Barnes on Batracian Animals and doubtful Reptils. 287 
end opening into the Lake was accidentally drained during 
the present summer, (1825. 
I have received probable information of another ‘ water 
lizard,’’ which inhabits Lake Champlain, and has been caught 
* at the lower falls of Ticonderoga by fishing, with a hook, at 
night. ‘The animal is described to me as black, long and 
slender, with four legs and a tail. It is said to be one foot 
and a half long, and without the spots by which the Proteus 
is remarkably distinguished. 
emarks, The first specific name given to this Proteus 
appears to be that of Mr. Say, whovcalled it lateralis, in al- 
lusion to the black /ateral line. e discoveries already 
Lakes, which, in the same paper, he asserts to be the same 
animal. The genus to which Mr. Say assigns this reptil, is 
omitted by most of the modern naturalists, and the honor of 
naming it seems of right to belong to the man who first had 
the sagacity to discover its true affinities to the Proteus an- 
guinus of Carniola. The Proteus lateralis difte: n the 
s anguinus by having fewer dorsal vertebers, and a 
greater number of false ribs. Cuvier makes the-same re- 
mark and comparison between the Proteus anguinus and Sa- 
lamanders, as is here made between these two animals. The 
Salamanders, in fact, in this respect, compare pretty exactly 
with the Proteus Lateralis, and the Proteus Mexicanns, or 
the Axolotl. I do not perceive any good reason for making 
a new genus to receive this animal. Dr. Mitchill describes 
him as a Proteus. He is without doubt very closely allied, 
and yet perfectly distinct from the Axolotl. A careful ex- 
amination of the two animals together has been made, an 
the result is entirely satisfactory. Laurenti, the founder of 
the Genus Proteus, included in it the Axolotl, and both Cu- 
vier and Lacepede have called the Mexican reptil a Proteus. 
Against this the reason alledged is that the number of dor- 
sal vertebers in the American animal is greatly inferior to 
the same in the Austrian animal ; and that the rudiments of 
ribs are an entire series, and also “ somewhat larger and lon- 
ger in the former than in the latter.’ The number of verte- 
bers is not admitted by Dr. Harlan as a generic distinction 
