THE COMMON INDIAN SNAKES. 1021 



Lepidosis — Rostral. — Touches 4 shields. Nasals — In contact 

 behind the rostral ; semi-divided ; in contact with only the 1st of 

 the supralabial series. Int&rnasal. — Single, broader than long. 

 Praefrontals — A pair ; in contact with internasal, loreal, prseocular 

 and supraocular. Frontal — Touches G shields, the fronto-supraocular 

 sutures longest. Supraocular. — Breadth and length rather less than 

 frontal. Loreal — One. Praeocular — One. Post oculars — Two. Temporal 

 — One. Supralabials — 8 normalty, the 4th only touching the eye. 

 Infralabials — G ; the Gth longest, the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th, or the 

 three latter only touching the posterior sublinguals. Sublinguals — 

 Two pairs ; the anterior larger. The posterior quite separated by 

 scales. Costals — Two headslengths behind head usually 23 

 (rarely 25), midbody usually 21 (rarel}~ 23), two headslengths 

 before vent 21 ; smooth. Ventrals — 150 to 177, rather narrow so 

 that 3 or 4 rows of costals can be* seen on each side when the 

 snake is laid on its back. Anal — Divided. Subcaudals — 47 to 78, 

 divided. 



Anomalies — I have seen two prasoculars once, and two tem- 

 porals once. The last two ventrals were divided in one specimen, 

 and the last only in another. In another example the 38th to 

 54th subcaudals were entire. 



Dentition. — Maxillary teeth 17, subequal ; followed after a short 

 gap that would take one tooth, by a pair of enlarged, obliquely 

 set teeth deeply grooved on their anterior faces. Palatine — 10 to 

 11 subequal, as well developed as the maxillary. Pterygoid — 18 

 to 24. as well developed anteriorly as the maxillary ; decreasing 

 in size posteriorly. Mandibular. — 23 to 24, subequal as long as 

 the maxillary. 



( >ur plate is excellent in every particular. 



(To be continued.) 



