ox THE SPECIFIC NAME OF THE COACH WHIP SNAKE. 



By Leonharu Stejnegeb, 



Curator of' the Dcpurimeut of lieptUes and Bntrachians. 



The name commonly aj)plie.d to this species is Bascanion JiageUi- 

 forme, and as autliority for tliis name Catesby's Natural History of 

 Carolina has been as frequently quoted. Catesby's names antedating- 

 Linnteus' tenth edition and, besides, not being binominal have no stand- 

 ing in zoological nomenclature. One subsequent to 1758 has therefore 

 to be adopted. 



Curiously enough no one seems to haA^e supplied a true binominal 

 name for this vSnake until after the beginning of the present century, 

 the first being apparently Shaw's Coluber Jfagellum, * Avhich is based 

 exclusively on Catesby's, Vol. ir, plate liv, consequently the species in 

 question, without the slightest doubt. I think i t will also be found that 

 DO one applied Coluber JJaf/ell if orm is binominally to the present species 

 until Holbrook, in the first edition of his Uerpetology (1836), adapted 

 it from Catesby's Auguis fiagellifonnis. 



The erroneous application of the specific name jlageUiformis to our 

 coachwhip snako is due to a misidentification of Laurenti's Natrix 

 JfagclliformisA That he describes an entirely different snake will be 

 plain from a glance at his diagnosis, which is based on '• Seba ii. 23, 2'' 

 as follows: "Supra cteruleo roquali, infra viridescente; capite angulato; 

 rostro iiroducto tetraedro; dorso utrinque linea alba ab abdomine dis- 

 tinct©; Cauda pentaedra."! He then adds: ''var/i. (Catesby Carolin. 

 2.47);" but Catesby's plate xlvii is not our coachwhip, being distin- 

 guished from Laurenti's diagnosis chiefly, as he says: "Colore magis 

 cfcruleo viridescente.'"§ 



It will be seen that Laurenti's snake is not tlie coachwhip snake, 

 neither in its entirety nor in part. 



* Shaw, Gen. Zool., iii, pt. ii, p. 475 (1802). 

 t Synopsis Reptilium, 1768, p. 79. 



t Above iTuiform blue, below greenish; bead angular; snont iiroduced, tetrabedral; 

 back separated on either side from belly by a white line; tail jientahedral. 

 $ By the more greenish blue color. 



Proceedings of the U. S. National Museum, Vol. XVII— No. 1022- 



595 



