HYDROPHIS STRICTICOLLIS, 
“Head narrow, not quite twice as long as broad ; body slender, 
especially in its anterior portion. Two pairs of chin-shields, both of 
which are in contact with each other. Only one anterior temporal, 
which is as high aslong. One post-ocular. Thirty-four series of scales 
round the neck. Ventral shields distinct, but only the anterior are 
twice as broad as the scales of the adjoining series; they are 398 in 
number. Six small pree-anal shields. Scales smooth in young specimens. 
Body with fifty-five blackish rings, not quite as broad as the yellowish 
- ground-colour between them; they are rather broader and darker on 
the back than on the belly, and sometimes sub-interrupted in the 
vertebral and ventral line. Head yellow above, with irregular blackish 
confluent spots; whitish below. ‘Tail with eleven blackish vertebral 
bars,” 
