NO. 1174. HAWAIIAN LAND REPTILES— STEJNEGER. 785 



It should be added, however, that a better and more detailed knowledge 

 of all the forms inhabiting Polynesia might give better results. Not 

 until specimens from all the groups have been brought together in suffi- 

 cient numbers will it be possible to affirm with certainty that these 

 widely distributed species have not differentiated into local forms by 

 which, however slight the characters, it might become possible to trace 

 their evolution and incidentally their migrations. 



The only point which can be claimed with certainty is that they came 

 from the west. One or two of the species, it is true, have also been 

 found in a few localities in America, but their distribution here is 

 purely local and, no doubt, is due to introduction by man, much in the 

 same way as they reached the Hawaiian Islands, though probably 

 much later. If, then, it be true that these lizards have accompanied 

 the Polynesians in their migrations, the conclusions to be drawn add 

 to the mass of evidence available against any theory of their having 

 originated in America, though this addition may perhaps be superflu- 

 ous at the present day. 



I am not aware of records of any of the marine snakes having been 

 taken at the Hawaiian Islands. 8ome are known to occur as far east 

 as the Society Islands; but the only surprising feature is that Hydrus 

 jilatiirus, which is recorded from Ja[)au, Tahiti, and the west coast of 

 Mexico, has not been found in Hawaiian waters, at least occasionally. 



The marine turtles living in the seas surrounding the Hawaiian 

 Archipelago and breeding on some of its outlying islets are, as yet, too 

 imperfectly known to make it protitable to discuss them on the present 

 occasion, hence the limitation of this paper to the terrestrial reptiles of 

 the islands. 



There are no indigenous batrachians in the Hawaiian Islands not- 

 withstanding the oft-repeated assertion that a toad, the so-called Bk/o 

 clialojyhus Cope, occurs there.' Cope himself has acknowledged his 

 double error, both in regard to the specific distinctness of the specimen 

 upon which the description was based and the habitat alleged.' It 

 was in fact a specimen of Bufo quercicus Holbrook, from eastern jS^orth 

 America. 



Batrachians have been introduced intentionally, however, during 

 recent years. Frogs and toads are said to have been brought from 

 China and Japan, as well as from America, in order to assist in the 

 fight against the mosquitoes. 



' The latest author to repeat this statement is Beddarcl in his Text-book of Zoo- 

 geography (1895), p. 147, footnote. On page 77 of the same work he attributes this 

 same species to the Fiji Islands. 



■^"The redescription of the species by my.self was due to the omission of its char- 

 acteristic peculiarities from extant writings. The erroneous locality (Sandwich 

 Islands) is one of several such errors, based on the iucoiTcct labelling" . . . Cope, 

 Man. N. Am. Hatr., 1889, p. 292. 



Proc. N. M. vol. xxi 50 



