238 BRITISH SERPENTS. 



large number of correspondents I have had in the 

 last few years, all of whom were evidently interested 

 in the subject. I have endeavoured to get a record 

 of our serpents for every county in the kingdom, and 

 for this purpose approached the secretaries of Field 

 Naturalists' Clubs in all those counties where such 

 societies are working. In each case my inquiries 

 took the same form, and the queries are reproduced 

 here in the hope that future correspondents will 

 supply me with local records on these lines. The 

 questions asked were : — 



1. Which snake is most common in the county (or 



district) of ? 



2. What is the averagje leno;th of the adder here ? 



3. What is the average length of the ring snake 



here ? 



4. Does the smooth snake occur to your knowledge ? 



5. Does the small red viper occur ? 



6. Kindly add any other note on snakes you deem 



of interest. 



The quotation of the questions will explain the 

 uniform nature of the arrangement of the county 

 reports. 



In addition to field naturalists I have had the 

 assistance of some of the curators of our museums, and 

 of authors of books on county fauna, and have so been 

 able to bring together a mass of facts which, though 

 some of it was in existence before, was so scattered 

 that it was not available for purposes of comparison. 



