ON THE COMMON INDIAN SNAKES. 735 



the walls of the canal meet on the anterior face are much more 

 apparent than in viperine fangs. Behind the maxilla supports four 

 small subequal teeth which are strongly grooved on their outer faces. 



Palata- pterygoid. — The palatine bone equals the maxilla in length 

 and supports 10 or 11 subequal teeth all of which are grooved on their 

 inner faces. The pterygoid bone is more than twice as long as the 

 palatine, but bears teeth only anteriorly, in rather more than one-third 

 of its length. The teeth numbering about 11 slightly decrease in 

 size posteriorly, and are feebly grooved on their inner faces. The 

 transpalatine bone is rather longer than the tooth-bearing part of the 

 pterygoid. 



The Mandible equals the skull in length. It bears about 15 teeth 

 in the dentary bone which is about two-fifths the length of the entire 

 mandible. The teeth are subequal in size except the 2nd, 3rd and 4th 

 which are rather the longest. All are grooved on their outer faces. 

 The accompanying figures illustrate these remarks, and show most of 

 the bones of the skull. 



Our Plate is good. Figures 4 to 7 are all taken at midbody, and 

 from specimens in the British Museum. Figures 1 to 3 are from the 

 specimen whose body marks are represented in Figure 5. 



EXPLANATION OF DIAGRAM I. 



A. Skull of Bungarus cceruleus profile. 



B. „ ,, „ basal aspect to show jaws and 



dentition. 



0. Maxilla of ,, ,, profile ) , , 



' \ i enlarged. 



D. ,, „ „ from below 9 

 (a) Articular bone of mandible. 



(d) Dentary „ „ 



If) Frontal, (m) Maxilla, (mn) Mandible, (n) Nasal. 

 (p) Prsemaxilla, (pa) Palatine, (par) Parietal. 

 (po) Postfrontal, (pr) Prefrontal, (pt) Pterygoid. 

 (q) Quadrate, (sn) Supratemporal, (t) Transpalatine or Ecto- 

 pterygoid. 



E. Supracaudals of Bungarus cceruleus. 



F. „ of Dipsadomorphus hexagonotus. 



G. ,, of Zamenis horros. 



The dotted lines in figures E., F., G. show the site of the anus. 



