32 AUSTEALIAN SNAKES. 



We have noticed before, that the Diamond Snake is of a glossy 

 black, with a bright yellow spot in the centre of almost every scale, and 

 with belly-plates of bright yellow, clouded with black. 



The Carpet Snake is uniformly greenish-brown, with darker irregular 

 spots, enclosed by a still darker margin of about a scale wide, covering 

 the body from the head to the root of the tail. The belly is pale straw 

 colored, and the plates often spotted or margined with a neutral tint. 



There is much variety in the marking of different individuals, but the 

 greater number have a pale, and sometimes interrupted and darker bordered 

 streak on each side of the body, running from the neck to the vent. 



The ground color iu old snakes is much darker than in young ones. 



Spirit specimens frequently turn quite white, the blotches appearing 

 dark grey, or pale black. 



If the Carpet and Diamond Snake are really one and the same 

 species, it is very curious to notice that tliey have so very defined a habitat. 

 It was mentioned before, that Diamond Snakes were only found in a very 

 limited district on the New South Wales coast, whilst Carpet Snakes 

 occur in every other part of Australia except the said district, and in 

 Southern Victoria. 



In their movements, and the way in which they obtain, kill, and 

 devour their food, both species are so precisely similar, that further remarks 

 on these particulars are unnecessary. With regard to their size, there is 

 reason to believe that Carpet Snakes attain even larger growth than 

 Diamond Snakes, and the Museum has lately received from Capt. Harley, 

 of the steamer "Havilah," a very fine specimen measuring 8 feet in length. 

 This snake was taken at Cleveland Bay, and is of the same size as the 

 monster Diamond Snake captured near the Point Piper Road, in the most 

 fashionable suburb of Sydney, by Capt. Stackhouse, E-.N., in July, 1868. 



It is possible that many larger snakes have been killed, but they 

 are generally measured by the eye only, and we all know how apt one is 

 to exaggerate the size of such quarry ; there is nothing so good as a tape- 

 line, if truth is to be ascertained ; but people do not generally care to be 

 very particular, and after relating snake stories for years they make the 

 size of the reptile increase as their story grows old. 



