. Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard College. Zoology. 32 Bulletin Museum of Comparative Zoology, Vol. 141, No. 1 .O Ci CO CO ^ :3 o to :3 CO o CD C3 s^ o CO .D qS E C: :3 ^ Q. o o. B Barbados D Dominico L Lesser Antilles M Martinique s St Lucia SA South America — oversea colonization Fig. 25. Suggested phyletic relationships between species of the me/onotus species assemblage and the genus Liophis. Short horizontal lines indicate proposed oversea coloniza- tions. size and scale counts are within the range of Dromicus (present concept). The question arises as to the vaUdi


. Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard College. Zoology. 32 Bulletin Museum of Comparative Zoology, Vol. 141, No. 1 .O Ci CO CO ^ :3 o to :3 CO o CD C3 s^ o CO .D qS E C: :3 ^ Q. o o. B Barbados D Dominico L Lesser Antilles M Martinique s St Lucia SA South America — oversea colonization Fig. 25. Suggested phyletic relationships between species of the me/onotus species assemblage and the genus Liophis. Short horizontal lines indicate proposed oversea coloniza- tions. size and scale counts are within the range of Dromicus (present concept). The question arises as to the vaUdity of the generic distinctions between ^'Leima- dophis" (, Dromicus) and Liophis made by Roze (1964: 535). As we have seen, the presence or absence of scale pits may not be as important a distinction as for- merly belie\'ed. Thus, the only major difference between these two genera is in the maxillaiy dentition in which "Leim- adophis" has a diastema with much en- larged posterior teeth, whereas Liophis lacks a diastema and the posterior teeth are little enlarged (Roze, 1964). I suspect that these two groups will be considered as congeneric when better known, but on present evidence I here treat them as valid genera. The inferred phyletic relationships be- tween Liophis and the West Indian species of Dromicus are presented in Figure 25. ANDREAE SPECIES ASSEMBLAGE Included West Indian species: amlreae Reinhaedt and LxJTKEN, Cuba; parvifrons Cope, Hispaniola. OsteolofS,y. Only two species of this assemblage are extant in the West Indies, andreae on Cuba and parvifrons on Hispan- iola and nearby islands. They are generally considerably smaller in size than Alsophis and are about the size of Dromicus mela- nofus. In cranial osteology amlreae and parvifrons show features characteristic of both Alsophis and Dromicus (Fig. 26). The frontal bones are very long and narrow with a deep emargination above the orbits as in Alsophis, but unlike the pro- portionately short


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Keywords: ., bookauthorharvarduniversity, bookcentury1900, booksubjectzoology