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Show 1 9 0 5 .] AMPHIBIANS AND REPTILES. 2 0 7 covered and caught by mere accident. For instance, I found one single specimen of II. staufferi at Motzorongo, a species until then known only from Guatemala. II. boucourti of the same country has been recorded once from Tepic, none from the enormous intervening stretch. I I miotympanum seems to range from the Isthmus through the mountainous parts of Vera Cruz, going up towards Puebla. II. venulosa is an eastern form, from South America to Tampico, decidedly Atlantic, but once recorded from near Mazatlan. II. baudini, the commonest Tree-frog, ranges from Ecuador right through Central America, and then spreads east and west through the hot countries of Mexico, absolutely avoiding the plateau, but reaching Texas. On July 4, 1902, when the rains were very irregular, we found II. baudini spawning, south of Cordoba. On a piece of inundated woodland meadow, about the size of a suburban lawn, were 45,000 frogs at a low computation, two-tliirds of them in amplexus, the other males making a deafening din. Next day the pool was dried up completely, the grass glazed with the spawn, and there was not a single frog to be heard or seen in the neighbourhood. II. copei, known as " Sapo bianco" or white toad, is a hill form. Known already from Texas, Chihuahua, Guanajuato, and Jalisco, I found it plentiful on the whitish calcareous terrain south of Chilpancingo, not in the trees but sometimes on rather barren and dry fields. Decidedly typical of the western and southern plateau and its Pacific slope, and very abundant, is II. eximia. Result.-Mexico has many Hylidse in common with Central and even South America ; but the majority are now peculiar to Mexico, and only two, TI. copei and I I baudini, extend northwards into Texas. C y s t ig n a t i i id ,®, like the Hylidte, of decidedly South-American origin. Of the 15 or 16 genera of this family only Leptodactylus *, Pcdudicola, Syrrhopus, Ilylodes *, and Borborocoetes occur also in Mexico, altogether with some 23 species. Those marked * are also Antillean. Not one reaches the United States ; in fact the most northern record is made by II. calcitrans at Zacatecas. B. mexi-canus is peculiar to the Central plateau and the high mountains of Jalisco, Colima, and Guerrero. Of the 9 or 10 species of Hylodes 6 are restricted to Mexico, but their recorded localities are still too few and scattered. The same applies to the six species of Syrrhopus ; the others range far south to Nicaragua and Costa Rica : H. palmatus is Pacific, II. melanostictus Atlantic Mexican; II. rhodopis on either side. The last is the commonest species and seems to be an instance of a southerner which, although not going on to the plateau itself, ascends the high mountains on its eastern, southern, and western borders, e. <j. Citlaltepetl up to 10,000 feet, Cerro de Oaxaca, Nevado de Colima; it also inhabits the hot lowlands of Agua fria in the State of Vera Cruz. Mostly of dark brown and reddish tints and living on or near the ground ; however, some specimens in the epiphytic Tillandsias, or on green |
