232 MOUNT EDGECUMBE. 



The Black Snake is subject to considerable vari- 

 ation in colour. The most common variety (a) is 

 black, highly polished ; with the ventral plates bluish 

 grey, and iridescent. Var. /3 is black with a dead 

 lustre, like the bloom on a plum ; and has a row of 

 large square palish spots on each side of the back, 

 but not on the tail. It appears as if obscurely 

 banded. The chin is white, mottled with brick-red. 

 Var. y is polished black, like a, but has a single 

 scale here and there pale yellow. Var. S has the 

 upper parts dark brownish grey ; the abdominal 

 shields lead grey ; the chin and sides of the face 

 whitish, mottled with brick-red and dark grey. This 

 was a remarkable deviation from the normal colouring. 

 It was killed in January, at Mount Edgecumbe grass- 

 piece, by the seaside. I took from its stomach a 

 common Jnolis, and a young Woodslave (^Mahouyd) 

 both considerably digested. Lizards constitute the 

 principal food of our Snakes. The greatest length 

 attained by any Black Snake that I have measured 

 was thirty-nine inches, of which the tail occupied 

 exactly one-third. The irides are dark hazel, or 

 golden brown during life, and the pupil is circular. 



NEGRO PROPER NAMES. 



I learned a very curious fact from an old coloured 

 lady, which may probably be as interesting to others 

 as it was to me. The names which in anecdotes and 

 tales we often see apphed to negroes, as Quashy, 

 Cudjo, &;c. are not promiscuously appropriated, nor 

 are they meaningless. They mdicate the day of the 



