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Show 2 1 2 DR. H. GADOW ON MEXICAN [June 6, two Asiatics of the same genus. But Coleonyx elegans is distinctly a forest form. I found it a few miles from the coast of Guerreio in a moist patch of thick lowland forest on the ground undei stones and rotten stumps. A typical Central American, ranging through the Pacific and Atlantic Tierra Caliente of Mexico, fiom which country it had hitherto been recorded only by Sumichiast from near Orizaba; extending south to Costa Rica, IguaniD/E f .-It is not profitable to speculate upon the original home of this family. The overwhelming majority of genera and species is American, from Mexico to Brazil. It is well known that the Galapagos possess the semimarine Amblyrhynchus and Cono-lophus, that a few species occur in Madagascar, and Brachylophus fasciatus in the Viti and Tonga Islands ; further, that an Iguanid allied to the genus Iguana existed in the Eocene or Oligocene of Europe, and that therefore attempts have been made to explain the present scattered distribution of the family by a formerly subuniversal range; in other words, they are a very ancient group. Concerning America, it is significant that only a few species of Sceloporus and Phrynosoma extend into the United States, although far northwards. Of the large genus Anolis, only A. carolinensis enters Texas to Carolina, but it is also found in Cuba. Mexico itself, Central America, and the Antilles are rich in genera and species. These Iguanidse can be divided into two groups:- A Sonoran set, comprising genera which are essentially xero-phile and humivagous, with depressed bodies and short tails. None of these reaches far into Central America, and none has entered the Antilles. Crotaphytus, Holbrookia, Uta, Phrynosoma, Sceloporus, which, in the order mentioned, extend from California and Arizona southwards, with decidedly Pacific or Western predilection ; only a few Sceloporus, those which have spread into the Atlantic Tierra Caliente, continue further into Central America. Nearly all these southern Sceloporus are fitted for arboreal life, less depressed in body, and suited to a moist climate, be this hot or cool. They lead thereby to the second set, which are essentially arboreal, mostly inhabitants of forests or of rocky bush-land; all southerners, with their centre in Central and South America, extending into the Mexican Tierra Caliente, with prevalence on the Atlantic side, and two * have allied genera or species in the Antilles : Anolis *, Iguana*, Basiliscus, Lcemanctus, Corythophanes, and Ctenosaura. Of course there are transitional forms, for instance the genus f Iguana, or Guana, is a native word applied to the Iguana; but where this does not occur, the name is given to Ctenosaura, for instance at Cuernavaca. The Zapotec name of Ctenosaura is Tilcampo; Basiliscus and Corythophanes are called Tcterete. At Rio Balsas, seal}' lizards, e. g. Sceloporus, are distinguished as Chint6t«. |
