22 LEPTOPHIS SAURITUS. 



rounded, and are broadest before. The frontal plates are broad and pentagonal, 

 broadest within, narrow without, where they descend to a small, quadrilateral, 

 loral plate; the anterior frontal are irregularly quadrilateral, narrow in front, with 

 their posterior and external angles pointed and prolonged. The rostral plate is 

 rather small and pentagonal; there are two nasal plates, the anterior of which is 

 small and regularly quadrilateral; the posterior is also small, and irregularly 

 pentagonal, and hollowed before for the nostril. The anterior orbital plate is 

 single, very long, pentagonal, slightly curved behind, and ascending to the plane 

 of the forehead; there are three small posterior orbital; and the inferior wall of 

 the orbit is completed by the fourth and fifth superior labial, of which plates 

 there are seven, all large: the anterior pentagonal; the second quadrilateral; 

 the third, fourth and fifth pentagonal; the sixth again quadrilateral; and the 

 seventh triangular. 



The nostrils are near the snout, lateral, but open obliquely upwards. The eyes 

 are of moderate size; the pupil is dusky, with the iris yellowish-grey and brilliant. 

 The neck is contracted, much smaller than the head, and covered with small, 

 hexagonal, carinated scales. 



The body is very long, slender, and covered above with scales of similar form 

 to those of the neck, but larger, all carinated, notched behind, and with plates 

 below. The tail is very long, thin, and terminates in a point. 



Colour. The head above is light olive-brown; the labial plates have a 

 greenish-yellow tinge, marked at their place of union with a dusky line; each 

 occipital plate is marked with a small yellow spot; this mark is, however, not 

 constant: I have never seen it wanting in the southern animal, but it is not 

 always found in the northern, and in some rare examples it is double: the 

 large anterior orbital plate is olive in front, but its posterior half is yellow, which 

 gives a peculiar physiognomy to the serpent. 



The body above is dusky if seen at a distance, but if examined closely and in a 



