REPTILES OF THE PACIFIC COAST. 



57 



only one well developed. Back and sides covered with 

 small granules, largest centrally and passing gradually 

 into the larger scales on the belly. Latter imbricate 

 and sometimes keeled. Irregular dermal folds usually 

 present on sides. Tail conical, a little more than twice 

 length of head and body, and covered with whorls of 

 small scales. Femoral pores varying in number from 

 about seventeen to twenty-three. Males with enlarged 

 postanal plates. 



In young specimens the head is dark brown above, 

 with cream-colored lines surrounding the orbits and 

 supraocular regions and running up the median line of 

 the snout from the rostral plate. The back is grayish 

 brown with white or cream-colored cross-lines, which 

 may either meet or alternate, on the median line, with 

 those of the opposite side. Between each pair of these 

 cross-lines is a round spot of dark reddish brown. The 

 tail is marked like the back, but not so regularly. The 

 limbs are brown with irregular spots and lines of white. 

 The lower surfaces are yellowish wdiite, marked on the 

 throat wdth longitudinal lines of dark brown. As the 

 animals become larger the brown dorsal spots become 

 smaller and more numerous, so that there are several 



