OPHIDIA. 61 



hardly differ from the rest; the tail itself, however, is long and 

 pointed. (l) 



Coluber, Lin. (2) 



This genus comprised all those serpents, venomous or not, whose 

 sub-caudal plates are divided in two, that is, which are arranged by- 

 pairs. 



Independently of the subtraction of the venomous species, their 

 number is so enormously great, that naturalists have had recourse 

 to all sorts of characters to subdivide them. We may separate in 

 the first place the 



Python, Daud. 



Hooks near the anus and narrow ventral plates as in Boa, from 

 which these serpents only differ in their double sub-caudal plates. 

 The end of the muzzle is furnished with plates, and their lips are 

 pitted. 



Some species are as large as any Boa: such is the Vlar-Sawa 

 or Great Coluber of the Sunda Islands^ Col. jav aniens, Sh., which 

 has bfeen found more than thirty feet in length. Seb. I, Ixii; 

 II, xix, Ijxxviii, Ijxcix, 2.(3) 

 The last caudal plates in some of these Pythons, and the first in 

 others, are simple.(4) This may sometimes be an accidental dif- 

 ference. 



Cerberus, Cuv. 



Nearly the whole of the head, as in the Pythons, covered with 

 small scales, and no plates but what are found between and before 

 the eyes; but the hooks at the anus are wanting. Sometimes there 

 are simple plates at the base of the tail. (5) 



(1) Erpeton tentacul^, Lacep. Ann. Mus. II, 1, a name given to this genus by 

 Lacep. who first described it; Merrem has substituted Rhinopiiius. 



(2) Coluber, a generic name for Serpents among the Latins. 



(3) This Ular-sawa or Python amtthiste, Daud., Boa amethystina, Schn., of 

 which we possess one great skeleton and several skins, brought from Java by M. 

 Leschenault, is at least closely allied to the Pedda-jwda of Bengal {Python tigre, 

 Daud.), Russel, XXII, XXIII, XXIV, Col. hoscformis, Sh., Boa castanea and albi- 

 cans, Schn.; and it appears to us that all the pretended species of Boa of the eastern 

 continent are in fact Pythons. Ular-sawa, in the Malay language, signifies the 

 River- Serpent. The B. reticulata, ordinata, rhombeata, Schn. are all Pythons. 



(4) The Bora, Russ., XXXIX [Boa orbiculafa, Schn.). 



(5) We have seen these plates simple in one individual, and double in others 

 of the same species, a proof of the little importance of this character. To this 



