232 THE VIVARIUM. 
ordinary room in which a fire is burning during the day and 
evening, is generally sufficient to prevent it from becoming torpid. 
If the creature be in good condition, when autumn arrives it may 
be packed away, as already directed, for its natural winter sleep. 
- Labourers sometimes when at work find great numbers of Snakes 
of this species hibernating together. For example, Miss Hopley, 
in her book on Snakes, records that “‘ at the end of September 
a farmer in Wales, who, with his labourers, was removing 
a heap of manure, came upon an extraordinary bed of Snakes and 
Slow-worms, and no less than 352 were killed, together with an 
enormous quantity of eggs; thousands in clusters were destroyed. 
Three Snakes were of immense size, and one hundred of them 
nine to twelve inches long..... One feels curious to know 
whether judgment for this act of wanton cruelty visited that 
farmer in a destruction of his crops next year by the mice and 
insects from which these harmless reptiles would have saved them !” 
A collection of the different varieties of the Ringed Snake 
would be a very interesting one. Many beautiful varieties are 
imported into this country from the Continent, especially from 
Italy. I believe that foreign specimens are rather hardier than 
our own, or perhaps it may be that they are more suited to a life 
in confinement. The Snake which I have had longest in my 
possession is such an one. It is a very beautiful striped variety. 
Mr. Boulenger speaks of the following varieties of 7. natrix, viz. :— 
(a) The typical form. A white, yellow, or orange collar, 
usuaily divided in the middle, sometimes absent, 
bordered behind by a broad, deep black collar, which is 
constant. 
(B) Collar altogether absent, or reduced to a small black 
blotch on each side of the nape (var. astreptophorus, 
Seoane). | 
(c) Collar well marked, though widely interrupted in the 
middle ; a yellowish streak along each side of the back. 
(C. Persa, Pall.; C. bilineatus, Bibr.; var. murorum, 
Bp.) 
(p) Black above, checkered black and white inferiorly. (C. 
scutatus, Pall. ; var., nigra, Nordm.) 
(x) Uniform black above and below. (Z. ater, Eichw.) 
