VIPERA 237 



Western France it does not extend much beyond the 

 Loire to the south, only isolated captures being on 

 record from the departments Vendee, Deux-Sevres, 

 Vienne, and Indre. Of rare occurrence south of 

 Paris, in the departments Yonne and Allier and in 

 the mountains of Auvergne, it is again abundant in 

 some parts of the Central Plateau. To the east it 

 is recorded from the departments Aude, Haute- 

 Marne, and Vosges. In Belgium, it is known from 

 Flanders, Limburg, the Meuse Valley, and the 

 Ardennes ; in Holland it is pretty generally distrib- 

 uted in the uncultivated parts. It is spread over 

 nearly the whole of the German Empire with the 

 exception of the vine districts, where it is absent or 

 extremely rare ; it is also very scarce in the mountains 

 of the Black Forest ; it is on record from only a few 

 localities in Lorraine, and has never been found in 

 Alsatia. In South Germany it is rarely found below 

 1,000 feet altitude. In Switzerland it is absent from 

 the Jura, but occurs in the Alps chiefly between 

 2,500 and 9,000 feet. To the East it extends to 

 Russia, as far north as 64 , Austria- Hungary, con- 

 fined to the hills in the south, and Roumania. 

 In the Balkan Peninsula it occurs in the mountains 

 of Bosnia, of Herzegovina, and of Bulgaria, up to 

 7,000 feet. Absent from the South of France, it 

 curiously reappears in the hills of the north coast of 

 Spain, even at sea-level in Galicia, and in a few 

 localities in North Portugal. On the southern side 



