108 BITLLETTN 61, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



their greater agility. Like the adults, they steadily refused earth- 

 worms, but at the age of three days took to the water and captured 

 and ate live minnows voraciously. Their manner of catching fish 

 was interesting. Dropping or chmbing into the basin they would 

 rush about, mouth open, until they encountered a fish, when they 

 would rush out of the water, lashing their tails energetically, carry 

 the fish to a corner and proceed to devour it. The sense of sight 

 seemed to be depended upon but little in capturing fish, and dead 

 ones were eaten apparently as frequently as live ones. 



Range. — As at present known the range of sackeni is confined to 

 the southern part of the coastal plain, in southern Mississippi and 

 Florida. This physically recent feature with its low altitude (no- 

 where more than a few hundred feet above sea level) is characterized 

 by scores of stagnant rivers, lakes, lagoons, and swamps. The 

 temperature and humidity are high and the rainfall-evaporation ratio 

 exceeds 110 per cent (Transeau, 1905). The vegetation is rich, and 

 consists of such forms as white cedar, sweet bay, magnolia, tupelo 

 gum, swamp cottonwood, cypress, Quercus texana, etc., in the 

 swamps, and several species of pines on the higher ground. 



Specimens of true sackeni have been examined from the following 

 localities: St. Johns River, Volusia County, Georgiana, Palatka, 

 Orange Hammock, Kissimee River, Kissimee, Enterprise, Lemon 

 City, Little Sarasota Bay, Clear Water, Pensacola, Marion County, 

 Gainesville, and Orlando, Florida, and Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. 

 As far as I have been able to find, the form has never been recorded 

 outside of Florida, although Ditmars (1907, 219) states that it is dis- 

 tributed in the ' ' coast regions of South Carolina and Georgia ; Florida 

 generally." Certainly typical sackeni may be expected to occur 

 somewhat nortli of the latitude of the northern boundary of Florida, 

 but in this general region it comes in contact mth sauritus and the 

 status of the two forms in the intermediate region must be examined 

 before the northern boundary of sackeni can be even approximately 

 fixed. I must confess to have examined but very few specimens 

 from the debatable region, but the fact that sauritus specimens 

 from the coastal plain from North Carolina northward show a much 

 closer affinity to sackeni than those from central Alabama would 

 seem to indicate that true sackerii pushes farther up the Atlantic 

 coast than in the interior, possibly into Georgia and South Carolina, 

 as Ditmars indicates, which might also be expected in view of its 

 more aquatic habits and its association with the coastal plain con- 

 ditions throughout the greater part of its range. The range as 

 known at present is indicated on the accompanying map (fig. 40). 

 Variation. — The dorsal scale formula is easily disposed of, for in 

 every specimen examined it is 19-17. The labial formula is nearly 



