158 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



1859 was favourable to their generation, and hence their 

 present numbers." In the following month adders again 

 come under notice : " Recently we mentioned the rather 

 remarkable fact that adders have been unusually plentiful 

 the last cold and wet summer and autumn. We have since 

 learnt that on one property in this district, from the I2th of 

 August no fewer than thirty-two adders have been killed. 



o * 



Out of those killed one was about to give forth a progeny of 

 sixteen young. Another, evidently not more than a week old, 

 showed fight when disturbed, and on being killed its stomach 

 was found to contain a mouse. A third, but older, when 

 dying dropped from its jaws a young bird, without a feather on 

 its skin. In addition to the prey of the adder just mentioned, 

 the mole may be given. Some years ago an adder was 

 killed in Galloway, from whose distended stomach the body 

 of an unfortunate moudie was extracted" (23rd October 

 1860). 



One more paragraph from the "Courier" and I have done 

 with such quotations. One of the party referred to happened 

 to be an almost lifelong friend of mine : " On Sunday 

 afternoon, as a party were walking down the road above the 

 Upper Saw Mill on the estate of Mabie, parish of Troqueer, 

 they were surprised to see, so late in the season, a large 

 black adder. The reptile, which measured about 2 feet 2 

 inches long, was crawling across the footpath with a frog in 

 its mouth. A few blows with a switch made the adder give 

 up the frog and the ghost simultaneously" (27th September 

 1870). 



The allusion to a " black " adder brings me to the 

 subject of colour variations in this species. I have never met 

 with either " black " or " white " adders, although it is quite a 

 common thing to hear of such specimens. Very dark adders 

 are frequent enough, but they are only so because the skin 

 has become dull and lustreless. Very pale examples are 

 also well known, but in this case also their old skins have 

 been but recently discarded. Yellowish adders are met 

 with occasionally, but as this shade rapidly leaves them 

 when dead, it has probably only a mere temporary cause, 

 though, for that matter, not any the less interesting on that 

 account. The bright mahogany-coloured variation that Dr. 



