Bangs.] 404 [Dec. .9, 
It was announced that the following Corporate Members 
had been elected by the Council : Miss Hetty O. Ballard, Miss 
Mabel D. Clapp, Miss Edith F. Sampson, Messrs. C. K. Eastman, 
M. L. Fuller, and F. D. Lambert. 
The thanks of the Society were voted to Mrs. Asa (4ray for 
her gift of an engraving of the late Professor Gray. 
Prof. W. M. Davis read some notes on certain European 
rivers. 
The following papers were read : — 
THE GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE EASTERN 
RACES OF THE COTTON-TAIL {LEPUS SYLVATICUS 
BACH.) WITH A DESCRIPTION OF A NEW 
SUBSPECIES, AND WITH NOTES ON 
THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE 
NORTHERN HARE {LEPITS 
AMERICANUS ERXL.) 
IN THE EAST. 
BY OUTRAM BANGS. 
Dr. Bachman in 1837^ proposed the name Lepus st/lvaticus 
for the common cotton-tail or gray rabbit of the United States. 
He did not describe or name a new animal — it was simply a 
matter of clearing up the mixed synonomy of the hares and of 
giving a new name to an old and well-known species. He 
therefore assigned no type locality for it, other than the United 
States. The name has since, by the splitting off of subspecies, 
been restricted to the cotton-tail of the eastern region, extending 
from northern Florida to the northern limit of the species. This 
region is, however, occupied by two quite different and easily 
recognized subspecies, for the northern one of which I propose a 
new subspecific name, thus restricting the true Lepus sylvaticus 
to the Carolinian life area. 
Of all North American mammals the cotton-tail seems to 
be the most protean, changing, in accordance with the four 
different faunal areas of the east through which it passes, into 
