76 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XX. 



stomach, once in a diminutive specimen only 1\ inches long. The 

 lizards I have known taken are Ptyctolaema gularis once, a Calotes 

 once in Shillong which was almost for certain jerdoni as the scales 

 were of a vivid green colour, and skinks of the genus Lygosoma on 

 three occasions, two of these being L. indica. 



The sexes. — My notes show that the sexes are evenly balaneed, 

 and with the exception of one unusually large 9 my measurements 

 seem to indicate a similar degree of growth between them. Males 

 as a rule have rather longer tails. 



Breeding. — I have had opportunities of chronicling but few breed- 

 ing events, so that I cannot speak with any great certainty of this 

 important function. In the hills the mating season would appear to 

 be in summer, probably about August since I have had two speci- 

 mens with impregnated ovarian follicles in September in the Khasi 

 Hills (Shillong) and one in the same month in the Eastern Himalayas 

 (Pashok). As regards the Plains I can vaguely suggest that matrimo- 

 nial intercourse probably occurs in the winter months — December 

 to February — at least so it would appear. The period of gestation is 

 not known, but probably exceeds four months, since the young are 

 discharged alive. The gravid 9 I kept in Dibrugarh appeared 

 obviously in this state two months before I killed her and eviscerated 

 her unborn progeny. In the Plains the young are born in June 

 and July, for I captured a hatchling 4J inches long in Rangoon in 

 June and the almost mature embryos of my captive Dibrugarh 

 specimen just alluded to were expected in July. 



The young at birth measure from about 4f to 5| inches. The 

 species is not very prolific from an ophidian standpoint. I have 

 on two occasions found 10 eggs in the oviducts, once 8, and in 

 my Dibrugarh specimen there were 3 embryos, and 3 non-fertile 

 eggs. 



The rate of growth is somewhat difficult to calculate from my 

 records, but it appears to me that the young double their length in 

 the first year, add some 4 to 6 inches in the second, and at the 

 beginning of their third year appear to be sexually mature since 

 my smallest gravid 9 measured 1 foot 3| inches. These deductions 

 are in consonance with my observations on other snakes. 



Distribution. — The Eastern Himalayas probably as far West as the 

 Western limit of Nepal, the Assam Hills and Plains, the Burmese 



