196 MAMMALS OF PENNSYLVANIA AND NEW JERSEY. 



ferences in size of eastern series from N. England, New York, etc., as cited 

 by Merriam, do not show anything more than what we would expect. The 

 variation among these is small, as I have just determined by averaging a very 

 much larger series from Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, Quebec, Central 

 Pa. and Northern and Southern N. J, in my collection. This only establishes 

 the fact that Quebec specimens are about 5 millimeters longer (h. foot, i 

 mm. longer) than those from Pa. and N. J., which latter do not materially 

 differ in size. In short there is a uniformly smaller size and paler coloration 

 in the Blarinas east of Nebraska. This pale coloration finds its extreme on 

 the N. England and N. Jersey coasts. I believe the diminutive examples 

 from Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket are insular forms which should not be 

 considered in this connection.* As to the inapplicability of Capper's name 

 because given to an intermediate form, we have often had to accept such 

 names in preference to using another. If, however, talpoides is not con- 

 sidered applicable we have a better name, given by Bachman in the Journal 

 of the Academy of Natural Sciences, Phila., in 1837, to a specimen from 

 northern N. J., viz : ^'Sorex dekayi (Cooper, mss.)." The alternatives would 

 therefore be: B lamia brevicauda talpoides (Capper), 1830, or Blarina 

 brevicauda dekayi (Cooper, mss., Bachman), 1837 ; habitat : Eastern Canada 

 and the United States from Lake Superior and the Mississippi Valley to the 

 Atlantic Ocean. 



Measurements (series of 70 from Alleghany Mts., Pa.). — Total length, 

 122 mm. ; tail vertebrae, 23 ; hind foot, 15. (Series of 30 from southeastern 

 peninsula of N. J.), 120, 24, 15. (Series of 40 from northern N. J.), 122, 

 24, 15.5. (Series of 13 from Lac Aux Sables, Charlevoix twp., Quebec, 

 Canada), 125, 26, 16. 



Least Mole Shrew; Small bobtail Shrew. Blarina parva (Say). 



1S23. Sorex parvus Say, Long's Expedition to Rocky Mountains, vol. i, 

 p. 163. 



1895. Blarina parva Merriam, North American Fauna, No. 10, p. 17. 



Type locality. — Near Blair, Washington Co., Nebraska; 



Faunal Distfibution. — Austral zone, rarely into lower edge of transition ; 

 New Jersey to Florida ; west to Texas and Nebraska, intergrading with B. 

 parva floridana (Merriam) and in southern Texas with B. parva berlandien 

 (Baird). 



Distribution in Pa. and N.J. — A rare species wherever found. I have 

 only noted it in the lowlands of the two States, the most northern record be- 

 ing that given by Miller for the Hackensack marshes, Bergen Co., N. J. No 



* Since this writing Mr. O. Bangs has described these insular Blarinas under the racial 

 names aloga and contpacta. — See Proc. N. Eng. Zool. Pub., 3, 1902, pp. 75-78. 



