84 SPOLTA ZEYLANIC.V. 



5 feet was sent this year to the Museum by Mr. H. C. P. Bell, who 

 found it asleep on the top of a verandah pillar at Anuradhapura 

 last May. Mr. Bell tells me that this is only the third of the 

 kind which he has seen in thirty years. 



The Sinhalese name for all the species of Dipsas is " mapila." 



II. — Dryophia pulvernlentus, Dum. et Bibr. 1844. 



Dumeril et Bibron, Erpetologie generale, t. VII., 1844, p. 812. 



The tree-snakes of the genus Dryophis are represented in Ceylon 

 by two species, D. mycterizans, the common green whip-snake 

 or eye-snake (see S. Z., Part II., p. 37), which ranges through India 

 into Burma ; and D. pulverulentus, a much rarer snake occurring 

 only in Ceylon and in the Anaimalai Hills at an altitude of about 

 2,000 feet (Boulenger). In Ceylon it has been recorded from 

 Ratnapura and Wadduwa (Haly). There is also a specimen in the 

 Swayne collection from Horana, and another example has reached 

 the Museum this year from the Kurunegala District, sent by 

 D. J. M. Seneviratne, Schoolmaster at Weuda. 



Finally, Mr. H. M. Drummond Hay informs me that he has 

 collected two or three specimens at Balangoda. 



Head of Dryophh pulvernlentvs in side view. 



It attains a great length, nearly 6 feet, and has a very long 

 whip-like tail. It differs from the commoner species in colour 

 and in the character of the dermal appendage of the snout (rostral 

 appendage). Instead of green the prevailing colour is a grayish 

 brown, and the rostral appendage [which in Z>. )nycterkatis is 

 formed by the modified rostral shield alone, which may be slightly 

 wrinkled (c/. S. Z., Part II., p. 37, fig. 14)] carries some small 

 accessory scales above at the base of the true rostral shield which 

 is itself somewhat furrowed. In both species the body-scales 

 occur in fifteen rows ; the pupil of the eye is horizontal ; anal 

 divided ; subcaudals in two rows. 



D. pulverulentus is called " henakandaya " in Sinhalese. 



in. — Gdllophis trimacalatiiii (Daudin, 1810). 

 Daudin, F. M. Histoire naturelle generale et particuliere des 



Reptiles, 1810. ( Vipera trimaculata, VI., p. 25.) 

 Among a number of snakes sent to me some months ugu for 

 identification by Mr. H. M. Di-ummond Hay, who had collected 



