﻿Dec, 1895.] 



BLARTNA TROPICALIS. 



21 



BLAEIXA TROPICALIS! Merriam. Tropical Blarina. 

 PI. 1, fig. 8. 



1843. Corsira tropiealis Gray, Proc. Zool. Soc, London, 1843, 79. Nomen nndum. 

 1861. Sorex micrurus Tomes, Proc. ZooL Soc, London, 1861, 279. (From Coban 

 Guatemala.) 



1877. Blarina micrura Alston, Proc. Zool. Soc, London, 1877, 446; Biologia Centrali- 



Americana, Mammalia, 1880, 56,57, PI. V, fig. 2. 

 1877. Blarina (Soriciscus) micrura Cones, Bull. U. S. Gaol, and Geog. Surv. Terr., 638, 



footnote. 



Type locality.— Coh^n, Guatemala (altitude about 4,400 feet). 



Geographic distribution.— TYO])icii] fauna of western Guatemala and 

 southern Mexico in States of (Chiapas?) Oaxaca and Vera Cruz. 



General cliaracters, — Size small, only a little larger than B.parva of 

 the United States. 



Color. — Upper parts dull cinereous hair-brown, with ^ pepper and 

 salt' appearance from admixture of black-tipped hairs 5 under parts 

 ashy. 



Cranial and dental cliaracters. —Skull small, but larger and more angu- 

 lar than that of parva and decidedly broader than floridana; brain 

 case essentially on plane of rostrum, with only a shallow sulcus between ; 

 hinder margin of palate slightly thickened on median line, suggest- 

 ing a projection. Second unicuspid with inner cusplet prominent 

 and projecting well inward; third uuicuspid without inner cusplet; 

 molariform teeth onlj^ slightlj^ concave behind ; large upper premolar 

 with antero-internal angle prominent and without distinct step behind, 

 the inner border of the tooth more on a plane than usual. 



Measurements. — Mean of the two original type specimens from Coban, 

 Guatemala, as measured by Tomes (converted into millimeters) : Head 

 and body, 60 mm.; tail, 23.6 mm.; hind foot, 11.4 mm. Average of 6 

 specimens from Pluma and Juquila, Oaxaca (measured in flesh) : Total 

 length, 93 mm.; tail vertebra?, 25 mm.; hind foot, 12 mm. 



General remarls. — In pushing northward in the tropical belt (tierra 

 caliente) of Vera Cruz to Catemaco (altitude, 1,000 feet), the Yalley of 

 Orizaba (altitude, 4,000 feet), and Jico (altitude, 4,800 feet) Blarina trop- 

 iealis undergoes certain changes in cranial and dental characters that 

 foreshadow B. soricina of the Valley of Mexico (altitude, 7,600 feet). 

 The brain case becomes narrower and less angular, and the large upper 



1 When Sorex micrurus Tomes (1861) was transferred to the genus Blarina it became 

 preoccupied by GaJemiis {BracTiy sorex) micrurus Pomel (1848), which is a synonym of 

 Blarina hrevicauda (Say), and therefore is not available. No other name seems to 

 have been proposed for the species except tropiealis Gray, which is a nomen nudum. 

 The name, however, is peculiarly appropriate, the species being closely restricted to 

 tropical America; hence I here reinstate it to replace 7nicrurus. but it will have to 

 date from the present paper. For Gahmys micrurus Pomel, see Archiv. Sci. Phys. et 

 Nat. Geneve, IX, Nov. 1848, 249. 



