Lac< rl;i |)r:itic()l;i, Eceiaiu. 29 



one side iiiul six on the other; in sneh case tlie niediiin 

 snture is formed by two shields on one side and three on 

 the other. As the two tornjs diU'er also in other eliaraeters, 

 sni'h anomalous speeiuu-ns eaii. however, easily he identiti.'d ; 

 tlierifore the separation of L. jjraficu!a into two sul)spccies 

 ^eenls to be jnslilieil. 



Evcrsmauu's description and figure of the type-specimen 

 h\nn Pialigor>k * are ntjt clear enough to settle the (jnestion, 

 which of the two subsijccies must be considered as the 

 tv|)ic.d. A full d('scr![)tion of the species was first given by 

 Kessler t, who i'\;!nniicd thiriccn specimens from the Kuban 

 district, Fiatigorsk, valley of R. Bielaia, and Ananur, two 

 of which formerly were in li^versmann's collection. Kessler 

 indicates six pairs of chin shields, tJie first three forming a 

 median suture. Relying on this, we intended to describe 

 a ('aspian subspecies, l)elieving the Western Caucasian 

 form to be the typical one. 



Thanks to the kindness of MM. Iv. Dcrjugin and 

 P. Nesterov we have been enabled to revise the collection 

 of the Petrograd University. We found there several 

 of Kessler's specimens, and amongst them one labelled 

 '* Piatigorsk, leg. Eversmann.'^ ^^'c must admit that 

 Kessler neglected to examine the chin-shields of this very 

 specimen, as it has only five pairs of them and agrees in 

 every respect with the Talysh L. praticola. It cannot, 

 liowever, be considered as the type-specimen, because it has 

 a normal interparietal and occipital, while Eversmaun 

 indicates these shields as separated by an accessory one. 



Both the type-specimen and the s|)ecimen preserved in 

 the I'ctrograd University are from the same locality ; other 

 material from Piatigorsk, Essentuki, and Kislovodsk % was 

 kindly examined for us by M.S. Tsarevski. All these show 

 only five pairs of chin-shields, two of them forming a median 

 suture. Therefore it is undeniably the Oriental subspecies 

 which occurs at Piatigorsk and surrounding localities that 

 must i)e considered as the typical L. praticola. 



It is of gi-eat interest that L. praticola pratlc' la seems to 

 be confined to the Caspian Sea basin §, while the western 



* Lacert.x' Imperii Kossici (Mu^xcdw, 18.34). 



t Joiiniev ill Tnuiscaucasin, St. I'eter.sb., 1878, p. 16(3 (\n Russian). 



t Coll. Acad. I'etr. Nos. iVJ?;}, 6H;1, and 71tOU. 



§ We e.VHiiiiiu'd epociniein from rititi^orpk. Mount II near Vladi- 

 V.avknr, Lagodekbi, Kala-I'itj-nn, vallev of H. Astfira-lwliai, Elbiirz 

 Mountains between Astara and Ardcbil, Sbal't-rud utur Enzoli. 



