OCR Text |
Show 1888.] FROM EQUATORIAL AFRICA. 51 8. NEUSTEROPHIS ATRATUS, Ptrs. (1877).-This example possesses one anteocular only. The species is new to the collection of the British Museum. 9. AHAETULLA EMINI, sp.n.-Ventral shields without keels, 151 ; anal bifid ; upper labials 9, the 4th, 5th, and 6th entering the orbit; 1 anteocular, 2 postoculars ; 6 of the lower labials are in contact with the chin-shields ; loreal not twice as long as broad ; temporal shields 1 + 2 ; scales smooth, in 15 rows. Head of moderate size, not elongate or depressed ; body and tail moderately slender. Uniform green ; skin between the scales black, each scale with a white spot on the basal half of its outer margin. The specimen measures 29 inches, the head beiug f, and the tail 10 long. 10. DASYPELTIS SCABRA, L. 11. PSAMMOPHIS SIBILANS, L.-Three specimens. 12. ATRACTASPIS IRREGULARIS, Reinh.-This species has invariably the subcaudals divided into "scutella"-a term which evidently has been misunderstood by Peters, who persisted in applying it to undivided subcaudal shields, properly "scuta," Peters using the term of squama? for the former. A renewed study of the species of this genus has also shown me that the doubts which Peters cast upon them can only have arisen from tbe incomplete materials at his disposal. 13. ATRACTASPIS ATERRIMA, Gthr.-The specimen is very much shrunk and possesses 299 ventral shields, the type having 274. FROGS. 14. RANA OCCIPITALIS, Gthr. 15. RANA MASCARENIENSIS, D. B.-Two specimens. 16. BUFO REGULARIS, Reuss.-Two specimens. 17. RAPPIA CINCTIVENTRIS, Cope. Of these 17 Reptiles and Frogs, 9 are almost generally distributed over the African Region ; of the remainder 7 are known from various parts of West Africa, whilst not a single species known to be peculiar to East Africa is included in this collection. Although it might thus appear that the Reptilian Fauna of the Upper Congo is rather West-African than East-African in its character, we must not lose sight of the fact that many species extend right across from the West to the East Coast, and that if in the end the Eastern and Western Reptilian Faunas should prove to be sufficiently distinct to call for the establishment of two or more separate zoo-geographical districts, our knowledge of the Reptiles of the central parts is at present much too fragmentary to assist in fixing the boundary line between such districts. 4* |