60 REPTILIA. 



grooved so as to resemble a slit beneath the eye, and further 

 back.(l) 



5. Finally, there are others in which the fossulae are wanting, 

 but whose muzzle is furnished with slightly prominent plates, 

 cut obliquely from behind forwards, and truncated at the end, 

 so that they terminate in a wedge. Their body is greatly com- 

 - pressed, and their back carinated. These inhabit the East In- 

 dies, and may constitute a distinct subgenus. (2) Schneider has 

 separated from Boa his 



PsEUDO-BOA. SCYTALE, Mcrr. 



Which has plates like the Coluber, not only on the muzzle, but 

 also on the cranium; no fossulae, a round body, and the head and 

 trunk one uniform ^icce, as in Tortrix.(3) Daudin also has sepa- 

 rated from it the Erices, or 



Euix, Daud.(4) 



Which differ in the tail, it being short and obtuse, and in the 

 ventral scales which are narrower. Their head is short, and nearly 

 of one uniform piece with the body; these characters would approxi- 

 mate them to Tortrix if the conformation of their jaws did not for- 

 bid it; besides, the head is only covered with small scales. There 

 is no hook near the anus. We may approximate to these the 



Eri'eton, Lacep.(5) 



Very remarkable for two soft prominences covered with scales on 

 the end of the muzzle. The head is furnished with large plates, 

 those on the belly have but little breadth, and the sub-caudal ones 



(1) The Boa broderie {B. hortulana, L.), Seb., II, Ixxxiv, 1, and the d^gant, 

 Daud. V, Ixiii, 1, which is the same; — the Bojobi [B. canina, L. ) Seb., II, Ixxxi 

 and xcvj, 2, or Xiphosoma araramboja, Spix, XVI. The B. hipnale, Seb. II, xxxiv, 

 1, 2, and Lacep. II, xvi, 11, appears to be nothhig more than a young Bojobi; — the 

 B. Merremii, Schn., Merr. betyr. II, ii, or Xiphosoma dorsule, Spix, XV, of which 

 Daud. has made his genus Corah,e, from the probably accidental and individual 

 character of the two first plates under the neck being double. 



(2) The B. carinata, Schn., or the ocellata, 0pp.; — the B. viperina, Sh. llussel, 

 pi. iv. N.B. These two subdivisions form the genus Xiphosoma, Fitz. the Cejt- 

 cHRis of Gray. 



(3) Scyt. coronata, Men:, Seb. II, xh, l,Pr. M. liv.VlI. N.B. TheScytaleof 

 Merrem must not be confounded with that of Daudin, which is the Echis of 

 Merrem. 



(4) £na; (hair), name applied by Linnaeus to a species of Anguis. 



(5) EporsToc, Serpent. 



