48 COLUBRID.E. 



Specific Character. — Above greyish olive, with several rows of alternate black 

 spots ; beneath greenish yellow, tessellated with black (sometimes almost 

 wholly black ; an interrupted yellow fascia across the neck, followed by two 

 black spots ; scales lanceolate, acutely carlnated ; tail about one-fourth the 

 length of the body. 



Natrix torquata, Rav, Syn. Quad. p. 334. Flem. Brit. An. p. 156. 



Jenyns, Brit. Vert. p. 296. Bonap. Faun. Ital. cum 



figuris. 

 Coluber natrix, Linn. Syst. Nat. I. p. 380. Shaw, Gen. Zool. III. 



p. 519. Latr. Hist. Eept. IV. p. 38. Daud. Hist. 



Kept. VII. p. 34, t. lix. f. 15; t. Ixxxii. f. 1. Turt. 



Brit. Faun. p. 81. 

 ,, torquatus, Lacep. Quad. Ovip. et Serp. II. p. 147, t. vi. f. 2. 

 Natrix vulgaris, Laub. Spec. Med. p. 75 et 80. 

 Tropidonotus natrix, Kuhl. — Fitzing . Prod. Faun. Aust. p. 326. Wagl. 



Syst. Amph. p. 179. Gray, in Griff. An. Kingd. IX. 



p. 85. 

 Ringed Snake, Penn. Brit. Zool. III. p. 33, t. iv. No. 13. 



Couleuvre a Collier, Lacep. 1. c. 



The fiimily of Coluhridce, to which our Common Snake 

 belongs, is one of the most extensive of all the natural groups 

 of reptiles. It includes a number of generic divisions, some 

 more and some less strongly marked, which are found in 

 every quarter of the globe. They are, all of them, perfectly 

 free from any poisonous quality, not possessing any of those 

 tubular teeth or poison glands which render some other 

 families of Serpents so formidable. Many of the species 

 Avhich, on account of the broad plates which are found to 

 occupy the upper part of the head, were considered as be- 

 longing to the genus Coluber, by Linneus and his immediate 

 followers, are to be referred, not to other genera only, but to 

 other families ; as the Cobra di Capello, and the Common 

 Viper, for instance. 



To this family, then, belong those Serpents, and those only, 

 which, in addition to the absence of poisonous fangs, have 

 the head covered with broad plates, and the under side of the 

 tail with divided scuta throughout its whole length, as shown 

 in the following figures, which are taken from the present 

 species. 



