Observations on Amphiuma. 315 
OBSERVATIONS ON AMPHIUMA AND ITS YOUNG. 
BY 0. P. HAY, MD! 
PRE waters of our Southern States are inhabited by certain elon- 
gated air-breathing animals, which are popularly known and 
feared under the name of Congo Snakes; although they in reality 
belong not among the serpents, but to the class of Amphibians. Of 
these animals, naturalists have up to near the present time recog- 
nized two species, and even two distinct genera, Amphiuma and 
Murænopsis, the two forms being distinguished by the possession 
respectively of two and three digits to each of their very feebly 
developed legs. The occasional finding of specimens with two toes 
on some of the feet, and three on the others, has cast doubt on the 
generic value of this character, and made it quite certain that both 
belong to the same genus.? As there are few or no other differences 
of importance between the two supposed species, it is now thought 
by some batrachologists that there is after all but a single species ; 
and this is the view at present held, I believe, by Professor E. D. 
Cope, the best American authority on such matters.? Amphiuma 
(Mureenopsis) tridactylum is, in this case, to be regarded as merely 
a variety of A. means. 
Of the habits, especially the breeding habits, of the lower Amphi- 
bia, in species of which North America is rich beyond all other 
countries, little appears to have been discovered. Siren, Necturus, 
Amphiuma and Cryptobranchus are all strictly aquatic, or nearly 
80, in their manner of life. With a few remarkable exceptions, our — 
Amphibia, whether affecting a terrestrial or an aquatic habitin © 
adult life, lay their eggs in the water; and the young, for a time — 
-afier hatching, live in that element, and breathe by means of gills. 
n cases where the young of a species have not been discovered, it 
has been assumed that they possess gills, which are after ward - : 
absorbed, 
git lished by permission of Dr. John C. Branner, Director of the — 
os Geological Survey. >? | 
„poder, Proc. Phil. Acad., 1879, p. 14. 
ings Amer. Philosoph. Soc. 1886, p. 526. 
