VARIATIONS OF GARTER-SNAKES. 



131 



Mcasarciaents and scutcllation of phenax. 



There are no lateral stripes. In the type specimen No. 30499 

 (which has been in alcohol for many years) the ground color above 

 is brownish olive (said to have been reddish olive .in life) with a series 

 of slightly darker cross-bands which extend entirely across the back 

 to the second row of scales. These cross-bands (which are said to 

 have been bright brownish red when the specimen was fresh) are 

 about four scales wide and one and one-half scales apart, and are 

 margined on the longer sides by black borders one-half scale wide, 

 which, owing to the inconspicuousness of the spots themselves, give 

 the snake the appearance of being cross-banded by paired narrow 

 black bars. The nuchal spots are quite similar to the dorsal band 

 in being but little darker than the ground color and heavily margined 

 with black, but they differ from those of the dorsal series in being 

 interrupted on the median line, the posterior black border on either 

 side bending f<)rward to the parietal plates. There is a trace of a 

 dorsal stripe on the nape, between the nuchal blotches. No definite 

 series of spots on the first row of scales. Head brown, marked with 

 black. Supralabials brownish yellow (said to have been light ohve 

 in the fresh specimen), and, with the exception of the sixth, partly 

 margined with black. 



In the second specimen. No. 3049S, the pattern differs from that of 

 the type in that the cross-bars are often interrupted along the median 

 line, in the presence of the spots on the first row of scales, that ante- 

 riorly form a definite row wiiich alternates with the second, and the 

 fact that the nuchal spots are fused across the nape, being strongly 

 notched behind and separated in front by a light line that is continued 

 along the parietal suture to the frontal. 



Range. — Both of the specimens described above are labeled 

 ''Orizaba, Cordova." The type was listed by Cope as from ''Cor- 

 dova, Vera Cruz," and the locality of the six specimens recorded in 

 1898 was given as Orizaba, Vera Cruz. The label "Orizaba, Cor- 

 dova" seems to mean, not that the specimens came from the towns 

 Orizaba and Cordova, but from Mount Orizaba, in the canton Cor- 

 dova. The range is thus apparently within the range of scalaris. 



