ADDENDUM B. 



NOTES ON THE "SALAMANDER" OF FLOEIDA (GEOMYS TUZA). 



\Communicated to the author by Prof. G. Brown Goode.] 



One of the most interesting mammals of the Southern Atlantic States 

 is the species of Geomys known in Florida and Georgia as the "Salamander.'' 

 The name of " gopher," by which the various representatives of this genus 

 inhabiting the Upper Mississippi Valley are known, would seem very appro- 

 priate for this animal. It appears to be a corruption of the French "gaufre", 

 and to refer to the manner in which the soil is honey-combed by the pouched 

 rats. 



Local usage, however, has appropriated this name to a kind of land- 

 tortoise, Xerobates carolinus, (Linn^) Ag., which is common in Georgia and 

 Florida, and which also excavates a burrow, a habit to which, perhaps, it 

 owes its name. I have never heard an explanation of the name u salamander w 

 in its application to Geomys tuza; but it occurs to me that it may allude to 

 the safety enjoyed by these little animals in their subterranean abodes at the 

 time of the devastating fires which sometimes consume the pine-forests. 

 After such a conflagration has passed over their heads, destroying every other 

 kind of life, they are seen at work among the ashes, very good types of the 

 salamander of fable, which passes unharmed over burning coals, and 



" with her touch 

 Quenches the fire, though blazing ne'er so much." 



Although the species was not scientifically described until 1817, it was 

 noticed by several among the earlier writers. William Bartram, an English 

 naturalist, who visited the Southeastern States in 1773, speaks of a large 

 ground-rat, which he observed in the vicinity of Savannah, which was more 

 than twice the size of the common Norway rat, and which in the night threw 

 out earth, forming little mounds or hillocks.* 



* Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, the Cherokee 

 Country, the extensive territories of the Muscogulges or Creek Confederacy, and the oountry of the 

 Chactaws. * * * —By William Bartram.— Dublin,— 1793. p. 7. [Orig. ed. Philadelphia, 1791.] 



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