330 TARIATIONS OF THE SPOTTED SALAMANDER. 



Corsica, Genoa (7 specimens out of 40), the province of Rome, and 

 Calabria. The latter is remarkable for the large size of the yellow 

 markings on the upper and lower surfaces, where they almost equal 

 in extent the black area. The opposite extreme occurs in a spe- 

 cimen from the Yal Bavano, Ticino, in which the yellow colour is 

 reduced to a few very small blotches on the parotoids and at the 

 base of the limbs. These two extremes are figured side by side in 

 text-fig. 100. 



On careful examination of the specimens of var. algira Bedriaga 

 and var. Corsica Savi, I have come to the conclusion that they are 

 not essentially difl[erent from the forma typica. 



The var. algira is described by Bedriaga (3, p. Ill) as having 

 the tail and digits longer and more slender than in the typical 

 form ; but the specimens from Mt, Edough (in the Lataste 

 Collection), upon which Bedriaga based his observations, are in a 

 leather emaciated condition, having, no doubt, been kept in 

 captivity for some considerable time, and this is evidently partly 

 the cause of their slenderness. Although the digits and tails of 

 the Salamanders from Algeria and Morocco are, as a rule, longer 

 than in the typical form, the longest digits in the latter may be 

 actually longer in proportion to the length of the body. Thus, 

 in a specimen from Lake Oomo, the length of the longest toe is 

 9 2 per cent, of the total length (from tip of snout to posterior 

 end of vent), while in a specimen from Mt. Edough, Algeria, the 

 length of the same is 9 per cent,, and in one from the Benider 

 hills, Morocco, as low as 6| per cent. Again, the length of the 

 tail in var. algira ranges from 65 to 81 per cent, of the length of 

 the body, against 54 to 78 in the forma typica, an overlap which 

 precludes the character being used as diagnostic. 



In the same author's description of the Corsican variety, the 

 head is stated to be remarkably broad, and the toes to be much 

 more strongly depressed and with sharper edges on the sides than 

 in the typical form, I have examined the very specimen described 

 by Bedrifiga, but do not find the head to be any broader than in 

 some of the typical and striated forms, and although the toes are 

 more depres^'ed than is generally the case, they are not more so 

 than in certain specimens from Vienna, Bosnia, Luxemburg, and 

 the Harz Mountains. As to the more sharply edged sides of the 

 toes, this sharpness simply coincides with the degree of depression. 



The supposed difference in the palatine dentition, on which 

 S. Corsica was founded by Savi (26), has long ago been disposed of 

 by Schreiber (27), Bedriaga (2), and Camerano (6). 



The habitat of the typical form seems to be bounded to the 

 west by the Erz Mountains, the Danube, the Alps, and the 

 Rhone, all the specimens from east and south of that line be- 

 longing to it, with a few exceptions mentioned below. All over 

 France, west and north of the Rhone, the var. tceniata, described 

 further on, alone occurs (with rare exceptions from the Doubs), 

 whence it extends to ISTorthei'n Spain (Bilbao, _y?c/e Bedriaga) and 

 Portugal (Oporto, Brit. Mus.). 



