HERPETOLOGY OF JAPAN. 445 



The original parchnient tags with the numbers are still attached 

 to the specimens which represent two species as follows: No. 32 

 (U.S.N.M. No. 14325) Coluber hems; No. 84 (14324), Coluber berus; 

 and No. 88 (14318), Coluber renardi. It should be noted that the 

 question mark following 88 in the invoice is not found on the parch- 

 ment tag; also that there is another No. 88, viz, a Natrix Tiydrus, 

 from Mangyshlak, Transcaspia (U.S.N.M., No. 14327). This {[ues- 

 tion mark in the invoice throws some doubt upon the accuracy of the 

 whole entry rendering the locality Dui on the island of Sakhalin for 

 Coluber renardi very dubious in the face of the fact that this species 

 hitherto has not been recorded from any locality east of the Altai 

 Mountains. On the other hand, it must not be forgotten that Col- 

 uber berus and C. renardi occur in the same localities in western 

 Siberia, and that Strauch himself did not distinguish between the 

 two species. Nevertheless, C. renardi can not be admitted to the 

 fauna of Sakhalin upon the strength of our specimen alone, the 

 locality of which must be regarded as erroneous until corroborated 

 by additional material. 



Coluber renardi"- is ([uite distinct from C. berus. Our specimen 

 (female) has 21 scale rows, 145 ventrals, and 25 subcauilals and shows 

 all the characteristic features of the species, such as: Snout pointed, 

 hollow with swollen canthal edge; one apical scale only in contact 

 with the rostral; upper preocular long, anteriorly touching nasal; 

 nostril small, located in the lower half of the nasal. The scutellation 

 of the top of the head is almost identical with Boulenger's figure c 

 on Plate LXIV.'' 



COLUBER BERUS' Linnseus. 



1758. Coluber berus Linn.eus, Syst. Nat., 10 ed., I, p. 217 (type-locality, Europe); 

 12 ed., I, 1766, p. 377.— Laurenti, Syn. Rept., 1768, p. 97.— Vipera berus 

 Davdin, Hist. Nat. Rept., VI, 1803, p. 89. — Middendorff, Sibir. Reise, 

 II, II, Pt. 1, 1853, p. 247 (Udskoi Ostrog; sources of the Riv. Tugur).— 

 Strauch, Mem. Acad. Sci. St. Petersb. (7), XXI, no. 4, 1873, pp. 206, 

 279 (Ussuri; Hadshi Bay; Udskoi Ostrog; Uisut Island; Sakhalin; Niko- 

 layevsk; Possiet Bay). — Jan, Icon. Ophid., livr. 45, 1874, pi. ii. — Nik- 

 OLSKi, Zap. Imp. Akad. Nauk, S. Peterburg, LX, Prilozhen. no. 5, 1889, 

 p. 290 (Sakhalin); Zap. Imp. Akad. Nauk, S. Peterburg (8), XVII, no. 1, 

 1905, p. .303 (Russia to Sakhalin).— Boulenger, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. (6), 



a 1861. Pclias renardi Christoph, Bull. Soc. Nat. Moscow, XXXIV, Pt. 2, p. 599 

 (type-locality, Sarepta, SE. Russia). — Vipcra rcnarrfi Boulenger, Proc. 

 Zool. Soc. London, 1893, pp. 598, 757, pi. lxiv (Southeastern Russia to 

 eastern Turkestan); Cat. Sn. Brit. Mus., Ill, 1896, p. 475 (southern 

 Russia and central Asia). 

 Named for councilor of State, Doctor Renard, then editor of the Bulletin of the 

 Imperial Society of Naturalists of Moscow. 

 6 Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 1893. 



(■Berus as the name of a water snake, probably Natrix natrix, is said to be used first 

 by such medieval writers as Albertus Magnus, Vincent de Beauvais, etc. 



