CHANNEL PROVINCE. 265 



Hampshire. 



This is one of the few counties where all our 

 six British reptiles are found — in this respect like 

 Dorset. 



" Vipera herns or Adder. — Universally distributed, 

 including the Isle of Wight, but most common on 

 light soils. The ground colour is most variable, 

 either brown, or red, or grey, or almost blue, or al- 

 most white. The country people declare that the red 

 viper is a different species, and the line down its back 

 is not black but brown, vetperfectly distinct. The pro- 

 portion of red vipers in the New Forest is said to be 

 about one in ten of the venomous species. An ex- 

 cellent observer in the island, the late Rev. C. A. 

 Bury, who said that he often counted seven or eight 

 adders in one walk in the spring, believed that vipers 

 are always red when young, and had never seen a 

 young one that did not answer the description of 

 the so-called red viper. Another variety of the 

 viper is almost black, the line only showing in cer- 

 tain lights, so that it is a safe rule to avoid black 

 snakes when you meet them. These black vipers 

 are found in the Forest and in the Isle of Wight. 1 

 The Forest people tell me that ' adders is fattest in 

 March month,' which shows they have finished hiber- 

 nating at that time. In Davenport Adams' ' Isle of 

 Wight' we read of their bunching in winter. 'Near 



1 Cf. Essex, Caermarthen, and Northumberland, pp. 279, 311, 332. 



