Bibron, Erpet. Gen., VI, 1844, p. 287 (Martinique, Guadeloupe, 

 Cuba). — Jan, Icon. Ophid., livr. 3, 1864, pis. iv, v, fig. 4. — Peters, 

 Mon. Ber. Berlin Akad. Wiss., 1876, p. 708 (Porto Rico).— Gundlach, 

 Anal. Soc. Espah. Hist. Nat., X, 1881, p. 312 (Porto Rico).— Stahl, 

 Fauna Puerto-Rico, 1882, pp. 70, 160 (Puerto Rico). — Boulenger, 

 Cat. Sn. Brit. Mus., I, 1893, p. 31 (Jamaica, Cuba, St. Thomas, Anti- 

 gua), III, 1896, p. 585. — Verrill, Trans. Connecticut Acad. Sci., 

 VIII, April, 1892, p. 351; author's separate p. 37 (Dominica) (or may 

 be platycephalitsf?). — Meerwarth, Mitth. Naturh. Mus. Hamburg, 

 XVIII,' 1901, p. 5 (St. Thomas, Haiti, Mona Island). 



1802. Anguis jamaicensis Shaw, Gen. Zool., Ill, p. 588 (type locality, Jamaica). 



1830. Typhlops cinereus Guerin, Icon. Regne Anim., Rept., pi. xviii, fig. 2 

 (Guadeloupe) (not of Schneider, 1801). 



1840. Typhlops ctibx Bibron, in Sagra's Hist. Fis. Pol. Nat., IV, Rept., p. 122, 

 pi. xxn ; French ed. (p. 204) (type locality, Cuba). 



1844. Typhlops richardii Dumeril and Bibron, Erpet. Gen., VI, p. 290 (type 

 locality, St. Thomas).— Dumeril, Cat. Meth. Rept, Mus. Paris, 1851, 

 p. 205 (St. Thomas, Cuba, Porto Rico). — Reinhardt and Luetken, Vid. 

 Meddel. Naturh. Foren. (Copenhagen), 1862 (1863), p. 164; author's 

 separate p. 12 (Virgin Islands). — Jan, Icon. Ophid., livr. 3, 1864, pis. 

 iv, v, fig. 7.— Garman, Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc, XXIV, 1887, p. 278 

 (St. Kitts). 



Dew'vption.— Adult; U.S.N.M. No. 27489; Aguadilla; July 28, 

 1900. Head rather depressed, snout strongly projecting, rounded 

 laterally; nostrils slightly below the lateral horizontal edge; rostral 

 about two-sevenths the width of the head (1:3.5), extending backward 

 to a line drawn between the anterior edge of the eyes; nostril on a 



a Resembling an earthworm, lumbricus. 



