NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF GLASGOW. 197 



been heard lately in connection with the Zulu war. They were 

 picked up in the bush by Mr. Noble, clerk to the Assembly, and 

 they had, no doubt, been used in warfare, as it was just after a 

 battle between two native tribes. 



Mr. Peter Cameron exhibited some new British Hymenoptera. 

 He enumerated and described 15 species, all new to the British 

 Fauna, and regarding a few of them he made some interesting 

 remarks. 



The President then spoke at some length on the composition of 

 the heads of Crustacea, illustrating his remarks by a number of 

 specimens. 



December 23rd, 1879. 



Mr. John Young, F.G.S., Vice-President, in the chair. 



Messrs. William Watson, George F. Bell, and William B. 

 Robinson were elected ordinary members. 



Mr. John M. Campbell exhibited a live specimen of the rare 

 Smooth Snake (Coronella laevis), from Hampshire, and made the 

 following remarks: — 



The Smooth Snake (Coronella laevis, Boie; C. austriaca, Laurenti) 

 is the rarest of all our British reptiles, and although so long ago as 

 March, 1863, Mr. E. R. Alston exhibited a specimen before the 

 Society, and made some remarks on the species, it may possibly 

 be new to many of the present members. Mr. Alston then stated 

 that the first recorded specimen taken in this country was 

 captured by a Mr. Fenton, in Hampshire, in September, 1862, 

 and was presented to the Zoological Gardens, London. It was there 

 seen and identified by Dr. Gunther, of the British Museum. But 

 in the volume of Hardwicke's Science Gossip for 1872, a corres- 

 pondent, while recording the capture of one in Dorsetshire, mentions 

 that the first authenticated specimen was captured in June, 1854, 

 where, he does not state. It has also been taken near Christchurch, 

 and J. R. Wise, in a book entitled " The New Forest," gives 

 Dorsetshire, the New Forest, and Kent, as localities for the 

 Smooth Snake. The specimen I have brought here to-night was 

 taken on a moor near Bournemouth, Hampshire, which is, as far 

 as I know, the most productive locality for the species in this 

 country, though there is good reason for believing that it has a 

 wider range. Bell, in his "British Reptiles," second edition, 1849, 



