Occasional Papers of the Museum of Zoology 3 



motor launch — not without various vicissitudes — to Panama. 

 The novelties now described have appeared during an exam- 

 ination of the reptiles and amphibians caught during this jour- 

 ney. Other notices will appear later dealing with the mam- 

 mals, birds, and fishes. 



The region is one of high, damp, humid forest, gloomy 

 and stifling except where some water course cuts through the 

 wooded lowlands, letting in the sunlight. Decay of fallen 

 wood and leaves is very rapid and the dark forest floor is 

 sodden and slippery. In general, reptiles were surprisingly 

 rare, and often a day would pass when none of us would see 

 a lizard, unless when coming to the shore of some small 

 stream the bipedal basiliscs would scurry away. The young 

 far outnumber the adults and all are well able to run with 

 equal ease over land or the face of the water. While running 

 the body is held almost upright, the tail is raised as a balance, 

 and the fore limbs are tightly pressed to the sides. They 

 move and stop with a speed and precision which seems mechan- 

 ical rather than animate. The paucity of adults and the shy- 

 ness of both young and old bespeak abundant enemies, but of 

 what nature we were never able to learn. 



One afternoon an Indian who had been gathering firewood 

 came in carrying a small lizard, and we then saw for the first 

 time the young of Diploglossus monotropis, already known 

 from Costa Rica and Colombia. This little creature, about 

 seven inches long, was so gorgeously colored while alive and 

 so different from the preserved examples that my field notes 

 are worth copying. "This specimen, seven inches long, has a 

 grey-green head, brilliant carmine sides covered with anasto- 

 mosing black lines; belly yellowish; back and tail black with 

 beautiful narrow blue-grey, almost mauve cross-bars." I have 



