Miscellaneous. 505 



On the Habits of the Munffoos (Herpestes griseusj. 

 By Lieut. Pegus. 



Ill this comniunication the author gives an account of a combat 

 which he witnessed at Pondicherrv, between a Mungoos and a Cobra 

 (Naia tripudians). The snake was brought in a trap to the Tra- 

 vellers' Bungalow, which is enclosed by stone wails, and on being 

 liberated and seeing the Mungoos it endeavoured to make its escape. 

 The latter, however, attacked it immediately with much fury, and a 

 battle ensued, wliich lasted about five minutes, when the snake was 

 observed to dart upon its assailant and wound it with its fangs. 



The Mungoos on this rolled over and lay for some little time as if 

 dead, \^ith a black foam at its mouth ; it then suddenly started up 

 aud darted off into the bush. In about twenty minutes it returned, 

 when the mouth was observed to be marked with green from some 

 herb it had been eating. It appeared quite recovered, and imme- 

 diately attacked the snake with even more furv- than before. This 

 combat lasted about six minutes, when the Mungoos got the snake 

 by the neck, killed it, and severed its head from its body. The snake 

 was upwards of five feet long. — Proc. Zool. Soc. July 27, 1852. 



Viola lactea. — [Edinb. Cat.'\ 

 The following may be added to the Ust of unrecorded locaUties for 

 the Viola lactea : Mayals Green, Gower, Glamorganshire. 

 Majals, May 2-lth. Caroline Catherine Lucas. 



On some Varieties of Land Shells from the South of France. 

 By J. Paget. 



Since my former communication* I have discovered another hairy 

 Helix, which in every other respect resembles the H. Carthusiana of 

 Draparnaud, or the H. Cantiana of Enghsh authors. I met with se- 

 veral specimens of this shell dead, last autumn, on some wet mea- 

 dows near the Pont du Var, Nice, but did not remark any peculiarity 

 about them. On observing however the other day a young Helix 

 which I had found in some irrigated gardens near the town, and which 

 I had taken for a young Carthusiana, to be thickly covered with verv 

 short hairs, I examined the adult specimens with more care, and 

 found on each of the six I possess, portions of the hairs still remain- 

 ing. I leave others to decide the value of this character in the de- 

 termination of the species, but I would call the attention of English 

 conchologists to a careful examination of their specimens of H. Can- 

 tiana from Cambridgeshire, in which I think it is not impossible 

 that the same peculiarity may be observed. 



Herr Adolph Schmidt inquires, in the ' Zeitschrift fiir Malaco- 

 zoologie,' if the H. depilata is not hairy when young. I have alicays 

 found it so when young, and generally more or less so when adult 

 and liring, but, like many other Helices, it easily loses both hairs and 

 epidermis after the death of the animal. 



Nice, Mav 22. 



* Seep. 454. 



