VIPERA 245 



greyish, yellowish, brownish, or reddish, above, with 

 a broad wavy dark brown vertebral band, edged 

 with darker; this band sometimes broken up into 

 transversely oval spots ; a lateral series of blackish- 

 brown spots, each corresponding to the sinus of the 

 dorsal band. 



Specimens so completely intermediate between 

 Vipera aspis and V. bents as to render their naming 

 arbitrary are known from parts of France and Italy 

 where the two species coexist, and are probably to 

 be regarded as hybrids. 



Size. — The largest specimen examined (St. Sever, 

 Landes, in the Lataste Collection) measures 2 feet 

 2.\ inches. It is a male. The largest female in the 

 British Museum is 2 inches shorter. 



Distribution. — Vipera aspis is found over the whole 

 of France south of a line connecting the depart- 

 ments Loire-Inferieure, Orne, Seine-et-Marne, and 

 Meurthe-et-Moselle, and ascends the Pyrenees to 

 the altitude of 7,250 feet. In Germany it is known 

 from Lorraine and the Black Forest, in Switzerland 

 from the western and southern parts, up to 5,000 

 feet on the northern side of the Alps. It occurs 

 also in Austria, in the Southern Tyrol and in the 

 Karst, and is distributed over the whole of Italy and 

 Sicily, reaching an altitude of 9,700 feet in the 

 Alps. Most of the specimens from the western parts 

 of the Balkan Peninsula which have been referred 

 to this species belong, apparently, to V. bents, var. 



