254 S A TJ R I A. 



■ Genus LIPINIA, Gray. 



Gen. Char. — Body subfusiform or subquadrangular, covered with 

 well-developed and perfectly smooth, and subequal scales. Head 

 depressed, declivous towards the snout. No supranasal plates ; 

 nostrils lateral, each in one plate. Vertex plate elongated, narrow, 

 tapering posteriorly. A pair of parietals. Middle occipital distinct 

 from either the parietals or the latero-occipitals. Palate toothless. 

 Tongue nicked at the extremity. Eye moderate ; lower eyelid with 

 a transparent disk. Auricular aperture large, subcircular, simple ; 

 tympanum somewhat sunk, though visible. Limbs four, slender, 

 and distant; palms and soles tuberculated; fingers and toes unequal, 

 very small, slender, compressed, and clawed. Tail elongated and 

 tapering. 



Syn. — Lipinia, Gray, Catal. Lizz. Brit. Mus. 1845, 84. 



Obseev. — Whether the species which we describe below is truly 

 congeneric with Lipinia pulclieUa, Gray, we are not prepared to decide 

 for the present, since no description of the latter has as yet been fur- 

 nished. 



The present genus, as here characterized, differs from Oligosoma, to 

 which it bears strong affinities, in the dorsal scales not being larger on 

 the two middle series, the weaker and more distant limbs, the exigu- 

 ous fingers and toes, and the coarsely granular or rather tubercular 

 structure of the palms and soles. 



Moreover, its scales are perfectly smooth, a character which will 

 distinguish Lipinia from both, Oligosoma and Lygosomella. In the 

 latter, the limbs are much wider apart, and the fingers and toes more 

 developed than in Lipinia. The tubercles over the palms and soles 

 are also less developed in Lygosomella than in the genus here referred 

 to. 



Lipinia vulcania, Grd. 



Char. spec. — Squamis in tidginta series longitudinales circwn corpus 

 dispositis. Scuto praefrontali magno, suhquadrangulari ; scutis post- 



